Color/Saturation Changed?

RC5728 · Sep 30, 2017

Did DJI change the color/saturation levels with the Mavic videos?

I got a new Mavic, updated to the latest firmware, and the videos look really grey and unsaturated compared to my past Mavics/firmwares. It looks terrible and needs more color.

I turned the color up +3, but that didn't help much. It still doesn't look like before.

Can anyone help?

Roamer105 · Sep 30, 2017

I noticed that too... takes quite a bit of post grading to get it to look good.

RC5728 · Sep 30, 2017

Roamer105 said:
I noticed that too... takes quite a bit of post grading to get it to look good.

How can you even fix it in post?

When I turn up the saturation in Adobe Premiere, I start getting purple artifacts and it looks even worse.

Roamer105 · Sep 30, 2017

RC5728 said:
How can you even fix it in post?

When I turn up the saturation in Adobe Premiere, I start getting purple artifacts and it looks even worse.

Whoops sounds like you have another problem added. My footage just seems to be at relatively low saturation made much worse by the lazy compression algorithm resulting in graying out low contrast color.

My P3P does a lot better under those circumstances. Unclear why that much of a difference since the sensors are the same (so I thought)...

RC5728 · Sep 30, 2017

Roamer105 said:
Whoops sounds like you have another problem added. My footage just seems to be at relatively low saturation made much worse by the lazy compression algorithm resulting in graying out low contrast color.

My P3P does a lot better under those circumstances. Unclear why that much of a difference since the sensors are the same (so I thought)...

Do you have a fix for this in post at least?

I have no idea how to fix these flat colors and it looks bad.

DJI apparently changed something in the latest firmware I guess?

RC5728 · Sep 30, 2017

Is there a way to downgrade firmware back to when the colors didn't look so flat and bad?

This was a recent change by DJI.

Robert Mitchell · Oct 1, 2017

After the latest update, I had to go to D-Cinelike, then custom, -1, 0, +1 to get the saturation and look I had before.

RC5728 · Oct 1, 2017

Robert Mitchell said:
After the latest update, I had to go to D-Cinelike, then custom, -1, 0, +1 to get the saturation and look I had before.

Which update was it? Can it be scaled back?

I was using Normal +1, 0, +3 previously, and now when I use that same setting the colors are totally flat and dead. Ridiculous.

Why does DJI keep doing this? It’s bad enough that they had already removed vivid color mode as an option (for no apparent reason?).

peros550 · Oct 1, 2017

I was in firmware 03.0900 and when I upgraded to 04.000 I noticed the same. Colors are so poor now. And look what DJI reported on their firmware release notes of 04.000:

-Adjusted the color in Normal mode to Vivid.

Robert Mitchell · Oct 1, 2017

RC5728 said:
Which update was it? Can it be scaled back?

I was using Normal +1, 0, +3 previously, and now when I use that same setting the colors are totally flat and dead. Ridiculous.

Why does DJI keep doing this? It’s bad enough that they had already removed vivid color mode as an option (for no apparent reason?).

.1000 and yes it's frustrating. After the upgrade I was ready to sell it.
But give d-cinelike a try and tweak your saturation and I think you'll be pleased again.

lisadoc · Oct 1, 2017

RC5728 said:
Is there a way to downgrade firmware back to when the colors didn't look so flat and bad?

How to rollback Mavic firmware

RC5728 · Oct 1, 2017

Robert Mitchell said:
.1000 and yes it's frustrating. After the upgrade I was ready to sell it.
But give d-cinelike a try and tweak your saturation and I think you'll be pleased again.

I’ll try it, but doesn’t D-Cinelike have even less color than the Normal color profile?

That’s what the comparison videos are showing anyway.

RC5728 · Oct 1, 2017

I downgraded my firmware to .700 and it fixed the color issue, but now I’m getting the 30m flight restriction.

Wonderful. I tried turning off beginner mode (already off), and also logged out and back in to DJI GO, and neither of those fixed it. So now my $1,000 Mavic is restricted to 30m range.

DJI is such a piss poor company and I can’t wait until they get replaced by someone who actually values customer freedom.

lisadoc · Oct 1, 2017

RC5728 said:
I downgraded my firmware to .700 and it fixed the color issue, but now I’m getting the 30m flight restriction.

Wonderful. I tried turning off beginner mode (already off), and also logged out and back in to DJI GO, and neither of those fixed it. So now my $1,000 Mavic is restricted to 30m range.

You shouldn't be restricted on .700. You shouldn't need to be logged in either. What version of DJI Go are you using?

RC5728 said:
DJI is such a piss poor company and I can’t wait until they get replaced by someone who actually values customer freedom.

Actually you've done exactly what you needed to do in order to gain back that freedom. (going to .700)

Did you rollback the RC firmware as well? You might try going with an earlier version of the Go 4 app if all else fails, though I've never been restricted even with the latest app version, as long as my firmware was .700

RC5728 · Oct 1, 2017

lisadoc said:
You shouldn't be restricted on .700. You shouldn't need to be logged in either. What version of DJI Go are you using?

Actually you've done exactly what you needed to do in order to gain back that freedom. (going to .700)

Did you rollback the RC firmware as well? You might try going with an earlier version of the Go 4 app if all else fails, though I've never been restricted even with the latest app version, as long as my firmware was .700

That’s what I was just planning to do next.

So with .700 I shouldn’t even need to be logged in to avoid the 30m flight restriction?

Apparently I need to scale back my RC too then, I’ll try that now.

lisadoc · Oct 1, 2017

RC5728 said:
So with .700 I shouldn’t even need to be logged in to avoid the 30m flight restriction?

No. The logged in requirement was imposed on version .800. You shouldn't have to log in at all in order to fly or lift the 30m limit on .700.

By the way, did you actually fly? Many people have reported the notification of the 30m limit (if coming from higher versions of the firmware) but there is no limit actually imposed (i.e. when they fly, there's no issue going as far as they want).

You may want to confirm that you are actually restricted before going further and tinkering more with changing apps and other solutions.

RC5728 · Oct 1, 2017

lisadoc said:
No. The logged in requirement was imposed on version .800. You shouldn't have to log in at all in order to fly or lift the 30m limit on .700.

By the way, did you actually fly? Many people have reported the notification of the 30m limit (if coming from higher versions of the firmware) but there is no limit actually imposed (i.e. when they fly, there's no issue going as far as they want).

You may want to confirm that you are actually restricted before going further and tinkering more with changing apps and other solutions.

I considered that, but I found someone who said they ignored the 30m limit and were able to keep flying, but got some other warnings and lost live feed connection soon after going past it, so that sounds risky if true.

Better to get rid of it completely if possible. I'm downgrading to .700 on the RC now.

lisadoc · Oct 1, 2017

RC5728 said:
I considered that, but I found someone who said they ignored the 30m limit and were able to keep flying, but got some other warnings and lost live feed connection soon after going past it, so that sounds risky if true.

I suspect that this was simply a coincidence. It wouldn't be very wise for DJI to cut off the connection if any limit imposed by them was not followed. It would lead to all kinds of liability claims.

RC5728 said:
Better to get rid of it completely if possible. I'm downgrading to .700 on the RC now.

I agree. However, I'm not sure that rolling back the RC firmware will fix this, though it can't hurt. It's just a good place to start. It seems folks can get some unexpected issues if operating on different firmware versions, though many people claim to never touch their RC firmware and do just fine with mismatched versions.

RC5728 · Oct 1, 2017

lisadoc said:
I suspect that this was simply a coincidence. It wouldn't be very wise for DJI to cut off the connection if any limit imposed by them was not followed. It would lead to all kinds of liability claims.

I agree. However, I'm not sure that rolling back the RC firmware will fix this, though it can't hurt. It's just a good place to start. It seems folks can get some unexpected issues if operating on different firmware versions, though many people claim to never touch their RC firmware and do just fine with mismatched versions.

Which version of the DJI GO 4 app are you using?

After downgrading the RC firmware to .700 the message went away temporarily, but ONLY after reinstalling the app. And only if I turn the RC on last (can't turn it on before the Mavic or the message comes back).

I found someone on another forum who said they downgraded to .700 firmwares and .8 GO app and that fixed it completely.

So that's the next step for me.

I would love to just use the latest firmware, but the flat color is just too horrible to use.