Hi, this is Wayne again with a topic “DJI Mavic 3 Review – Most Powerful Drone on The Planet?”.
Uh, hey: what’s up folks how’s it going! This watch hope you guys are all doing well and today we’re going to be taking a look at the dji mavic 3.. Now, back in 2018, we took a look at the first generation hasselblad partnership with dji with the mavic 2 pro this time around. We have a 20 megapixel steels capability with a main camera sensor. That is, four thirds inch size. So that’s about the same size as you find on a panasonic gh5, g85. G7. Many of the cameras that we use on a day-to-day basis to film most of our videos. So you pretty much have the power of a mirrorless, a digital camera in here on an aerial photography platform and probably one of the most advanced aerial photography platforms in terms of obstacle avoidance capabilities where you have sensors at the front back top bottom as well as Left and right, lateral, sensors, and apart from the upgraded video capabilities where you could do 5.1 k, video recording at 50 frames per second, you can also shoot 4k at 120 frames per second, but you also have a dual camera system with a telephoto dedicated uh camera That can get you up to 28 times hybrid zoom. Furthermore, one of the most impressive things about the mavic 3 has to be the battery life.
It’S actually rated up to 46 minutes according to dji in optimal flight time conditions, and you can pretty much have this things charged and use it for three or four days and not really have to worry about charging it. So that’s awesome in the sense that you probably don’t need to get a spare battery right away and definitely makes the usability of this aerial photography platform a lot more accessible and convenient. We’Re going to take a look at some of the pros. Some of the cons to see whether this thing is worth the two thousand dollars that it’s worth so, let’s get right into it now.
First thing i do have to mention that there’s two versions of the mavic 3.: you have the standard version like what we have over here, as well as the cine version, there’s only a real difference between what video codec they can record up to with the standard. Mavic 3: you can record h.264 h.265 with a maximum bit rate of 200 megabits per second recorded on a micro sd card locally on the drone. The mavic 3 city, on the other hand, can actually record apple prores 422, with a maximum data bit rate of 3 700 megabits per second.
It also has a built-in one, terabyte solid-state drive to facilitate that extra bandwidth and throughput, and certainly a little bit more unnecessary. If you’re in a professional environment that utilizes apple prores from a workflow standpoint beyond that notion, both drones are pretty much identical in every other way: same camera, configuration same flight dynamics, etc. Now i just want to talk about how the mavic 3 compares against the previous generation mavic 2 pro that we had a few years back now in terms of the weight. Both the drones are roughly weigh around 900 grams. There is a slight difference in terms of the folded dimensions, with the new mavic 3 being slightly more compact, but generally they’re, actually very, very similar in terms of their overall footprint in the folded position.
Diagonally speaking unfolded, the new mavic 3 is actually a little bit longer with a end and diagonal measurement of 380 millimeters versus 353 millimeters on the mavic 2 pro in terms of flight dynamics. Both drones are actually fairly similar with the slight advantage going up to the mavic 3, with a faster sport mode, both an ascend descent and horizontal traveling speed of up to 21 meters per second versus 20 meters per second on the previous generation drone. In terms of hover stability, both are quite similar in terms of minimizing overall hover deviations to get you a relatively smooth shot and both have the same 6000 meter maximum altitude rating. What is a big difference is the overall camera performance both are utilizing.
Hasselblad designed camera architectures, the mavic 2 pro utilizing a 20 megapixel one inch cmos chip with a 28 millimeter 35 equivalent lens maximum aperture rating of f 2.8. You can shoot 4k video at 30 frames per second and 1080p at 120 frames per second, with the new generation mavic 3. You can now shoot 5.1 k resolution at 50 frames per second, you can also shoot 4k at 120 frames per second, as well as 1080p. At 200 frames per second, so in pretty much every facet of the video capabilities, the new generation is certainly more capable, in addition to all that, the mavic 3 also has a dedicated telephoto camera, with a half inch cmos chip that can record 4k at 30 frames Per second – and it has a built-in 162 millimeter optical lens and with a little help of four times digital zoom, you can actually get hybrid zoom capabilities up to 28 times.
So that means with the telephoto camera. You have the ability to have pretty much binocular vision up in the air, giving you the ability to zoom into far away objects with fairly decent fidelity and clarity, and pretty handy if you want to spy on somebody for whatever reason now. Based on my experience. Using the telephoto lens on the mavic 3, i do have to say that when you’re completely zoomed into its maximum capabilities of 28 times, you’re, essentially looking at a digitally zoomed in image, so the quality isn’t that great? It’S good for, in the sense that you can zoom in that much and pick out little details in the distance, but if you want the absolute best video quality out of the telephoto camera, you definitely want to utilize it in the seven times optical zoom range.
This is where you’re utilizing the full half inch cmos chip at that 4k resolution. Everything looks really nice and crystal clear, and you can always zoom in post later on and get finer details if necessary, but the visual performance at seven times optical zoom, with this 162 millimeter lens built into this telephoto camera, is absolutely sensational. The main hasselblad camera is known as the l2d l2d-20c. It has 20 megapixel four-thirds cmos chip effectively the same size cameras you find on popular mirrors, digital cameras like the panasonic gh5 g85.
Things like that cameras that people use on a day-to-day basis for their main video shooting capabilities, especially on the prosumer and essentially with the mavic 3 you’re, pretty much getting a camera quality equivalent to the gh5, putting it on a flying camera platform, but then shrinking it Down and making it foldable and convenient like in this form factor that we see over here pretty darn, incredible, considering the fact that, just a couple of years ago to get this kind of camera quality and aerial performance, you were looking at a rig. That was at least three four times the size. Now, with the sensor, you get a effective dynamic range of up to 12.8 f-stops and you can also shoot 10-bit, d-log color profile settings. You can shoot with a relatively flat image and then grade grade later on, to bring in shadow and highlight details as well as uh, be a little bit more creative with your cinematic color grading with luts, and things like that.
So definitely very flexible for both professionals and consumers. Unlike now, as mentioned earlier, with the standard version of the mavic 3, you can shoot 200 megabits per second using h.264 codec and uh with the cine version. You get the access to shoot, apple, prores, 422 hq and that will definitely give you more grading options, a little bit more latitude and flexibility from a post-production and color grading standpoint. But i think for most users out there.
I think they’re going to find that the latitude and grading capabilities of just the standard drone shooting at h.264 is going to be more than enough for their needs, even if they’re using it on a professional basis. Furthermore, one of the big advantages of having that larger sensor on the mavic 3 is going to be a much better low-light performance, with a greater dynamic range in nightscape photography, as well as less overall noise. Since we have more surface area for more photons to gather onto compared to a smaller imaging sensor, in fact we’re working on our comparison with the mavic air 2s, which has the same size imaging sensor as the previous generation mavic 2. Pro of one inch cmos ship and just on a few examples we’ve encountered, you can totally see so much more details in the shadow and highlights in low light situations, making nightscape and nighttime aerial videography a total viability with the mavic 3.
Unlike the previous generation drones. Now, in terms of the safety capabilities, we’re using a pass 5.0 on the mavic 3 with omnidirectional obstacle, avoidance capabilities and you have dual sensors both at the front back top bottom as well as left, right, lateral, sensors. So in pretty much any 3d spatial area, the drone will be fully aware of its surroundings, actively avoid obstacles if necessary, as well as return to home in the event of an emergency or lost contact with its operator in terms of the smart modes. Unfortunately, with the mavic 3 in its current launch edition, it doesn’t have access to active track, 5.0 master, shots, hyperlapse, etc.
Those features will be unlocked in a future firmware upgrade they’re saying somewhere around january 2022. So we’ll keep you updated on those, but i’m really interested to see how the machine learning algorithms have improved uh. Since the previous generation drones in terms of tracking smaller objects, more reliably, as well as trucking, larger cars objects, people things like that and, of course, how the quick shots master shots come into play with the mavic 3, as well as the hyperlapse capability. So i definitely stay tuned to the channel to get those updates really really soon.
Now the standard control that comes with the base model configuration of the mavic 3 is the same one that you found in the air 2s, which is the rc 231 controller, has a latency about a 130 milliseconds. The maximum communication distance between the drone and the controller with a 1080p 60fps feed is about 15 kilometers using the 03, a plus video transmission technology from dji. I personally haven’t done a maximum range test with this drone, but i’ve gone as far as about eight kilometers and haven’t really had any issues with the data transmission uh, given the fact that you’re in an area that has minimal interference now last, i want to talk About probably the biggest selling feature for me personally on the mavic 3, which has to be the battery life, it has a 5 000 milliamp hour battery, giving you a total flight time of 46 minutes according to dji. That’S absolutely insane! Now i personally haven’t gotten 46 minutes myself most of my flights last between 35 and 38 minutes, and typically that drone wants you to land anyways when it gets 15 or 10 percent around its battery capacity.
So i typically want to be on the safe side of that, so in terms of comparing it to the previous generation mavic 2 pro, which uh dji claimed had around 30 minute flight time. I typically got around 20 to 25 minutes, based on my experience and uh. That is definitely a massive improvement, considering the fact that both drones were around 900 grams they’re not really relatively light, and even if you compare it to the relatively light mavic air 2s, which we’re gon na be doing a direct comparison.
I guess it’s rated around 30 minutes according to dji, so it’s even getting better than that. So one of the great things about the mavic 3 is you probably don’t need to get an extra battery initially speaking, especially if you’re going to use this drone on more of an occasional basis, you can easily get a couple of flight sessions in uh throughout a Couple of days without having to worry about charging it all the time, and that is definitely a huge selling factor for me, but really on that guys. That’S really! It now definitely have to hear your thoughts on uh.
What you think of the mavic 3. we’re going to be doing direct comparison between this thing and the air 2s, which costs about half as much as this 2 000 drone. So, if you’re interested to see whether uh, it’s really worth upgrading to, if you’re coming from an air 2s or if you’re new to drones, which one is a best for your personal needs, definitely check out that video that’ll be in the description down below. If that video isn’t out already, it’s going to be interesting to see how the new active track hyperlapse, as well as master shots, uh features, are, will be enabled with this thing, hopefully with the firmware upgrade they’re saying early january of 2022. So we’ll do a follow-up. Video for that to test out those features in the meantime, if you haven’t done so already, please check out the description for all the detailed information and links to everything we’ve talked about.
If you want to help support the channel, we didn’t get this from dji as a review unit. We actually had to pay for it ourselves and it’s quite expensive to make this kind of content, so any uh support using our affiliate links would be greatly appreciated. You can also directly donate to our paypal.me account, of course, subscribing liking.
The video sharing is always helpful as well. We’Ll see you real soon in the next one, and thanks again for watching take care. .