Aperature priority for auto camera mode

Auto exposure settings changes the aperture instead of favouring shutter speed. Considering lower shutter speed results in ground blur, not having the ability to have a shutter priority option seems strange. I don’t use auto modes because of the consistent ground blur, even in sunny weather.

Manual settings are my favoured option but as I discovered yesterday, over exposed roofs and then cloud cover under exposing ground shadows near trees is a tricky thing to combat without auto exposure. I understand setting DD to use manual camera options then using DJI Go app to set shutter priority would work, but as an all in one solution, shutter priority should be a usable option in DD.

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@Vantage, thanks for keeping suggestions coming! Could you explain a little more why you can’t set up the camera the way you want in DJI and turn off drone deploys control? I think it might be a little much asking a drone flight program to actually control all aspects of the camera. everything of that nature comes through the DJI SDK and would take a lot of resources to engineer and test, but I think it is a valid option.

I should have said aperture priority sorry, not shutter.

Anyway, for me currently in a typical mission my workflow would be:
Launch with DJI Go (iPad)
Ascend to mapping altitude
Set manual exposure with best possible shutter, open aperture, check for zebra lines and set white balance.
Exit DJI Go, start Drone Deploy, Exit Drone Deploy, Start Drone Deploy.
Start mission.

It feels quite inefficient and consumes extra battery, but currently it’s necessary.

I’ve no idea why Drone Deploy needs opening twice and closing in-between after using DJI Go, but if I don’t do that then it doesn’t acknowledge a connection to the drone on the first attempt and I’m unable to start the mission.

It’d be interesting to hear other people’s workflows. In my experience the auto camera mode is a waste of time unless ground blur is acceptable, due to the way it favours closing aperture over faster shutter.

I changed the title for you. You must be in some pretty bad conditions. Shutter is the first value that is adjusted and if that is going out range then the aperature changes. Very rarely does the aperature move beyond f5.6 unless you are flying over something like sand or snow, otherwise the aperture is wide open so I’m not sure how that could be causing ground blur. I have never seen ground blur unless I was flying at a bad time and now we have the low light setting.

What drone are you flying?

My ideal exposure setting for image capture would be:

ISO > 100
Aperture > 3.2 - 5.6 (user set-able) and is static.
Shutter > max. value 1/250 (user settable) floating and adjusts faster if needed for conditions.

If, EV is going to fall below 0 when shutter speed hits 1/250, then ISO will switch to 200 with the other values remaining as set.

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Our experience of auto settings are that they result in slow shutter speeds. Trying to control this manually is time consuming, difficult and not always successful. Have not had positive responses on this - “unsupported” tablet, “photos look ok to us” etc.

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Note also that the P4P RTK has a shutter priority option on the controller, so perhaps this is more commonly needed than DD might think.

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I use the option to set camera control with GO and set shutter priority. DD’s auto results in too slow of shutter speed on occasion for me as well. If they were to have Auto with a minimum specified shutter speed, that would probably be workable.

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I am trying out a new app (Hammer Missions). Guess what, full camera control, including Aperture Priority. First test and it worked great. Apparently, no problem with the SDK. FWIW, MP is dragging their feet in this area as well. Guess it takes a new player to shake things up.

I have suggested the same thing, and they basically discounted the suggestion.

I noticed that Hammer Missions also has a feature that has the drone stop to focus before each picture, something I always thought would be a nice option on days with low lighting and higher winds. I also often get blur on photos at the waypoints where the drone is turning while taking the photo.

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I noticed the occasional blurry image in turns as well. The design intent is to not take pictures in corners or in between corners, but it still happens every once in awhile. Camera settings are coming as announced in the DDC and this should eliminate blurred images if you know how to use camera settings, but I don’t know exactly which settings they intend to give us access to.