so ive been flying for about a year now and i feel like my videos always look super obviously drone footage, like that flat overhead look or the weird slow pulls that every travel video on youtube has. i watch stuff from guys like Johnny FPV or even just random creators and their stuff looks so much more cinematic somehow even when theyre using similar gear to me.

i've been trying to work on my movement more, like combining a forward push with a slight tilt down at the same time, or doing reveals around buildings. but in post i feel totally lost. im using premiere and i have no idea if im color grading wrong or if its the movement that looks off or both. my shots are mostly locked in d-log on my mini 4 pro so the flat footage is there i just cant seem to get it to look warm and filmic without it looking orange and weird. any tips from people who actually figured this out would be huge

the movement thing is actually huge and i think most people underestimate it. the shots that look too drone-y are usually the ones where you're moving in one axis only ? just going forward, or just going up. what makes stuff feel more cinematic is combining movements, like a slow pedestal up while also rotating and moving slightly laterally. it creates this parallax effect that feels way more like a real camera dolly or crane shot instead of a drone hovering around.

for the color grading, with d-log you really want to apply a LUT first as a base ? DJI actually provides free ones on their site for each camera. drop the saturation slightly on that LUT layer and then do your actual grade on top. most people go too heavy on the LUTs and skip that step of pulling saturation back first, which is why everything looks orange and over-cooked. also try adding just a tiny bit of film grain in Premiere, even like 3-4% noise, it sounds counterintuitive but it removes that digital-clean look that makes drone footage feel cheap.

honestly the thing that helped me most was just slowing everything way down in post. like i thought i was flying slow but then when i actually looked at the footage i was still moving pretty fast. i drop almost everything to 80% speed in premiere now and it immediately feels more deliberate. also somebody told me to try flying with expo cranked up so my stick inputs are less sensitive and i get smoother movements without having to think so hard about it