The DJI Mini 2, a small flying technological miracle

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Some months ago I bought a drone, the ZLRC SG906. It's an entry level drone, that does what it does well enough, though not great. And after some time of playing with it, I realised that though it is a capable drone, I found it lacking in the things I wanted to do with it. The picture quality is good, but the two-axis gimble is not precise enough, causing a jittering image while flying. And though the gimbal can be rotated up and down, it does so in discrete steps of about 15 degrees. And that means you can not change the direction of the camera while shooting, because it would look awful.

So I soon decided I would buy a more expensive drone eventually.

And as it somtimes goes, 'eventually' came sooner than expected. Last novemer DJI, one of the top manufacturers of drones, presented it newest model, the DJI Mini2. It's a really small drone that weighs less than 250 grams. It is specifically designed to weigh less than 250 grams, because that weight is in most parts of the world the division between a drone you can just play with and a drone you need to do some theoretical and even practical exams for before you are allowed to fly with it. Despite this, it is a very capable drone.

It is a small miracle what DJI was able to engineer into this litlle lightweight drone. It has a three axis gimble that can rotate from 20 degrees up to 90 degrees down. And it does so in a continuous motion. It takes pictures and shoot video in 4K and has several preprogrammad quickshots. The link between drone and th controller features OcuSync 2.0, which means that the connection is nearly indestructable (though not infallible). What the camera of the drone sees, is visible on the creen of your phone with only a very small lag. And the connection between drone and controller is supposed to bridge some 10 kilometers. Though in reality you'\ll never make it that far, because the battery won't last long enough to fly the drone back. And there is of course the small matter that in most countries you're supposed to keep your dron in line of sight.

The drone came last saturday and last sunday I flew it for the first time. And it is all I visualised a drone hould be. It is very easy and reliable to fly. The footage it shoots is buttery smooth. It is, in short, a great drone for a newbie. If I were to mention a disadvantage, it would be that is has no obstacle avoidance. Meaning it is entirely mt own resposibility to not fly into trees, buildings or people.

Now I have to practise and practise, to make those great cinematic drone shoots. It's a long way before I get there, but I already like what I can shoot now. These are just a few shot from "Het Leersumse Veld", where I took it flying last sunday. I did of course glue them together, other than that I did no processing like white balance correction or colour grading. This is just the video as it comes out of the drone.

As you can see in the video shots above the water, it was quite windy. However, that was not noticable in the flying of the drone. Amazing how something so small and lightweight can be so stable in fairly strong wind.

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