so ive been flying my mini 3 for about 6 months now and honestly the footage is fine when i go out early morning or evening but any time i try to shoot around noon or even like 2pm everything just looks completely blown out and flat. i know its not the drone itself because ive seen people get great shots in harsh light but i cant figure out what im missing.

right now im shooting in auto and i wonder if thats the problem? i tried switching to manual once but then the exposure was all over the place when i was moving. someone at my local club mentioned ND filters but i dont really understand how those work or which ones to get. any advice would be really appreciated, even just pointing me in the right direction would help

yeah auto mode is definitely working against you in bright conditions, the drone is basically just trying to keep everything exposed and it tends to blow out the highlights especially when theres sky in the frame. the ND filter thing your club friend mentioned is spot on - basically theyre like sunglasses for your lens, they cut down the incoming light so you can use a slower shutter speed without overexposing everything.

the rule of thumb most people use is to set your shutter speed to double your frame rate, so if youre shooting 30fps you want 1/60 shutter. in midday sun thats way too much light for that setting without an ND. an ND16 or ND32 is usually a good starting point for bright days. honestly just grab a cheap set to experiment before spending a lot, i started with a no-name pack and they worked fine for learning the concept. once you sort the exposure side out the shots will look way less flat even without touching anything in post

also worth shooting in d-log or whatever flat picture profile your mini 3 supports if it does, cant remember if the non-pro version has that. flat profiles preserve more highlight detail which gives you more to work with in editing. midday light is just brutal though honestly, sometimes the best move is to just not fight it and shoot something that works with harsh shadows instead of against them. some of my favorite shots have come from just leaning into the contrast rather than trying to make it look like golden hour