Does Mavic Shoot Video or Watercolor Paintings? Don’t settle. Get Involved!

[borislip]

It would be interesting if you rolled back the firmware using assistant 2 to the earliest availible version (at the bottom of the versions list). Recalibrate IMU, Gimbal. Don't adjust any camera settings to ensure that the install remains totally clean. Then see what results you get.

Probably not going to happen, because i kinda imagine a worst caae scenario, which is - old FW, that has never beem on my Mavic, screws something up, i flash the newer one back, and the newer one doesn't fix it, following by me digging for hours and hours on how to revert it. Sorry, i currently have no desire to do this experiment and will rather take the "not broken - don't fix it" approach.

 

[JPMavic]

Probably not going to happen, because i kinda imagine a worst caae scenario, which is - old FW, that has never beem on my Mavic, screws something up, i flash the newer one back, and the newer one doesn't fix it, following by me digging for hours and hours on how to revert it. Sorry, i currently have no desire to do this experiment and will rather take the "not broken - don't fix it" approach.

Yes that's a fair point. I had the same concerns before I did it but it's the only thing that worked for me. Now before each outing I recalibrate the IMU, gimble and reset the camera. That seems to purge any glitches and doesn't take too long. Hopefully DJI are working on getting a script into the thing that automatically does all that everytime it boots up.

 

[jjmucker]

Yes that's a fair point. I had the same concerns before I did it but it's the only thing that worked for me. Now before each outing I recalibrate the IMU, gimble and reset the camera. That seems to purge any glitches and doesn't take too long. Hopefully DJI are working on getting a script into the thing that automatically does all that everytime it boots up.

Do you have to do all these 3 things every time you boot up the quadcopter?


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[JPMavic]

Do you have to do all these 3 things every time you boot up the quadcopter?


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All I'd say is that's what I do before each flight & since I've started doing that I've had no issues with watercolour or muddy video footage. It maybe total overkill. I don't know. But it seems to work. Some guys are toggling NTSC/PAL/NTSC & that works for them. Hopefully next firmware release will include "fixes an issue where some users were experiencing issues with picture quality".

 

[devinkumar]

It would be interesting if you rolled back the firmware using assistant 2 to the earliest availible version (at the bottom of the versions list). Recalibrate IMU, Gimbal. Don't adjust any camera settings to ensure that the install remains totally clean. Then see what results you get.

I might try this. I remember seeing Mavic footage in the late Fall of all the people who first got Mavics and don't remember seeing this bad of a watercolor issue. Sure a few people had mushy footage but often that was from bad focus or trying to go too far with turning sharpening down. So those earlier firmware versions and Go App's didn't seem to have the problem as much. Unless there's some change they made to the current Mavics being produced that are different and are helping to cause the issue.

My Mavic arrived 7 days ago and had 2nd to last firmware version. Had the watercolor effect. After trying everything to get rid of it, I upgraded to the most recent firmware in hopes that would fix it. Nope.

So far for me, the only thing that has fixed the problem is making sure to reset the camera before flying by switching to PAL and then NTSC (I shoot 24fps), keeping settings at 0,0,0, and most importantly MANUAL FOCUS. I have tried flying around autofocusing every 10 seconds, and it just doesn't focus well enough to get rid of the watercolor. It's all mushy. Interestingly, autofocus works fine if I'm taking still photos in raw DNG. I can hover, autofocus, take a still DNG, and it looks great. As soon as I switch to video and start recording, the footage looks mushy. However if I go to manual focus, turn on focus peaking, and turn the focus slider so that everything is red (in focus), then my footage is less likely to have the watercolor effect.
I hate to spend all my flights with one finger (thumb) on the focus slider though when it should be on the RC joystick.

 

[devinkumar]

Yes that's a fair point. I had the same concerns before I did it but it's the only thing that worked for me. Now before each outing I recalibrate the IMU, gimble and reset the camera. That seems to purge any glitches and doesn't take too long. Hopefully DJI are working on getting a script into the thing that automatically does all that everytime it boots up.

JPMavic, when you say reset the camera, which reset are you talking about in particular? the "Reset Camera Settings" under the gear icon within the the main camera settings page. Or something else?

 

[cardplayer71]

Yes, sadly im having the same problem. my thread with examples is over here-
This photo quality aint good enough, don't you think?
I had a similar problem with my phantom vision 2 years ago. Same kind of optical problems. I returned it and the new one was much better. I've got pics from that fiasco if anyone is interested.
Looks like I'm gonna have to go for the whole return thing. Do they pay for the return postage as a matter of interest?

One thing I learned is that a recent firmware update has changed the focus to continuous autofocus. This results in horrible video and intermittent blur/jitter. Just use a hyperfocal distance and then it will behave like a phantom.

I found the hyperfocal distance is 13 meters. Go in AF mode, focus on something around 13 meters away, then switch to manual focus. This is a focus lock workaround. Your video should be crystal then.

Also make sure your shutter speed is not too low, or that will naturally cause a softness. Try a few stills with this and see if it helps.

Regards.




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[borislip]

Just use a hyperfocal distance...

Easier said than done. Its not like the manual focus scale got a "--- hyperfocal ---" mark. Even with the focus highlighting, good luck being 100% sure you are actually hyperfocal or close to it :-(

 

[devinkumar]

One thing I learned is that a recent firmware update has changed the focus to continuous autofocus. This results in horrible video and intermittent blur/jitter. Just use a hyperfocal distance and then it will behave like a phantom.

You can turn continuous autofocus off. There's a setting in the menu for AFC which can be turned on or off.

 

[JPMavic]

JPMavic, when you say reset the camera, which reset are you talking about in particular? the "Reset Camera Settings" under the gear icon within the the main camera settings page. Or something else?

Yes that's correct. Directly beneath format SD card. This may do no more than toggling NTSC/PAL/NTSC which probably does the same thing. This is the challenge with this issue because none of us really knows what these procedures are doing. Disadvantage of resetting rather than toggling is that all the camera settings need to be reset.

 

[cardplayer71]

Easier said than done. Its not like the manual focus scale got a "--- hyperfocal ---" mark. Even with the focus highlighting, good luck being 100% sure you are actually hyperfocal or close to it :-(

Agreed. I usually look around for something about 13 meters away and focus lock onto that during my preflight procedure.

It's far from ideal. I don't like this variable focus camera. I'm doing landscapes lol.




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[borislip]

Agreed. I usually look around for something about 13 meters away and focus lock onto that during my preflight procedure...

I am kinda thinking, maybe we should raise it 13m AGL, point the camera down, and focus on the ground the first thing during the flight... just an idea.

 

[MavicFrank]

I am kinda thinking, maybe we should raise it 13m AGL, point the camera down, and focus on the ground the first thing during the flight... just an idea.

I was just thinking the same thing. Hover at 13m. Point down. Manual focus. It should work.

 

[cardplayer71]

It has made a huge difference for me so far. Previously, the videos would show a lot of focus hunting just going on and on and on.


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[cardplayer71]

I am kinda thinking, maybe we should raise it 13m AGL, point the camera down, and focus on the ground the first thing during the flight... just an idea.

Great idea! Just make sure to toggle back to Manual Focus to lock in the setting. It's aggravating to have the manual focus slider on screen, but so nice to have fixed focus for the flight.




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[dangerm0us]

I only have this issue when using an ND filter and setting my FPS to 30 and shutter to 60. It's made my filters a waste of money. Other than that though, I don't seem to have this issue at all. So for me, it's 100% appearing at low shutter speeds. I can film using normal or D-Log or whatever and use 0-0-0 or -1 -1 -1 all with no watercolour effect. Slap an ND filter on, set my manual shutter speed, and bam, I'm drowning in watercolours.

 

[CyberNate]

So today I tried the trick of changing to PAL and back to NTSC format. That seems to work for me. I no longer see the water color affect in my video. I'll do a few more flights to verify. That switch between PAL and NTSC seems to reset the camera completely with video feed cut temporarily and a whole gimbal re-initialization. Even the "Camera Reset" function did not work, but this PAL/NTSC switch seems to. Is this something I'll have to do before EVERY flight, or does this issue occur only when messing with camera settings?

 

[jjmucker]

So today I tried the trick of changing to PAL and back to NTSC format. That seems to work for me. I no longer see the water color affect in my video. I'll do a few more flights to verify. That switch between PAL and NTSC seems to reset the camera completely with video feed cut temporarily and a whole gimbal re-initialization. Even the "Camera Reset" function did not work, but this PAL/NTSC switch seems to. Is this something I'll have to do before EVERY flight, or does this issue occur only when messing with camera settings?

No you'll more than likely have to do it everytime you boot up the drone.



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[JPMavic]

No you'll more than likely have to do it everytime you boot up the drone.



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i agree. First thing after every boot. No fix seems to work for all of us which I think is down to the fact that inevitably after a fresh FW install we all make adjustments & dial in settings in different order. Every setting we save corrupts the OS of our individual Mavic's in a different way, which may explain that we can't find one fix that'll work.

 

[JPMavic]

I only have this issue when using an ND filter and setting my FPS to 30 and shutter to 60. It's made my filters a waste of money. Other than that though, I don't seem to have this issue at all. So for me, it's 100% appearing at low shutter speeds. I can film using normal or D-Log or whatever and use 0-0-0 or -1 -1 -1 all with no watercolour effect. Slap an ND filter on, set my manual shutter speed, and bam, I'm drowning in watercolours.

That's an interesting observation. Even on overcast days, in manual I can't get anywhere near a shutter speed of 60 so always use at least an ND8. Obviously Massive implications if filters are the root cause. Are you filming in Auto?