getting into more cinematic stuff and i know i need ND filters to get that motion blur right, the 180 degree shutter rule and all that. but theres like a million options on amazon and i cant tell whats worth buying vs whats just cheap garbage that'll mess up the image quality. ive seen the DJI ones obviously but they're kind of expensive and then theres Freewell and PolarPro and a bunch of random brands i dont recognize. does the quality actually matter that much on a mini 4 pro sensor or am i overthinking it. also not sure which set to even get, like what ND values do i actually need for normal outdoor shooting

Freewell is the sweet spot imo. PolarPro is great but honestly overkill for a mini series camera, like youre not shooting a feature film here. The DJI branded ones are fine but overpriced for what you get. I've been using the Freewell all-day kit for about a year on my mini 3 and the image quality difference between those and the DJI ones is not something i can see in actual footage. For ND values id say ND16 and ND64 cover probably 80% of outdoor situations, bright overcast day vs full sun basically. the ND256 comes in handy if youre shooting midday summer but i reach for it maybe once every few months

honestly this whole ND filter thing took me way too long to figure out and i still dont always get it right. one thing nobody told me when i started was that you also want to make sure youre shooting in manual mode otherwise the camera just compensates with ISO and you lose the whole point of the filter. also the cheap amazon ones i tried first had this weird color cast that i didnt even notice until i tried to color grade and everything looked slightly green. wasnt a lot but enough that it bugged me. so yeah maybe dont go with the absolute cheapest option