Noise on 4K footage Mavic 2 pro

[Solomonenko]

Hi all,

Could somebody explain me why the footage so noisy on the ground and buildings?
the link to noisy footage

Thanks!

 

[brett8883]

Hi all,

Could somebody explain me why the footage so noisy on the ground and buildings?
the link to noisy footage

Thanks!

It’s hard to see on my phone’s screen but are sure that’s noise and not atmospheric haze? What’s your focus point?

 

[Solomonenko]

It’s hard to see on my phone’s screen but are sure that’s noise and not atmospheric haze? What’s your focus point?

focus on cars on road

 

[Photo Beaty]

This doesn't look like the noise I get on a DSLR. It looks more like haze to me.

 

[brett8883]

focus on cars on road

I’ll take a look when I get home but what’s your camera settings here? ISO, shutter, aperture?

 

[Solomonenko]

FFoV, 4K, 30 fps, f2.8 or 4 don't remember, 1/60, iso 100, Dlog-M, filter ND8PL

 

[Solomonenko]

took some grades in FCP, but original footage has the same noise

 

[brett8883]

FFoV, 4K, 30 fps, f2.8 or 4 don't remember, 1/60, iso 100, Dlog-M, filter ND8PL

Try increasing your aperture and use the ND16. ND8 is really for cloudy days and I thing part of it is your aperture is too low for the amount of depth in your scene

 

[CanadaDrone]

That footage looks pretty normal to me, but to answer your question in general terms, shadows are always going to look more noisy compared to highlights because you are not feeding the sensor enough light, which enters the sensor randomly. Notice that the highlight and balanced exposure areas look good.

If you're interested in a more technical explanation....

The foreground is very underexposed (because you are trying to balance with the sun) which is why you might see noise there. You have a very bright sunset, which you seem to be exposing for, so anything darker than that is going to be very underexposed. You will notice that the highlights and properly exposed areas look quite good.

The reason for this is how image sensors work - they achieve best image quality when they have been saturated with light to the point that they can reach their FWC/full well capacity (where the ADC reaches maximum value, which is also at base ISO). If the bright/highlight areas are properly exposed, that typically means far less light has been collected by the photosites responsible for the dark areas, and as a result they are going to be noisier. When you raise the ISO, the ADC is told to reach maximum value much earlier, hence the dynamic range reduction at higher ISO levels, because it is working with far fewer electrons before it reports a maximum value. This is also why you see grain/noise at higher ISO levels, because the ADC is reporting maximum value with only a tiny fraction of the light collected compared to base ISO FWC, and light is collected randomly (noise also occurs randomly, which is why stacking multiple high ISO images is an effective form of noise reduction).

This is not a problem unique to DJI or the sensor used in the M2P - no camera can expose all areas of a scene like that with such high dynamic range. There will always be more noise in the shadows, and even the 1" sensor isn't giving you enough flexibility in a scene like that. Shooting high contrast scenes like that is simply not ideal because you can only expose for the shadows or the highlights - not both. Choosing the light that you fly in has one of the biggest effects on how good your footage will look, and that goes for 'standard' photography as well. Any time you have ultra high contrast and/or strong shadows, there will be compromises, which is what HDR imaging attempts to overcome.

 

[CanadaDrone]

Try increasing your aperture and use the ND16. ND8 is really for cloudy days and I thing part of it is your aperture is too low for the amount of depth in your scene

The value of the ND filter is actually irrelevant, provided you are getting the exposure you want - the camera has no idea what ND filter is on it, the light meter just measures the light coming in.

If he was already at F2.8 and ISO 100, there is nothing left to increase if he wants to stay at 1/30 shutter (Other than using a weaker ND) but if he moved up to a ND16, all else equal, he would need to get a stop of light back from somewhere to keep the exposure even. A ND8 with F4/ISO100/1/30 shutter is identical to a ND16 with F2.8/ISO100/1/30 shutter, so there would be no advantage to using the ND16 assuming he was happy with the lens performance at F2.8.

Regarding depth of field, at typical drone heights, even F2.8 has everything in focus from about 3 feet onward on such a small sensor (1"). To put that in perspective, F2.8 on a M2P is the same as F8 on a full frame/35mm camera in terms of equivalent depth of field at any given subject distance (crop factor of 2.7). DOF on drones is a complete non issue unless you are flying extremely close to something - on a typical flight at 100+ feet or whatever, as long as focus has been set properly, you have unlimited DOF even at F2.8. The only thing to note with the M2P is that due to the relatively small sensor size and high resolution, diffraction will start to degrade the image after F4 and become very noticeable by the time you are at F8-11, making the image extremely soft.

 

[RogerMav]

Is that the vid downloaded from the SD card on your Mavic 2 ir from the SC or smartphone or tablet connected to the controller?

 

[kilomikebravo]

Solo: CanadaDrone knows very well whereof he speaks.

The value of the ND filter is actually irrelevant,

Dead on. Forget the ND filter numbers and simply use the one that gives you the shutter speed you need at f4-f5.6.

..no camera can expose all areas of a scene like that with such high dynamic range. There will always be more noise in the shadows, and even the 1" sensor isn't giving you enough flexibility in a scene like that.

Yep, the type of noise in this clip would absolutely be evident due to the lighting (or more correctly, the lack thereof) anytime the conditions are similar to when you made the recording. The M2P camera has some amazing lowlight capabilities but when there are very few city lights other than car headlights, the sun is about to set completely, and you're shooting into the sun, you can expect image quality to pretty much always look like this. I do wish Premiere or AE had a "Dehaze" filter like Photoshop though as that would clear this clip up a bit. (And if Premiere DOES have a "dehaze" filter would someone please point it out to me?)

 

[Solomonenko]

That footage looks pretty normal to me, but to answer your question in general terms, shadows are always going to look more noisy compared to highlights because you are not feeding the sensor enough light, which enters the sensor randomly. Notice that the highlight and balanced exposure areas look good.

If you're interested in a more technical explanation....

The foreground is very underexposed (because you are trying to balance with the sun) which is why you might see noise there. You have a very bright sunset, which you seem to be exposing for, so anything darker than that is going to be very underexposed. You will notice that the highlights and properly exposed areas look quite good.

The reason for this is how image sensors work - they achieve best image quality when they have been saturated with light to the point that they can reach their FWC/full well capacity (where the ADC reaches maximum value, which is also at base ISO). If the bright/highlight areas are properly exposed, that typically means far less light has been collected by the photosites responsible for the dark areas, and as a result they are going to be noisier. When you raise the ISO, the ADC is told to reach maximum value much earlier, hence the dynamic range reduction at higher ISO levels, because it is working with far fewer electrons before it reports a maximum value. This is also why you see grain/noise at higher ISO levels, because the ADC is reporting maximum value with only a tiny fraction of the light collected compared to base ISO FWC, and light is collected randomly (noise also occurs randomly, which is why stacking multiple high ISO images is an effective form of noise reduction).

This is not a problem unique to DJI or the sensor used in the M2P - no camera can expose all areas of a scene like that with such high dynamic range. There will always be more noise in the shadows, and even the 1" sensor isn't giving you enough flexibility in a scene like that. Shooting high contrast scenes like that is simply not ideal because you can only expose for the shadows or the highlights - not both. Choosing the light that you fly in has one of the biggest effects on how good your footage will look, and that goes for 'standard' photography as well. Any time you have ultra high contrast and/or strong shadows, there will be compromises, which is what HDR imaging attempts to overcome.

Thanks a lot that info is very helpful.

 

[houstnwehavuhoh]

Were you ever able to improve upon image quality? Unless I'm shooting a relatively uncontrasty scene, I get the same noise you do. I use Neat Video (and a profile made by someone who worked with Neat Video to form specific to the Mavic 2 Pro and different ISO's), to which helps, but obviously softens and shifts colors slightly. The highest ISO I've shot was 200, but even at 100 I'm getting this similarly weird noise.


Usually shoot (and seeing this same noise) at:
4k, 24fps
DLOG (expose 0.0)
1/50
iso100
PolarPro ND's or ND/PL's (whatever's applicable per scenario)

 

[paulatkin73]

any small sensors will have some amount of noise in the shadows. did you expose like the OP - to the central weighted level of the light for the setting sun, and object the noise in the almost completely darkened foreground? show some samples, who knows, may be it is an issue with your sensor.

 

[gnirtS]

Try increasing your aperture and use the ND16. ND8 is really for cloudy days and I thing part of it is your aperture is too low for the amount of depth in your scene

The mavic sensor is tiny so even at f/2.8 anything 10ft or further away is at infinity so its not that.
f/2.8 to about f/4.5 are pretty much identical sharpness too.

His settings are fine regarding frame rate, iso, shutter speed - no need to change filter.

Thats a really tricky scene lighting wise - i dont see anything unusual about noise levels in the shadows.

 

[WithTheBirds]

Try increasing your aperture and use the ND16. ND8 is really for cloudy days and I thing part of it is your aperture is too low for the amount of depth in your scene

As has been pointed out to you- the issue here has nothing to do with DOF so a smaller aperture will achieve nothing. It is the dynamic range required to render the sky and foreground correctly that is the issue.

The most practical options here include;

1. Graduated grad filter (reduce sky predominantly allowing for more balanced overall exposure).

2. Allow the sky to blow out increasing exposure overall for better rendering if the foreground.

3. Fly earlier before when the sun is lower in the sky.

There might be some further detail that can be pulled out if the shadows in post however it is also likely that the accompanying increased noise will be objectionable.

 

[charlas]

Obviously YouTube compression wont help, but as others would say doesn't look terrible, I'd always try stick from either end of the F-Stop range, as low and high have their issues F3.5ish upto sub 7 seems sharpest to me on mine at least.