I am more used to read the posts of others than participating myself, today is different!
Having failed (once again) to fly this morning because of the updates, I decided to write this review, review that has been in my mind for quite a long time now… It is not a full coverage review, but more of a list of what's really annoying with this drone. You can find plenty of marvelous positive reviews on the net to moderate mine!
DISCLAIMER: I don’t pretend to be an expert in drone flying, the following statements might be wrong, as I don’t totally master the drone nor the software (I might have missed some options…). However, being generally speaking ‘’tech-savvy'' I think it is an honest review and that, at least, I tried to do my best, please don’t send me hate messages!
I qualify myself as a serious amateur photographer: it is not my main activity but I do sell photo for advertisement or stock, mainly in the travel and adventure industry. I do own professional level photography equipment and the
Mavic air was supposed to be a great addition to my kit. I must be honest and say that I bought the Magic air mainly to do aerial photography, as I am not into videography. But I certainly enjoyed the possibility of filming as well.
The magic air is my first drone: after having contemplated the possibility of doing aerial photography for a long time, I took my decision after the announcement of the
Mavic air: after having read a lot on internet about it, it seemed that it was THE perfect drone for me: foldable, easy to operate, image quality seemed to be good enough.
I had not tried it myself before, nor any other model or brand: The
Mavic air was my first drone experience, and I have since tried the
Mavic pro.
Knowing that I paid less than 1000 $, I didn’t expect a professional grade product, and that most of my following comments would be addressed if only I had more money to spend, but I think that most of my bad experience comes from the software rather than the hardware.
Maybe I am dreaming, and I should only pay more to get what I want…
Although it is an amazing piece of technology, as a photographer, and after 3 months of use, I want to get rid of it as soon as possible, and here are the reasons why:
Camera controls (for photographer):
- Being a DSLR user, I am used to have all my controls available at the fingertips, so I can change the settings without leaving my eye from the viewfinder. With the air, changing settings is a pain in the a**…
On the
mavic air, we have two ‘’fn’’ keys that we can personnalise. I would have preferred to have only one, and have an aperture or shutter-speed wheel instead, like on the
mavicpro remote.
Of course you can change the settings on the app, which means not looking at your drone anymore, and try to hit the right spot on your tiny screen with your big finger (of course I could use an iPad, and the problem wouldn’t be one anymore…).
I know that the
mavic pro has more controls like this, and that DJI needed to cut costs in order to sell it at the price I was able to buy it, but it is really a pain...
- Automatic controls: I wish I could have different modes, like on a DSLR : Aperture priority, speed priority, program mode.
For now, the air offers us a fully manual mode, and a full auto mode. The problem of the full auto mode is that sometimes it will raise the ISO (knowing that above 100 ISO, you would start to see noise a lot), or slow down shutter-speed to the point that your image will be blurry… There is no way (as far as I know) of choosing to have the fixed iso and change only the speed, or the other way around.
- Of course I would have loved to have control of the aperture as well…
- As I said, I didn’t bought the drone with video in mind. However, I very often shifty to the video mode, and I would have loved that the software would have separate settings options. I explain myself:
Say I am shooting photography with certain settings and I see something that I want to film: I hit the record button, the app switches to video mode and I am able to record. I can change my settings in the menu (ISO, shutter speed…).
When I am done with video, I go back to photography mode, but I need to change again my settings, because it is now the settings I used for video that are on… Meaning I need to go back to the settings again… If I need to switch from one mode to another several times, I would love that the app keeps different settings in memory: one set for photo, the other set for video.
Suggestions:
- Shutter-speed controlled by the wheel (like on the pro), with real-time visual return, like on modern electronic viewfinders.
- Semi automatic modes based on the Program mode of DSLR.
- Automatic mode with fixed ISO
- Separated set of settings for photo and video
Connexion problems:
- Very often it takes forever to connect the
mavic to the controller, I don’t know why… By the time it is connected, in third of the battery is gone.
- Connexion is very unstable…During a flight in semi urban area, I will have several connexion issues during a battery worth of flying time.
- I have had one very frustrating experience, where the drone would fly away and disappear, with a lost connexion, to the point that after trying everything, I started packing my things, sobbing to the loss of my new drone… when It magically reappeared! Returned home easily (thanks DJI for this amazing feature!). I only wished I had some informations from the controller or the app...
Updates: THIS IS THE MAIN POINT OF FRUSTRATION FOR ME!
First of all I would like to say that I find it very reassuring to see that DJi continues to update it’s products and tries to resolves all the small bugs that we are experiencing : it means that they really care about it!
I live in this parts of the world where internet connection is a nightmare (we are talking about 175kb/s at its best…)
So every now and then, when I want to fly my drone, I prepare everything, unfold my drone, connect it to the controller, and then… Nothing! Because I need to update this or that…
It means:
- I cannot fly right away
- I need to spend 3 full Drone batteries in order install do the updates
- I need to use some of the battery of the controller (I don’t know why I cannot download the update without being connected to the controller and the drone running up? Every time the drones shuts down, the remote starts ringing, and the updates stops…)
This means that because of my internet speed, I am not able to do the updates correctly. (The drone runs out of it’s 3 batteries before I can manage to download the update!)
- I need to drain my phone battery. Knowing that when my phone’s battery will be under 50%, the app will refuse to download the update.
It means that before the updates are finished:
- I have lost an entire day worth of shooting (because my internet download speed is almost inexistant)
- Even if I had some more time available, I don’t have anymore battery on my devices to fly
At the end of the day, I have experienced these issues almost every time I wanted to fly… Which is very frustrating!
Meaning that since march 2018, I have managed to fly only 7 times!
Basically I bought a drone that is only capable of updating itself, nothing else… I would have saved money in buying a ‘’useless box’’ instead!
This means I cannot use my drone on any serious project in which I need to be sure I can fly!
Suggestion:
The app could send us a ‘’popup’’ message whenever an update is available: like this, we can update everything having to wait 3 hours, or maybe we could receive an email, stating that next time we want to fly, we wonM’t be able unless we do the update before! AS for now, every time I want to fly is more of a gamble…
The update could be downloaded automatically in the background, the app just ‘’popping up’’ when the download is finished and the update ready to be installed. Like this, even if the update takes 3 weeks to download because of internet speed, I can still use my drone! (It would mean allowing the drone to flight without the last update as well, which is not the case at the moment: no update, no flight!).
Small other things:
- Remote controller sounds and ‘’Bips’’: could we just have the opportunity to turn it off? Or maybe just turn down the volume? I know it is here to make us aware that we are running out of battery, or returning home, or maybe something else that we don’t know, but once we are aware of it, it is very annoying to have to endure it until the drone has landed…. Of course I could do a ‘’mechanical’’ and definitive operation with a heated needle, but we are in 2018, and a small
- Focus: as a photographer It is very frustrating not to have any control over the focus… I know the pro have a focus selection possibility, and that the air is cheaper… but still, in the end, images from the air are never sharp: not an issue in video, but definitely a No go for photo…
- Ok, this one is maybe a stretch, but is there not any way to have a variable ND/PL filter that we could manage from the app? (either physical or not…), using a rotating PL filter on a drone is almost a bad joke…
In the end, the
mavic air is a great technology packed product, with a lot of fussy options and auto modes that are great for videographers, but I feel that we don’t event have the basic stuff needed for photography…
Of course my experience is very bad because of my internet connexion, in which DJI cannot do anything, except allowing me to do the updates at any other time than the time I decide to fly….
Overaal these little things ruined my experience with the drone, to the point that I am now reluctant to even think of turning it on...
After a fewweeks without using it, I prepared everything today, got ready to fly, and once again I wasn't able to...
Right now: my 3 batteries, my phone and the controller are charging, and the update was a failure (because of ''no more juice'' to perform it!).
Why don't you just allow me to fly with the old firwmare?
It has been a very frustrating and disapointing experience overall....
I've really wanted an Air, but My parents arents gonna spend another 800$ for me to gte one.
Mini 2 Beautiful Ordu City View From Boztepe Hill
Mini 3 Yesnaby Castle, Orkney - to be featured on UK National TV this weekend...
