Sadly the new Mavic Mini is a waste of time for anyone looking to use it for photography or video use. Having deliberately downgraded many features of this drone, a trick played by the professional video industry for many years.

Giving a drone Auto White Balance only (AWB) is a complete disaster for photographers and anyone producing video. Only this week I flew my Mavic 2 in my local park to discover after a firmware update my drone was set to AWB.

Flying over yellow autumnal leaved trees drastically changes your white balance if set to AWB making your footage useless, so to give you a drone with AWB only is a disaster and very poor thinking by DJI.

With the Skydio 2 made in the USA about to enter the arena DJI should not be producing drones with a very poor feature set. Other commentators say they are “protecting” the Mavic line of drones…nonsense.

All they are doing is loosing a major percentage of serious drone users who would welcome a drone of this weight and size.

I would like to thank Nino Leitner from Cinema 5D for pointing out these poor features and here is his video and a link to his review https://www.cinema5d.com/dji-mavic-mini-review-good-pro-filmmaking/

For all your video production needs in Scotland, get in touch with Small Video Productions

Loupedeck CT is ready to go right out of the box with a vast set of integrations with your favorite software, letting you move between and work freely in Premiere, Final Cut Pro, Photoshop, Lightroom, Ableton Live and soon more – all from one sleek user interface.

The pros already love Final Cut Pro and Loupedeck+ makes editing videos with Final Cut even faster, smoother and more precise. Loupedeck+ is custom-designed to enhance the entire Final Cut Pro X editing experience, giving you quick access to all the tools and functions you need. Its intuitive user interface features controls, sliders and dials for color grading and fine-tuning your work. And you can edit in full-screen mode, which means you can focus all your attention on what really counts – nailing the perfect edit. Loupedeck+ is also simple to set up and will quickly become a completely natural part of your editing workflow. Give it a spin and see for yourself. 

For all your video production needs in Scotland, get in touch with Small Video Productions

By activating LUMIX S1 with Upgrade Software Key DMW-SFU2, you can enjoy best-in-class 14+ stops V-Log with your LUMIX S1, as well as many other advanced video functions for use in a professional setting.

Original unopened box from Panasonic, this arrived after I sold my S1. Save a massive £60 off the price of the same box from Panasonic. Send an email to smallvideo@mac.com if you are interested.

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Very interesting Netflix have now approved the Panasonic S1H as a camera suitable as a main camera, so long as the footage is captured within a range of formats and settings.

4K or UHD with V-LOG 10bit 422 ALL INTRA 400Mbps, not many cameras have this ability in such a small body.

This is indeed great news for Panasonic and with a camera that only uses SDXC Memory Cards it’s a far cry from the usual crowd…ARRI’s Alexa LF, Canon C700, RED Weapon Dragon 8K and Sony F55 camera systems.

For all your video production needs in Scotland, get in touch with Small Video Productions

The NTG5 is a short, ultra-lightweight shotgun microphone ideal for use in the most demanding recording applications. Featuring a revolutionary acoustic design with circular ports replacing the linear slots found in other shotgun mics, it offers unmatched transparency and a more natural, uncoloured sound. Combined with a tightly controlled frequency response, smooth off-axis response, and very low self-noise (just 10dBA), the NTG5 sounds spectacular in a wide variety of applications, particularly location recording and demanding filmmaking scenarios where superlative audio is the imperative. No excuses.

The NTG5 is a boom operator’s dream, weighing a mere 76g and measuring just over 20cm, making it ideal for use on long, demanding shoots. It also features RF-bias circuitry to ensure reliable performance in adverse environments, with excellent resistance to high humidity, severe cold, damp, and dust. The perfect location recording mic.

Key features:

• Revolutionary acoustic design, delivering a natural, uncoloured sound.
• Extremely lightweight (just 76g), and short in length (just 203mm)
• Tailored frequency response and very low self-noise of just 10dBA
• Highly directional supercardioid polar pattern and smooth off-axis response
• RF-bias technology and conformal coating ensure superior performance in adverse environmental conditions
• Comes in a complete location recording kit with WS10 windshield, PG2-R pistol grip and other accessories

For all your video production needs in Scotland, get in touch with Small Video Productions

For a long time DJI have ruled the drone market but with increasing problems in the USA accepting electronics from China the USA are fighting back with this amazing drone.

American drone manufacturer, Skydio, has announced the release of the Skydio 2. A more compact, lightweight, autonomous drone with a superior camera, compared to its predecessor, the R1, it is going after the DJI Mavic 2 Pro and Air markets.

The Skydio 2 retails at a competitive price point of $999. A 12MP camera, mounted on a 3-axis gimbal and built around Sony’s IMX577 1/2.3” CMOS sensor with Qualcomm’s RedDragon™ QSC605 technology, can deliver up to 4K/60p HDR video. Using 45 megapixels of visual sensing from six 200° color cameras, the drone can detect obstacles in every direction and avoid them. This is Skydio’s foundation for truly autonomous flight, an ‘Onboard AI’ that powers the ‘Skydio Autonomy Engine.’

The drone can reach a maximum autonomous speed of 36 mph and can remain in the air for 23 minutes with up to 3.5 km wireless range. To compare, the DJI Mavic 2 series can fly up to 45 mph remain air bound for up to 31 minutes. Nevertheless, Skydio is also selling the fact their latest release is 50% smaller, lighter, and quieter than the R1.

SENSOR TYPE Sony IMX577
1/2.3” 12.3MP CMOS SENSOR ACTIVE PIXELS 4056 (H) x 3040 (V) LENS APERTURE f/2.8 LENS FOCAL LENGTH 20mm (35mm format equivalent)

LENS DEPTH OF FIELD 1m – ∞SHUTTER SPEED electronic shutter 1 to 1/1920s ISO RANGE video 100-3200

Photo 100-3200 IMAGE SIGNAL PROCESSOR Qualcomm QCS605GPUAdreno™ 615CPU64-bit octa-core Kyro™ 300DSPHexagon™ 685, 2x HVX RESOLUTION and MODES

3840×2160 30 fps
3840×2160 60 fps
3840×2160 48 fps
3840×2160 24 fps
1920×1080 120 fps
1920×1080 60 fps
1920×1080 30 fps
BITRATE 100 Mbps
VIDEO FORMAT MPEG-4 (AVC/H.264, HEVC/H.265)
STILL RESOLUTION 4056×3040 (12 MP)STILL FORMATS JPEG, DNG (RAW) STILL MODES Single, Interval DYNAMIC RANGE 13 stops
STORAGE Removable Micro SD Card
UHS Speed Class 3 / V30

For all your video production needs in Scotland, get in touch with Small Video Productions