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Mavic 3 vs 3 Cine - ProRes? Flymore? Worth it?

Both combos have an Elephant in the room ... the Fffg bag! That bag is what is bad about everything in the combos ... & then the filters .... it's like they are charging full price for these things! They should just eliminated the bag all together & offered the combo at $2,499! M3, Charger, 3 batts & that's it! Nobody has ever used the DJI bag! Get real! JMHO :)

Cheers, Jon
Completely agree! I created my own á la carte Combo, and replaced the bag and filters with another battery, giving me 4 in total, and still saved $300!
 
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Both combos have an Elephant in the room ... the Fffg bag! That bag is what is bad about everything in the combos ... & then the filters .... it's like they are charging full price for these things! They should just eliminated the bag all together & offered the combo at $2,499! M3, Charger, 3 batts & that's it! Nobody has ever used the DJI bag! Get real! JMHO :)

Cheers, Jon
What are you going to put all of the stuff in when you travel around to fly,lol.
A bag or backpack right,this bag does both.
Yikes
 
A $110 case. Would you through your Cine in that soft bag above you on a flight?
& as you say "Yikes".

Cheers, Jon
 
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A $110 case. Would you through your Cine in that soft bag above you on a flight?
& as you say "Yikes".

Cheers, Jon
Yes it was designed for all the stuff.Would you throw your Cine(which I would Never Get)
In that soft bag above you on a flight? Clarify please
 
Here's my opinion so take it for what it's worth lol. After seeing the prores footage next to the H265 and 264 footage......... Unless you NEED to work with prores because that's your workflow, then it's an astounding NO. I can see NO difference in the quality of the footage.


And for those talking about the SD cards. Simply make sure you get one that's rated V30 or higher and your good. I have two Samsung 256gb Evo select cards, PNY pro elite 256gb and an old 64gb Samsung pro and they all work good without any slow card messages. All of my non V30 cards gives me slow card message.
 
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Hey guys. Aussie based, so gonna say Aussie prices here from: Buy DJI Mavic 3 - DJI Store

M3 - $3099.
M3 Fly More - $4199
M3 Cine = $7199

1. I'm not quite sure where the extra $1100 value is for the fly more combo? Extra batteries only cost $289, so buying 2 extras is only $578 (and one extra battery could conceivably be enough - that's like having 3 batteries on the old one). So... $522 for some filters...? Surely Polar Pro will soon have a set for less than that...? (I know there's a little more in the combo than just batteries and filters, but... that's a price hike that doesn't seem to add up to me.

2. If I were to opt for the Cine, it comes with the DJI RC Pro included ($1529 on it's own). That's pretty **** close to an iPhone 13 Pro Max, and double the cost of a New iPad Mini. So... what am I actually getting here? Does it unlock extra features? I'd Much rather pay $5600 for the cine with a regular controller. Doesn't seem right to force me into something I think is mostly a luxury if I want the best codec...

3. ProRes 422HQ... Will this make any difference to image quality? (Change bit depth or chroma sub sampling? Any extra latitude, or less noise/artefacts?). I'm assuming so, but is it game changing? Or only noticeable if pixel peeping?

Bonus:
4. Anyone know if the Goggles work on this?
The real question is, have you priced out a computer capable of editing 422HQ from a 4/3rds sensor?
 
ProRes is actually less demanding to edit than H265, the only downside really is the huge file sizes, but storage is dirt cheap these days.
I don’t know, can you show more information as that goes against my understanding? I can edit 265 no problem from an x5s, won’t even bother trying with 422HQ and I run the Mac system. On the other hand I don’t use proxies while editing as it’s too hard to tell if the focus is holding its sharpens as I crop. I want high res in my editing window. There is now way a 2018 MacBook Pro is going to edit 422HQ with a high res editing window, it will with 265 no problem.
 
I don’t know, can you show more information as that goes against my understanding? I can edit 265 no problem from an x5s, won’t even bother trying with 422HQ and I run the Mac system. On the other hand I don’t use proxies while editing as it’s too hard to tell if the focus is holding its sharpens as I crop. I want high res in my editing window. There is now way a 2018 MacBook Pro is going to edit 422HQ with a high res editing window, it will with 265 no problem.

Uncompressed ProRes doesn't have to be decoded to nearly the same extent as H264/H265, and if you are using software designed to easily decode it like Final Cut or Davinci Resolve, you can take full advantage of that. H264/H265 has lots of compression and it takes more power to decompress it into a playable format. The benefit obviously is much smaller file sizes.

This is also why some people use ProRes as an intermediate format, converting their videos to ProRes specifically for ease of editing. Just as one example, ProRes is kind of like a RAW file, you can do non-destructive editing to it and is good for instances where the video may be used in many different ways. H264/5 is like a JPEG, every time you do something to it, you lose quality from the repetitive compression, and is therefore more suited to single use scenarios.

As for why your Mac doesn't do a good job with it, most Macs do not have specs that I would consider suitable for a video editing workstation, but I don't know exactly what model you have.
 
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Uncompressed ProRes doesn't have to be decoded to nearly the same extent as H264/H265, and if you are using software designed to easily decode it like Final Cut or Davinci Resolve, you can take full advantage of that. H264/H265 has lots of compression and it takes more power to decompress it into a playable format. The benefit obviously is much smaller file sizes.

This is also why some people use ProRes as an intermediate format, converting their videos to ProRes specifically for ease of editing. Just as one example, ProRes is kind of like a RAW file, you can do non-destructive editing to it and is good for instances where the video may be used in many different ways. H264/5 is like a JPEG, every time you do something to it, you lose quality from the repetitive compression, and is therefore more suited to single use scenarios.

As for why your Mac doesn't do a good job with it, most Macs do not have specs that I would consider suitable for a video editing workstation, but I don't know exactly what model you have.
422HQ files are massive compared to 264 265, dealing with way way more data. Mac Pros are specifically designed to edit video. So I’m not sure what your getting at? A 16GB Ram MAC will chew through video in FCPX at the same if not faster speed then a 32GB PC, that’s no secret. However, it’s not a good gaming platform, if your looking to play games don’t get one. A 2TB SSD Drive will run us around $500 for a good one, and that won’t be big enough to edit 422HQ from a 4/3 sensor. I’ve seen me fill at 2TB SSD editing a 3min 4K video from the x5s. Mind you I’m talking heavy edits not just cutting video then adding a basic transition.

The SSD Drive we would need to edit the 422 from that camera at 5.1k 50 FPS and do it all in one shot would not be cheap. I wouldn’t even try it without a 5TB SSD. Dell has a 4TB SSD for about $600 Canadian after tax. I bought the G ultra fast SSD 2TB 1.5 years ago it was $500. You can’t use a hard drive to edit video from this sensor, you can if you don’t mind pulling your hair out.

You can’t touch 422HQ from a 4/3 sensor at 5.1k 50fps without some serious professional level computer power. Mind you, maybe you could if your edits are very basic. I’m very familiar with this exact sensor I’ve been editing it’s 4k video at 265 for 3 years, kicking it up to 5.1k pro res... your going to want a serious computer if your doing more then just cutting out the bad parts and syncing music to what’s left. I also tend to dabble with special effects for fun, haven’t in a while. If your into layering 2 clips to make a compound clip in 422 from a camera sensor that big and you want an HD editing window you need some serious horsepower.
 
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The SSD is somewhere inside the drone (I haven't see any teardowns yet to know exactly). M.2 SSDs weigh only a few grams and are extremely compact, so quite possibly nothing is in the slot inside the drone for the non-Cine models. DJI probably just installs the SSD in the Cine models, and doesn't for the non-Cine models. The rest is just firmware because ProRes is just a license - the non-Cine hardware is technically capable of shooting ProRes as well, it's just disabled, probably with firmware or similar.
The SSD will likely be under the battery, SSD don’t like cold weather that’s why the SSD on an I2 is between the batteries where it stays worm. The basic M3 can’t shoot Pro Res, no SSD Drive. So it’s not simply a matter of unlocking the software license so you can have it. It will never be possible for a standard M3 to shoot pro res, that’s not a possible upgrade DJI can offer.

No your right, there won’t be anything in the basic model where the SSD would be, just empty. Theoretically you could buy the Cine SSD from DJI and have a tech install it for you. But DJI will soak us for about $1200 to do it. Plus charge you another $500 to unlock the pro res license.
 
422HQ files are massive compared to 264 265, dealing with way way more data. Mac Pros are specifically designed to edit video. So I’m not sure what your getting at? A 16GB Ram MAC will chew through video in FCPX at the same if not faster speed then a 32GB PC, that’s no secret. However, it’s not a good gaming platform, if your looking to play games don’t get one. A 2TB SSD Drive will run us around $500 for a good one, and that won’t be big enough to edit 422HQ from a 4/3 sensor. I’ve seen me fill at 2TB SSD editing a 3min 4K video from the x5s. Mind you I’m talking heavy edits not just cutting video then adding a basic transition.
File size has absolutely nothing to do with the processing power required for decompression/decoding. You seem to think that just because ProRes is a large file, it is difficult to process - that is not the case. RAM is only one small part of the equation. There is nothing special about FCPX, programs like Davinci Resolve can do the same hardware accelerated ProRes editing on a Windows machine - as long as the program is optimized for it, you're good to go. Like I said, I suspect the specs of your Mac are at least part of your frustrations, but you haven't mentioned what they are to confirm.

The SSD Drive we would need to edit the 422 from that camera at 5.1k 50 FPS and do it all in one shot would not be cheap. I wouldn’t even try it without a 5TB SSD. Dell has a 4TB SSD for about $600 Canadian after tax. I bought the G ultra fast SSD 2TB 1.5 years ago it was $500. You can’t use a hard drive to edit video from this sensor, you can if you don’t mind pulling your hair out.
SSD's are extremely cheap these days (unless you buy through Apple at 3X retail) and don't have much to do with video editing speed - that is almost all CPU/GPU depending on the specific task. There is no need to buy a 5TB SSD to edit ProRes. Sounds like something else is going on if you think you need that much hard drive space to edit ProRes. I have no problems editing it very smoothly from a 1TB SSD.

You can’t touch 422HQ from a 4/3 sensor at 5.1k 50fps without some serious professional level computer power. Mind you, maybe you could if your edits are very basic. I’m very familiar with this exact sensor I’ve been editing it’s 4k video at 265 for 3 years, kicking it up to 5.1k pro res... your going to want a serious computer if your doing more then just cutting out the bad parts and syncing music to what’s left. I also tend to dabble with special effects for fun, haven’t in a while. If your into layering 2 clips to make a compound clip in 422 from a camera sensor that big and you want an HD editing window you need some serious horsepower.

As mentioned, it's much less demanding than editing H265 because the compression is very light (hence the larger file size). This is literally one of the main reasons people use ProRes. Also as mentioned earlier, people specifically convert to ProRes for this reason, and you can also edit via proxy to further reduce the burden on your computer. The sensor itself has no real bearing on the editing power required - you could use the exact same sensor to capture garbage quality video at a low bitrate if you want and editing it would be a breeze. You could also use a smaller sensor than 4/3 and capture video that would be much more difficult to edit - the two aren't linked.
 
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File size has absolutely nothing to do with the processing power required for decompression/decoding. You seem to think that just because ProRes is a large file, it is difficult to process - that is not the case. RAM is only one small part of the equation. There is nothing special about FCPX, programs like Davinci Resolve can do the same hardware accelerated ProRes editing on a Windows machine - as long as the program is optimized for it, you're good to go. Like I said, I suspect the specs of your Mac are at least part of your frustrations, but you haven't mentioned what they are to confirm.


SSD's are extremely cheap these days (unless you buy through Apple at 3X retail) and don't have much to do with video editing speed - that is almost all CPU/GPU depending on the specific task. There is no need to buy a 5TB SSD to edit ProRes. Sounds like something else is going on if you think you need that much hard drive space to edit ProRes. I have no problems editing it very smoothly from a 1TB SSD.



As mentioned, it's much less demanding than editing H265 because the compression is very light (hence the larger file size). This is literally one of the main reasons people use ProRes. Also as mentioned earlier, people specifically convert to ProRes for this reason, and you can also edit via proxy to further reduce the burden on your computer. The sensor itself has no real bearing on the editing power required - you could use the exact same sensor to capture garbage quality video at a low bitrate if you want and editing it would be a breeze. You could also use a smaller sensor than 4/3 and capture video that would be much more difficult to edit - the two aren't linked.
A hard drive to edit video? Good luck with that. Sensor size is very important, it dictates how much data your going to be dealing with? A 4/3 sensor is capturing twice as much data as a 1” sensor. A P4P photo is around 20MB, an I2 photo from the x5s is 40 even though both are roughly 20MP cameras. It takes a computer twice as long to edit x5s 4k video as it does from a P4P because it’s twice the workload.

Can’t use proxies for one reason, checking focus. When using proxies the image in the editing window is no longer clear and crisp HD. When you do zooming or cropping in post you can’t tell if the focus has held its value. There is no way to know this till after you finish the editing if you can’t see what your doing? You absolutely need a real-time HD editing window as you go, so you know how much you can crop and still have a good product. Simply looking at your video before you import it into the editor won’t tell you this.

So proxies are out, unless your only doing very basic editing where there is no cropping or adding digital zoom… and if your not going to be doing that there is no reason to ever buy the M3. The only reason to ever want a video camera with 5k res is so you can work it in post or you shooting a movie for a big screen.

My MacBook Pro does an excellent job I think you misunderstood me. But I don’t know how well it’s going to handle the amount of data needed for huge 422HQ files? I have tried editing with a regular external hard drive and it will work, if you don’t mind waiting a lot on rendering. Most of the time you sit there will be spent just waiting, not very productive.

My Mac Pro converts 265 x5s video to pro res pretty fast. I’m not worried about compression, I’m worried about the sheer size of the files and how well my 2018 pro will handle it? I spent 4k on that laptop and have no interest in upgrading. I can’t recall the specs, it’s a good machine specifically made for editing video.

All I know is anyone who buys this M3 needs to be prepared, properly editing its video to its full potential without pulling your hair out can’t be done with a cheap set up. Been there tried that.
 
Both combos have an Elephant in the room ... the Fffg bag! That bag is what is bad about everything in the combos ... & then the filters .... it's like they are charging full price for these things! They should just eliminated the bag all together & offered the combo at $2,499! M3, Charger, 3 batts & that's it! Nobody has ever used the DJI bag! Get real! JMHO :)

Cheers, Jon
This is the first DJI bag I do use. I actually like it quite a bit.
 
Ironically, the original Autel Evo bag fits the Mavic 3 with the jock strap installed perfectly, when set lengthwise across inside it. I picked up an extra Evo bag when BestBuy was selling it with two Evo batteries inside for $99 a few months ago. Mavic 3 RC fits well underneath, and extra batteries can be placed inside the two side pockets. Saves $300! Still available from B&H for $30.
 
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Hey guys. Aussie based, so gonna say Aussie prices here from: Buy DJI Mavic 3 - DJI Store

M3 - $3099.
M3 Fly More - $4199
M3 Cine = $7199

1. I'm not quite sure where the extra $1100 value is for the fly more combo? Extra batteries only cost $289, so buying 2 extras is only $578 (and one extra battery could conceivably be enough - that's like having 3 batteries on the old one). So... $522 for some filters...? Surely Polar Pro will soon have a set for less than that...? (I know there's a little more in the combo than just batteries and filters, but... that's a price hike that doesn't seem to add up to me.

2. If I were to opt for the Cine, it comes with the DJI RC Pro included ($1529 on it's own). That's pretty **** close to an iPhone 13 Pro Max, and double the cost of a New iPad Mini. So... what am I actually getting here? Does it unlock extra features? I'd Much rather pay $5600 for the cine with a regular controller. Doesn't seem right to force me into something I think is mostly a luxury if I want the best codec...

3. ProRes 422HQ... Will this make any difference to image quality? (Change bit depth or chroma sub sampling? Any extra latitude, or less noise/artefacts?). I'm assuming so, but is it game changing? Or only noticeable if pixel peeping?

Bonus:
4. Anyone know if the Goggles work on this?
I have both versions, Cine and regular. I can say that even pixel peeping I can't see any image quality difference between Prores and H265. Bizarrely, I find I can push the H265 files more in post than the Prores files. The only advantage I can see in using Prores is how responsive they are in the timeline being relatively uncompressed. If you are sharing your footage/edits with others who will also edit the footage then the iterative loss of quality is much less with Prores than with H265. But if you are the only person editing your footage then Prores doesn't offer anything meaningful that I can see. In fact, when you consider the file sizes and the irritating necessity to have to plug your drone into your PC and power it on to download footage I'm mostly just shooting to microSD in the Cine. I'm going to do more testing with motion as this is an area where Prores might show a qualitative difference compared to H265.
 
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