Seeking Advice on Improving Night Photo Quality with DJI Mini 2 SE
Hey fellow drone enthusiasts,
Ive got a DJI Mini 2 SE, and overall, I’m thrilled with its performance. However, I’ve been facing some challenges when it comes to capturing quality photos at night. The images seem a bit grainy, and the details aren’t as sharp as I’d like.
I was wondering if any of you have experience with optimizing night photography settings on the DJI Mini 2 SE. Are there specific camera settings I should tweak, or any accessories you recommend for low-light conditions? I’ve tried experimenting with exposure and ISO settings, but I’m still not achieving the desired results.
Any tips, tricks, or advice would be greatly appreciated! Looking forward to hearing about your experiences and learning from the community.
Hi, I fly at Mini 2 too and I’m often blown away how stable it can be at long shutter speeds. I took some night time photos of Basingstoke about this time last year experimenting with shutter speeds between 1 and 4 seconds ( ISO: 100 ). They were taken around 6pm and I think I was using a ND filter to lower the shutter speed to create the light trails.
Ok, I see what you mean, I seem to remember it was really calm when I took mine though I did also take a few 4 second exposure time images.
I’ve just gone back and checked mine, these 4 second exposures do show motion blur on the gantries and lamp posts that aren’t as visible on the 1 second exposure. I think the distance to the subject is also helping here
@Oculus Ricky
Bumping the iso would probably help to get more light in the picture only thing especially with a smaller sensor on your drone, you then run the risk of a noisy & or grainy picture, only speaking from experience on my old mavic air 2 when I tried this which had a 1/2 inch sensor, others with more experience may no better tho.
The problem is not graining but movement, with a 4sec shutter speed you need the drone to be perfectly still but this wasnt the case, look at the lines
To obtain those perfect nightime shots you’ll need a very steady camera, the small drones take awesome shots but are restrictive due to their own lack of size. A small drone hovering produces enough vibrations to affect the overall quality.
Dropping the ISO to 100 or even 50 reduces the grain effect, increasing it only creates more grain. Using an ND filter will slow the shutter speed but as above the drones needs to be virtually still to benefit its use.
Using a city scapes that creates lots of light will help produce sharper images and helps the drones small aperture lens. Anything longer than 3secs exposure you’ll suffer what your already getting, unsharp images.
Digital camera sensors have this in common with traditional photographic film: increasing the sensitivity (ISO film speed) for low light conditions results in a grainier image.
This is most noticeable in night scenes, also when a fast ISO speed is used with a fast shutter speed to capture a sharp image of a moving subject.
A longer shutter speed (to receive more light for the image) has the disadvantage that any camera/subject relative movement will result in blurred images.
For any camera sensor, there is probably an ideal light level which will provide the best image.
Basic drone cameras with a fixed aperture cannot control the amount of light entering the camera, but Neutral Density (ND) filters can be used to reduce the light coming in when desired. These can counter the “washed out” effect of reduced contrast when the sensor is overloaded due to high brightness conditions.
ND filters can also be used with longer shutter speed when blur is a wanted effect.
Predominately drones are used during daylight hours and so their camera sensors are ideal for that purpose. Our average drones are ideal for general use and capture great daylight,evening and some nighttime shots but getting those perfect crystal shots the odds are stacked against us.
Using multiple images stacked using editing software would reduce the blurry images and maybe give you a sharper image but if you over develope the images you’ll bring back the grainy images
