the biggest thing for me was learning about composition before even touching the editing. i was so focused on getting the settings right that i wasnt thinking about what made the shot interesting in the first place. started paying attention to leading lines ? roads, rivers, field edges, that kind of thing ? and trying to position the drone so those lines pulled your eye through the frame instead of just shooting straight down at something and calling it done.

on the editing side i stopped using presets almost entirely. they never quite fit the light conditions you actually had and then you spend more time fighting the preset than just editing the photo. now i start by just getting the exposure and white balance where they feel right, then i lift the shadows a little and bring the highlights down, and usually do a slight S curve in the tone curve. nothing crazy but it makes a big difference. dehaze in lightroom is also kind of addictive once you discover it, dont overdo it though because you can tell immediately when someone went too heavy on it.

anyway just thought id share in case anyone else was spinning their wheels like i was for a while

someone at my local flying spot mentioned shooting in manual and using something called the exposure triangle but honestly that conversation went over my head pretty fast. im not a photographer by background, i just got into drones because i thought the aerial perspective was cool and now im trying to actually make the shots look decent.

any advice on where to even start with manual settings for bright sunny days? do i just crank the shutter speed up or is there more to it than that

im not asking about camera settings really, more like the actual art side of it ? how do you decide where to position, what angle, how high, all that stuff. feels like theres no rules to learn so im kind of lost on how to improve

someone in another thread mentioned shooting in D-Log but i tried it once and everything looked so washed out i thought i broke something lol. do i need to learn to edit properly before that even makes sense? also does the time of day actually matter as much as people say or is that just a golden hour obsession thing

i think its a composition thing? like on the ground i naturally think about rule of thirds and leading lines and all that but when im up in the air i kind of forget all of it and just point the camera at the pretty thing. do you guys have like a mental checklist or something you run through before you start your shots? or is it just something that gets more intuitive over time

also curious if anyone has thoughts on editing ? im using lightroom for the stills and resolve for video and i feel like im overprocessing everything. how do you know when to stop

like what ISO should i even be using for midday shots? i tried bumping it down to 100 and things looked better but then i was losing detail in the shadows and i dont really know how to balance all of it. do people actually shoot in d-log on these smaller drones or is that more of a pro thing? feels like every time i read about it i get more confused not less

any tips appreciated, even basic ones, im not too proud to start from scratch on this

i watched some youtube stuff about composition and everyone talks about the rule of thirds and leading lines and i get it in theory but when youre actually up there flying i just kind of default to whatever looks safe i guess. not sure if other people hit this wall or if theres something more specific i should be actively thinking about before i even take off

editing wise im using lightroom and my presets are probably making everything look the same too now that i think about it, every photo gets the same treatment basically

im shooting in auto mode mostly which i know is probably part of the problem but every time i try to switch to manual i get confused about where to start. i think i had ISO at like 400 and shutter was around 1/500 and it still looked terrible. not sure if its a polarizer thing or a settings thing or honestly maybe just a me thing lol

does anyone have like a basic starting point for bright sunny days? even just a rough idea of where to set things would help a ton. also shooting RAW vs jpeg ? is it actually worth it for fixing stuff in post or is that overhyped

i know a huge part of it is location obviously but even when im in a great spot the composition feels flat. i find myself always defaulting to straight nadir shots or just hovering and pointing forward which i know is lazy. i also think my editing might be too heavy handed ? i tend to crank the clarity and texture sliders in lightroom because it makes stuff pop on my phone screen but maybe thats not right

anyone gone through this and figured out what clicked for them? whether its composition rules or editing stuff or just a mindset shift, interested in all of it

i've tried messing with the shutter speed but honestly i don't fully understand the relationship between that and the drone movement. like when im hovering the shots look better but the moment theres any wind or i pan it all falls apart. also shooting in auto everything which maybe is the problem lol

any advice on what settings i should actually be dialing in? someone mentioned the 180 degree shutter rule to me at my local club but i couldn't really follow what they meant by it in practice

im mostly shooting real estate and some landscape stuff, nothing action related so maybe it doesnt matter as much for my use case but i want to understand it properly rather than just copying settings without knowing why. currently running a mavic 3 classic and i have a set of ND filters but ive honestly only used the ND16 because im not sure when to switch to the others

i think part of it is my camera settings, im mostly leaving it on auto everything which i know is probably the issue but every time i try to mess with manual settings i either blow out the sky or lose all the shadow detail. i did try shooting in d-log m a few times but honestly the flat footage looks even worse to me, maybe im not editing it right after?

also i never really know where to put the horizon in the frame. i just kind of center it and that feels wrong but i dont know what else to do. any advice from people who've actually figured this out would be great, even just pointing me toward what to google would help

i mostly shoot stills not video if that changes anything. been at this about a year.

ive tried bumping down the exposure but then the foreground gets too dark and it just looks weird. a friend told me to shoot in manual mode but honestly ive been too scared to mess with that stuff. is there a middle ground here or do i just need to accept that i have to do HDR stuff in post? i feel like im missing something obvious that everyone else already knows

ive tried lightroom for the photos and it works fine i guess but i always end up making everything look super HDR and fake looking because i dont really know where to stop with the sliders. my wife says my edits look like a video game which, fair enough probably. for video i havent even really started, premiere feels overwhelming and ive heard people talk about something called D-log or flat color profiles but i shot everything in normal mode so maybe thats why my footage looks weird when i try to color grade it

not really sure what im asking exactly, just wondering if theres a simpler approach or if everyone goes through this learning curve

i shoot in auto mode mostly because i was scared to mess with the settings and break something (i know, i know) but i finally switched to manual last week and now im just confused about which settings actually matter. someone at my local flying club mentioned something about ND filters and histogram but i dont really know what that means in practice. do i need to spend a lot of money on filters or is there a way to fix it in post?

also i noticed my shots look way better in the hour before sunset but i dont always have time to fly then. is there any way to make midday shots not look terrible or is golden hour just always going to be better

i shoot jpeg mostly which someone told me recently might be the issue because lightroom apparently works a lot better with raw files. could that really make that big of a difference? the jpegs straight out of the drone honestly look pretty nice already, kind of warm and punchy, so part of me wonders if i even need to edit them at all or if im just editing them because i think im supposed to

flying a dji air 3 if that matters. mostly shooting landscapes, coastline stuff, that kind of thing

someone at my local flying club mentioned shooting in d-log or something like that but i honestly dont fully understand what that means or if it even applies to photos. do people shoot photos in log format too or is that just a video thing? and what about ND filters for photos, are those even worth it or is that more of a video thing as well

also any basic advice on composition would be great, i feel like my shots are technically ok sometimes but they just look boring compared to what i see other people posting. not sure if thats a settings thing or just how im framing shots

i tend to just fly out, point straight down or do the classic 45 degree angle shot and call it a day. i know there's more to it but im not sure what im actually missing. anyone have thoughts on this or things that kind of clicked for you at some point?

anyone gone through this and figured it out? im mostly shooting landscapes and the occasional real estate thing for a friend

i think part of my problem is i just hover and then tilt the camera down and shoot, maybe im not being deliberate enough about finding the actual shot before i take it. anyone else go through this phase and what helped you get past it. is it just a reps thing where you fly enough and your eye develops or is there actual stuff i should be studying

im shooting on a mini 3 pro if that matters. mostly leaving it on auto settings which i know is probably the issue but every time i try to go manual i end up with something worse. does anyone have a starting point they use for sunny midday conditions? or is it just one of those things where you shouldnt even bother shooting at noon

i shoot a lot of coastal stuff and forests, occasionally some urban stuff. been at it for about a year and a half. just feels like i have all the technical stuff down but the creative side isnt clicking. anyone been through this and figured out how to get past it?