2.7k 60fps

xavster · Apr 15, 2018

Dear all
I’m relatively new to drones and am still exploring the capabilities of my MA.
Up until now I have shot exclusively in 4K 30fps. But I thought it might be fun to try shooting 2.7k 60fps to be able to play the footage back at half speed without affecting smoothness of movement too much.
But, the quality is nowhere near what I was expecting - it just doesn’t look sharp. Is this normal? 4K looks great, but 2.7k 60 really doesn’t. Anybody else find this?
Thanks

MrRobville · Apr 16, 2018

I also found that 2K 60FPS looks subpar to it. And before anyone says it, I am aware of the resolution difference, but that's not it. If you view both 4K and 2K on a 1080p monitor, it should look pretty much identical, which it doesn't.
My guess is that this is related to the sharpness settings in the Go app which become more apparent at lower resolutions because these algorithms have less pixels to work with.
I can only assume that is what causes the softer result. Try to hover the drone in one place, and make a few recordings with multiple sharpness levels (from -3 to +3) and see which one looks best compared to 4K footage.

Also try 2K 30FPS and see if the issue persists. Perhaps it is a bitrate issue. I recall reading that camera quality tends to downgrade the faster the FPS is. Pretty much all digital camera's have this effect. That's also why slomo footage looks usually a lot worse and requires a much lower resolution. If this is the case, then there's unfortunately not a lot you can do about it since you are running against the drone's physical limitations.

xavster · Apr 16, 2018

I did some experimenting last night with the drone just sitting on my desk.
1080p, 2.7k and 4K all look great up to 30fps, but as soon as you go up to 50 or 60fps (obviously not for 4K) the image gets cropped a bit and looks much softer.
I might try and upload some screen shots from my iMAC when I get home.

MrRobville · Apr 16, 2018

That's interesting. Seems like it is a hardware limitation then unfortunately.

Larry Gibson · Apr 16, 2018

Following

Kilrah · Apr 16, 2018

Yup the high frame rate modes are a crop so you won't benefit from the downscaling that is done in other modes.

Also remember that 60fps sets a min shutter speed that is twice that of 30fps, so low light performance will be affected.

UneBoleeDAir.fr · Apr 16, 2018

Hey guys ! I have done some video tests at various resolution and framerates. Of course there is the Youtube compression algorithms on top of it but in my opinion the difference is thin (except for the obvious crop factor) between :

1) 2.7K at 60fps:

and

2) 2.7K at 30fps:

Am I blind or you do agree ?

Ultimatepump · Dec 23, 2018

Hello All,

I don't know why or what I'm doing wrong but I have the Alpine White Mavic Pro and it is on the latest firmware BUT in camera settings under 2.7k I have NO option for 60fps. Why?

Thanks.

gottahavit · Dec 24, 2018

your 60fps is distinctly sharper, just look at writing on the building. im comparing on a native 2k display

btw those having issues with 2k or 60fps remember.. on 4k monitor 2k should look ok, but on 1080p monitor you are down rezing at a non proportional ratio and monitor and software can have bad affects. Also you need to make sure your monitor is running 60fps as lots of 4k monitors run at 30fps.

Ultimatepump · Dec 24, 2018

Ultimatepump said:
Hello All,

I don't know why or what I'm doing wrong but I have the Alpine White Mavic Pro and it is on the latest firmware BUT in camera settings under 2.7k I have NO option for 60fps. Why?

Thanks.

Bump