not really a technical question more of a creative one i guess. i feel like i can fly fine now and my exposure is decent but when i watch my clips back they feel kinda boring? like i'll get a nice top down shot of a beach or whatever and its technically fine but it doesnt have any life to it. i see some peoples footage and theres this real sense of movement and drama and i cant figure out if its the editing, the way they flew, the locations they pick, or some combination of all three.

been watching a lot of youtube tutorials but they all seem to focus on the technical stuff and not so much the actual why behind why some shots look great and others are just meh. anyone have thoughts on this, even vague ones would help at this point

so this is something i think about a lot and honestly i think the biggest thing people miss is leading lines and having a clear subject. a beach shot from above is just a beach unless theres something for the eye to land on ? a single person, a boat, waves breaking in a pattern, something. your brain needs an anchor point otherwise it doesnt know where to look and the shot feels empty even if its technically beautiful.

also for movement ? try flying toward your subject at the same time as you're descending slowly, that reveal feeling is way more engaging than just hovering and panning. and dont underestimate the edit, the same clip cut to music with the right color grade feels totally different than the raw footage. ive spent like an hour on a 10 second clip before and it was worth it

golden hour. seriously thats like 80% of it. i went out at noon for months and wondered why my shots looked mediocre then started going out an hour before sunset and suddenly everything looked way more dramatic without me changing anything else. the shadows get long, the light goes warm and directional, it just does a lot of the work for you compositionally