Should I be shooting stills in 4:3 aspect ratio for the best quality?

[Meta4]

Actually it does make sense to shoot in the cropped format, it you are working in stitching, and creating panos, the 4:3 takes out the worst of the distortion, which is extreme on the P4 camera towards the edges in 3:2.

You already said that in post #9 above.

I shoot a lot of panoramas and like most panos shot with a drone, there's nothing in the corners, top or bottom to make any difference.
For my photography (and I imagine many others) it makes no sense to let the camera chop off the top and bottom of the image and limit my options to crop as I see fit.

Can you show an example of the problem you are describing?

 

[Paul2660]

You already said that in post #9 above.

I shoot a lot of panoramas and like most panos shot with a drone, there's nothing in the corners, top or bottom to make any difference.
For my photography (and I imagine many others) it makes no sense to let the camera chop off the top and bottom of the image and limit my options to crop as I see fit.

Can you show an example of the problem you are describing?

If you have great corners, with anything shot with a P4, at F 4.5 then I do envy you, as I have not seen that. Corners are OK, but nothing like the center in regards to apparent sharpness.

If the shots work for you I fully understand your preferences. The camera for me has a lot amount of distortion, which to me seems worse with the 3:2 ratio, again made worse if the gimbal is pointed downwards.

No problem if it works for you. BTW, the 3:2 is cropping the top and bottom to extend to the sides. Just shoot a 4:3 of a scene, the switch to 3:2, you can watch the scene change, the top and bottom will be cropped down and sides extended. That is how my P4's work, 3:2 vs 4:3. I believe by the ratio, 4:3 (4 high by 3 wide) which is closer to a square would give more height, where as the 3:2 (which is really 2 high y 3 wide) gives less. It's just a matter of personal preference.

There is no right answer here as in many things. You prefer one method I prefer another. I just wanted to describe what works for me.

Paul C

 

[With The Birds]

If you have great corners, with anything shot with a P4, at F 4.5 then I do envy you, as I have not seen that. Corners are OK, but nothing like the center in regards to apparent sharpness.

If the shots work for you I fully understand your preferences. The camera for me has a lot amount of distortion, which to me seems worse with the 3:2 ratio, again made worse if the gimbal is pointed downwards.

No problem if it works for you. BTW, the 3:2 is cropping the top and bottom to extend to the sides. Just shoot a 4:3 of a scene, the switch to 3:2, you can watch the scene change, the top and bottom will be cropped down and sides extended. That is how my P4's work, 3:2 vs 4:3. I believe by the ratio, 4:3 (4 high by 3 wide) which is closer to a square would give more height, where as the 3:2 (which is really 2 high y 3 wide) gives less. It's just a matter of personal preference.

There is no right answer here as in many things. You prefer one method I prefer another. I just wanted to describe what works for me.

Paul C

You can’t get more height than that determined by the lens angle of coverage and the sensor height... To crop a 3:2 sensor to get 3:2 aspect ratio would be stupidity in DJI’s part.

 

[Paul2660]

Ok, guess I am all wet on this one. Stay with 3:2. I will go back and try it again as I must be doing something wrong in my setup.

Will try to get out next week weather permitting.

Paul C

 

[Harleydude]

Or is the aspect ratio irrelevant? I much prefer the look of 16:9, but I've heard somewhere 4:3 is best for quality, is this correct?

OSO nailed it. For real-estate, I shoot 16:9 because that's the ratio of your computer monitor and those shots are going to be reduced anyway for web. Real estate agents don't want to crop photos or color correct, so I shoot differently for them. Otherwise, for mapping, I shoot 3:2.

 

[RPP]

To utilize all the available resolution of 20+ MP, use the 3:2 aspect ratio in the P4P. See this earlier thread -

Size of P4P image?

 

[whitelineNI]

I shoot 3:2 and the softness/distortion at the edges is clearly noticeable to me...but if I show it to my partner she's like " there's nothing wrong with that". I'd be surprised if any p4p owners shooting 3:2 aren't experiencing similar issues tbh.
Paul2660 how do you shoot panos bracketing....manually I assume yeah? Then are you merging the 3 or 5 stills for each shot before composing the final panorama. Sorry if I'm sounding thick here [emoji4]

 

[Paul2660]

I shoot 3:2 and the softness/distortion at the edges is clearly noticeable to me...but if I show it to my partner she's like " there's nothing wrong with that". I'd be surprised if any p4p owners shooting 3:2 aren't experiencing similar issues tbh.
Paul2660 how do you shoot panos bracketing....manually I assume yeah? Then are you merging the 3 or 5 stills for each shot before composing the final panorama. Sorry if I'm sounding thick here [emoji4]

Hello,

I shoot pretty much everything as a 5 shot AEB, I would prefer to use 3 shots, but DJI only allows .7 per step and that's really not enough, so to get 1.34 you need to take 5 shots. So I know from the series, odds are 2 images will be used, bracketing for sky and foreground.

I shoot all panos manually, mainly due to the fact that the Pano mode on the P4 goes up up too high 30 degrees and pulls in way too much prop shadow. I realize most times this is only sky, but it's a pain to take out the shadows and on a pure blue sky or one with few clouds the process is harder. I usually go 3 across in 6 shots. Starting on one end, working across the shot. I use the grid lines on the screen to help line up the shots, but even with them it's not perfect, but enough to get most pano engines to make the shot. Having a solid horizon helps.

Mainly using Lightroom for stitching, but it can have issues on certain shots, so I will move to either Kolor's software or Ptgui.

Paul C

 

[whitelineNI]

I get you now...Cheers man.