How to take better night video and photos, mavic mini 4 pro

[shutterup]

I know there's no one size fits all answer but can someone give me some good tips on how to get some good quality night images and video, most of mine come out all mushy I'm shooting manual, iso 100 or 200.

Can the metering mode be changed?

 

[shutterup]

 

[MS Coast]

I know there's no one size fits all answer but can someone give me some good tips on how to get some good quality night images and video, most of mine come out all mushy I'm shooting manual, iso 100 or 200.

Can the metering mode be changed?

You might post an example or two of your results that you're not happy with. By "mushy" do you mean blurred?

 

[shutterup]

I've posted an example above

 

[Felix le Chat]

I know there's no one size fits all answer but can someone give me some good tips on how to get some good quality night images and video, most of mine come out all mushy I'm shooting manual, iso 100 or 200.

Can the metering mode be changed?

Stills: set focus peaking to high and then engage manual focus once you're at the height you want with the camera pointed at whatever has caught your eye. Rack focus until there is as much red outline as you can get then fire the shutter. I always keep ISO at 100: but I don't mind 'crushed' blacks when what I'm shooting is a busy, well-lit motorway interchange

 

[Droning on and on...]

Yeah, the "crushing black" thing... Too many people are tied up in knots preserving detail in black areas in a night shot!

@Felix le Chat has it right – always keep the subject in mind! Optimize that, and in a night shot, it's almost always what's Illuminated, not the dark black area under the lighted bridge.

 

[Felix le Chat]

Yeah, the "crushing black" thing... Too many people are tied up in knots preserving detail in black areas in a night shot!

@Felix le Chat has it right – always keep the subject in mind! Optimize that, and in a night shot, it's almost always what's Illuminated, not the dark black area under the lighted bridge.

I actually like the silky black as a counterpoint, a bit like a negative silhouette.

 

[Meta4]

I know there's no one size fits all answer but can someone give me some good tips on how to get some good quality night images and video, most of mine come out all mushy I'm shooting manual, iso 100 or 200.

Can the metering mode be changed?

The main thing for night photography is to have a definite subject rather than just a big area with a lot of indistinct stuff going on off in the distance.

There's no need for fancy manual focus, autofocus should do all you need.
Autoexposure is good too, but you might need to adjust the exposure compensation of the subject is relatively small in the frame with a lot of the frame being dark.
Shooting when there's still a little colour in the sky can be better than later when it's completely dark.

 

[BigAl07]

The main thing for night photography is to have a definite subject rather than just a big area with a lot of indistinct stuff going on off in the distance.

There's no need for fancy manual focus, autofocus should do all you need.
Autoexposure is good too, but you might need to adjust the exposure compensation of the subject is relatively small in the frame with a lot of the frame being dark.
Shooting when there's still a little colour in the sky can be better than later when it's completely dark.

Great shot.

If that a PANO of several images stitched or is it a single image cropped?

 

[Meta4]

Great shot.

If that a PANO of several images stitched or is it a single image cropped?

It's a pano made with two rows of 7 images. and spans about 180°

 

[DARKSeifer]

Do blue hour instead, true nighttime is only viable when there are fireworks or a similar thing that only occurs at night, but if you want to take pics from a landscape or building, blue hour is what you want.

ISO 100 and whatever time it takes to take the pic. DJI drones tend to over exposure at least 1/3. While editing the DNG try color shifting a bit to orange, as the lights on the street usually don't have an attractive color.

 

[Vic Moss]

Not sure what you mean by "mushy". Can you describe it better?

In your example, you have blown highlights and blocked up shadows. Both of those can be mitigation with a HDR image. You don't seem to have any camera movement, so that's good.

But in order to help, we need a better term that mushy. We can't really tell what you mean by simply looking at the example.

 

[Droning on and on...]

It's a pano made with two rows of 7 images. and spans about 180°

Stitched outside the drone (I suspect)? It's perfect as far as I can tell.

I've had some stitching artifacts with night panos that I haven't been able to fix.

 

[Meta4]

Stitched outside the drone (I suspect)? It's perfect as far as I can tell.

I've had some stitching artifacts with night panos that I haven't been able to fix.

Correct.
I always shoot my panos by hand and stitch at home.