BEST Drone to Buy in 2024 - Mini 4 Pro vs Air 3 vs Mavic 3 Pro

in this video I want to go through dji's lineup of drones to figure out which drone is the best for you whether it's the mini3 Mini 4 Pro air3 mavic 3 classic mavic 3 Pro there's a wide range of features that all of these drones have but there's also unique things for each drone and depending on your situation you're going to want to pick one drone over the other and so in this video I'm going to show you a ton of footage from all of these drones but also I'm going to talk about all the features that make make them different all right let's get into [Music] it so the drones that we're talking about in this video is the Mini 3 mini4 Pro air3 mavic 3 classic mavic 3 Pro and then the cine version of the mavic 3 and so this is the lineup of the newest of each model from the cheapest to the most expensive and I know there's other drones in dji's lineup That kind of fill in between these drones however this video would be super long if I went through every single drone and also these are the newest versions of each lineup so these are going to be the drones that you're most likely going to want to get and so first let's just talk about price because there's a wide range here so the mini3 sits at 469 the Mini 4 Pro sits at 759 the air3 sits at 1,99 the mavic 3 classic is at $15.99 the mavic 3 Pro is at $21.99 and the mavic 3 C is $4,799 and this is for the base model which is basically the Drone the cheaper controller and one battery so it's only the essentials to be able to start flying however most of us are going to want to get the flymore package which has multiple batteries and a few extra accessories that just make it a lot easier when working with this drone and so you can see here on the screen here's the prices of the flymore package with the more expensive controller for each one of these drones so there's different price points for each drone and once you find the Drone that you're looking for you're going to want to have to decide if one battery and the cheaper controller is enough or if you want to get the flymore package which has all of the different accessories plus the three batteries now with all of these drones you should consider getting dji's care refresh program and they have options for either one year or 2 years and DJI will replace your drone for a small fee if you crash it if there's water damage if there's a fly away or just from natural wear and tear and so you could have coverage for either one year or 2 years so you have peace of mind when you're out flying and this is something that you purchase right when you get your drone and so if you want to see more information about the DJI care refresh I'll include a link down below description to where you can check out all the details about this program and the different prices for each one of these drones now there's three styles of controllers that you're going to be able to use with these drones there's the rcn1 or rcn2 which is going to be the most stripped down controller and this one you use your phone in and there's two versions of this depending on which transmission signal you're using and then the next size controller up is the DJI RC and there's two versions of the RC depending on which transmission you're using in your drone so both of these controllers have a screen built in and they have more features on the controller themselves to be able to give you more buttons and flexibility when you're flying the Drone and then there's the RC Pro which has even more advanced features and it has things like an HDMI out however this controller doesn't work with all of these drones you can only use this controller with the mavic 3 drones so if you're getting one of the other drones you're just going to decide between the version of controller that's going to hold your phone or the RC that has a screen built in personally I like the RC because it just makes it a lot easier to fly and I don't always have to have my phone in the controller now one of the big deciding factors of which drone you're going to want to get is going to be the weight so the mini3 and the Mini 4 Pro are both sub 250 g and so depending on where you're at in the world you might need a drone that's under 250 g and so you're going to want to stick with the Min series of drones the other drones are all going to be heavier and when you look at the air3 and the mavic 3 Series they're similar so the air3 is closer to size to the mavic 3s versus The Minis and the air3 is 720 G and the mavic 3 classic is 895 G and the mavic 3 Pro is 958 G however with all of these drones they still are small enough to fit into your backpack and so I just want to show you side by side here is all three of these drones with the RC controller in my backpack and you can see how much space the mavic 3 Series takes up versus the air series versus the miniseries and so if you're someone who's really focused on travel or you need small drones well the mini might be a good option because they are so small and also with a small drone comes smaller Batteries Now the controller is going to be the same for all of them so it's not just the size of the Drone but it's all the accessories that you bring with it however even with the mavic 3 Series being larger they're still easy to travel with I've taken my mavic 3 Pro on different documentary trips and I've easily kept it in my backpack when I'm going on the plane and when I'm out hiking with the Drone the good thing about all of these drones and DJI lineup is they're all small and compact to be able to take with you anywhere it just depends on how much space you really want to save and if the Mini 3 makes sense with the other features versus getting one of the bigger drones now also with size and weight you're going to have more wind resistance on the heavier drone they have more power and they are heavier when you're working with the miniseries they're lighter and they can be pushed around a little bit more than the mavic 3 so if you're working in super windy environments that might be something to consider and your mavic 3 drones are going to perform much better than the miniseries now probably the biggest difference between all of these drones is the camera and the gimbal setup and so on the mini and the air you have a one and 1/3 in sensor now the big difference with the air is you have two cameras so you have one WI lens and then you have one telephoto lens and this is a huge advantage of the air3 now on the mavic 3 you have a 4/3 in Hustle BL camera so you have a really nice sensor on these bigger drones and it's also a much bigger sensor so you're going to be able to get better photos and especially when you're shooting in lower light situations now the big difference between the mavic 3 classic and the mavic 3 Pro is the amount of cameras so on the mavic 3 classic you just have one wide camera that's equivalent to a 24 mm but on the mavic 3 Pro you have three cameras so you have a 24 mm a 70 mm and then 166 mm so you have a wide range of focal links that you can use when you're out filming and so across the entire lineup the wide lens is always a 24 mm you'll find that on every drone the air3 has a 70 mm second camera so it gives you this super zoomed in punched in look and on the mavic 3 Pro you have that same 70 mm telephoto but then you also have that 166 that gives you a ton of range when you're out filming to really zoom in on your subject now on the air3 both cameras are the exact same sensor it's both the 1 and 1/3 in sensor and the wide camera opens up to an f1.7 and the telephoto opens up to an f2.8 now on the miniseries they're both 24 mm at an f1.7 when you get into the mavic 3 Classic this is where there's a huge differentiating factor between the mavic and the rest of the drones so on the mavic drones you have a variable aperture meaning that you can change it it goes from an f2.8 to an F1 11 gives you a lot of flexibility to be able to change up the look of what you're creating but also if you're using something like ND filters you could just close down your aperture instead of having to put an ND filter on front of your lens and so it's going to give you more flexibility when you're flying in the sky especially when you're shooting full manual because you'll be able to use your aperture to adjust your exposure versus having to rely on your shutter speed and your ISO to do all of your changes now on the mavic 3 Pro the second and third camera are not the same sensor as that 4/3 Hustle BL camera so the medium is a 1 and 1/3 in sensor just like the air3 and then that 166 mm is a/2 in sensor so you do have a little bit of a difference between all three sensors on the mavic 3 Pro on the 70 mm it's an f2.8 and on the 166 mm it's an F 3.4 so you also have an aperture difference between all of the cameras and so for me personally when I've been working with the mavic 3 Pro versus the air3 I like the fact that the air3 has the same two sensors so that when I'm switching between my cameras it makes it a lot easier to match the footage there is a slight difference when you're switching between all three cameras on the mavic 3 Pro however working with this drone geared towards creators who do want to have more control of your image and it just takes a little adjusting in your editing software to make all three cameras match perfectly now another huge differentiating factor between all of these drones is going to be obstacle avoidance and really it's the difference of the Mini 3 versus all the rest so the Mini 3 has no obstacle avoidance and with that there's no tracking or way points on all of the other drones you have 360 obstacle avoidance so this allows you to fly with a level of confidence because you'll know that you're not going to run into objects when your obstacle avoidance is turned on and so when you're working with the obstacle avoidance on these drones if you're flying to the side to the front up or down it's going to be able to detect objects so that it doesn't run into them and so when you have this obstacle avoidance you have things like tracking and all of these drones except for the mini3 have tracking now the tracking is a little bit different between each however they have the same features where you could track from in front behind off to the side off to some corner and there's access to active track which is going to be following a subject Spotlight which allows you to control and keep your subject centered the entire time or point of Interest where the drone's going to continue to do an orbit around a subject while it's tracking it and I'll include a video down below description that really digs into the tracking in these drones so you can see how it works and how flexible it is when you're out flying now in terms of tracking all of these drones have quick shots which is a stylized shot that the Drone automat automatically creates and so this is the only style of tracking that you have in the mini3 and so for example here is a boomerang shot where the Drone starts in close it Loops out and around and it comes back and you have these different quick shots that are accessible in all of the drones now what's cool on the drones that have the longer lens like the air3 or the mavic 3 Pro you can use those longer lenses when you're tracking and also when you're doing things like your quick shots and so the next important feature is the way that it records your footage so all of these drones do both jpeg raw for photography so if you need to shoot Raw photos you have access to that on all of these drones now a big difference comes into when you're shooting video and if you want more control especially when you're color grading your footage so on the mini 3 you only have access to a normal color profile and so this is going to give you just a baked in contrast and saturation and it's also an 8bit 420 image so you're not going to have a whole lot of room to color grade now on the mini 4 Pro you get 8 Bit And you get 10 bit so there's a dlog m option which is going to shoot a flat color profile and this also shoots in 10 bit 42 so you're going to have more room to color grade with this drone now on the air3 you have the same dlog M with the same 10bit 42o and this is on both cameras so you could color grade all of this footage the same now when you get to the mavic lineup of drones you not only get normal and dlog M but you also get dlog which is an even flatter profile giving you more range to color grade now I've created an entire set of drone LS that are specifically geared towards dlog m you've been seeing those throughout this entire video this is a set of color profiles that make it super easy to color grade your footage when you're working with dlog M on any of these drones and so if you want to see more information around this set of drone LS I'll include those down below in the description now with the mavic series of drones you get 10 bit 422 which gives you more data so that you have more ability to color grade your footage so in the Mini 3 it records at 100 megabits per second on the mini 4 Pro and the air3 it records at 150 megabits per second and on on the mavic 3 it records at 200 megabits per second so you get more information with the mavic series of drones now this is where the mavic 3 Pro C comes in because with that drone you also get access to Apple prores so you get a more professional codec that makes it easier to integrate with higher-end Productions and so the cine version of the mavic 3 Pro is that much more expensive because of this ability to shoot at these higher data rates which just give you a lot more flexibility to work on your project and also with the cine version you get a 1 tab inter internal hard drive so you don't have to have an external memory card when you're working with that drone so on the mavic 3 Pro mavic 3 classic and air3 you get 8 GB of internal memory now on the mini 4 Pro you only get 2 GB of internal memory and on the mini 3 you don't get any internal memory and so really the internal memory is only on the mavic 3 Pro cine version the other ones have just enough to grab a few shots if you forget a memory card but most likely you'll want to always use a memory card when you're working with all the other drones now in terms terms of flight time all of them are relatively similar unless you're working on the lighter battery for the mini3 series so if you need to keep your drone under 250 g there's a smaller battery for the Mini 3 and the mini4 pro which allows you to keep that lower weight class and so on these drones you have two battery options you have the small battery and then the larger extended flight battery and so for the Mini 3 you get 38 minutes of flight time on the smaller battery and 51 minutes on the bigger battery on the mini 4 Pro you get 34 minutes with the smaller battery and 45 minutes with the larger battery on the air3 there's only one battery style and you get 46 minutes of flight time with that battery on the mavic 3 classic you also get 46 minutes and then on the mavic 3 Pro you get 43 minutes and so with all of these drones that are available now they all get a good amount of flight time up in that 40-minute range and so there's not a major difference between them unless you're getting that smaller battery now one big difference that I've personally noticed when I'm flying all these drones is the speed at which these drones Ascend descend and take take off and fly away and so the mini drones are going to be much slower than the air3 and the mavic 3 and I'm going to put all of these times up on screen just so you could see them all side by side and you can see that the Mini 3 and the Mini 4 Pro are much less than the air3 and the mavic 3 drone the air3 and the mavic 3 are very similar with the air3 being the fastest out of all of these drones when it comes to an overall takeoff descend and horizontal speed and so if you're someone who needs to get your drone up you want to be able to move fast you're going to want to get the air3 or the mavic 3 drones you'll notice when you're flying on the mini 3 Series that they feel a little bit more sluggish especially when you fly the drones back to back now personally it's not that big of a deal they still fly at a good Pace however it is something noticeable if you do want that extra speed and you want to go super fast if you're say flying across the landscape or if you want a drone that can get up in the sky quick and take off and get to the location to start flying without taking a whole lot of time now let's talk about frame rates that you have access to in all of these drones the Mini 3 only goes up to 4K 30 frames per second and it does full HD up to 60 frames per second the Mini 4 Pro goes up to 4K 100 frames per second and HD up to 200 frames per second so you can get some super slow-mo with the mini4 pro now the air3 has the same as the mini4 pro so it goes up to a 4K 100 frames per second and Full HD up to 200 frames per second and then on the mavic 3 with the HOSA blood camera you can go up to 5.1k at 50 frames per second and for 4K it goes up to 120 frames per second now that changes with the 70 mm and 166 mm because those cameras only go up to 4K 60 Fram per second so all of these drones do have good slow motion options except for the Mini 3 which is going to be limited by which frame rates you have access to in that drone now another big differentiating factor between all of these drones is going to be vertical shooting so the Mini 3 and the mini4 pro both have a camera that rotates so you could do Native vertical shooting if you do want to shoot in that format now on the air3 you have a vertical mode but it's limited a 2.7k resolution and this is because it's just cropping in on the horizontal sensor to give you that vertical image now in the mavic 3 there's no vertical mode and you just have to crop in on your horizontal image so if you're someone who's going to be shooting vertical content the mini3 or the Mini 4 Pro are going to be good options because you have that true vertical shooting with the rotating camera now also a differentiating factor is going to be your transmission so on the mini- 3 you have O2 transmission on the mini 4 Pro and the mini air3 you have 04 transmission which is going to be the best transmission out of dji's drones it's going to give you up to 20 km or 12 M of range between the Drone and the controller and that's using line of sight if it goes behind a mountain you'll lose signal but it gives you a ton of range for this controller to the Drone so that you just have more confidence when you're out flying so that you have a strong signal now on the mavic 3 you have 03 plus transmission so it's not as good as 04 however this is the transmission that the RC Pro uses and so that's why you can work with the more advanced controller with the mavic series of drones now when it comes down to deciding which drone is the best for you I really think it comes down to what it is that you're shooting and how much the weight impacts and also how many cameras that you want to have when you're out filming personally the 70 mm camera is something that I want to take with me when I'm filming because the 70 mm gives you such a unique perspective that you don't get on most drones you usually have the wide lens which is great however that 70 mm especially when I'm working with a subject just gives you so much compression and just a completely different look that has more of this cinematic quality and so for me the air3 and the mavic 3 Pro are two drones that I try to take out whenever I'm out filming because with these drones you have that extra lens capability that gives you just more creative potential more options when you're out filming however if you want to keep your bag super slim down but still have a lot of flexibility especially when it comes to something like color grading then the Mini 4 Pro is going to be the Drone that you're going to want to get but if you're someone who's going to be working with clients you might want to get the most out of your drone and so you'll probably want the mavic 3 Pro cine version so that you have the most flexibility when you get to your editing software but if you're someone who just wants to take some family photos you just want to shoot some drones when you're out with your friends well then the mini3 might be the best option for you because it's the cheapest it's the lightest it's the smallest going to be the easiest to fly but one of the major things that might set you away from the mini3 series is no obstacle avoidance and no tracking or any of those other features overall I think all of the drones are great depending on the situation that you're flying in and if you want to see more details about each of these drones side by side DJI has a comparison tool on their website and you can put which drones you're thinking about side by side and look at all of the data to figure out if one looks better than the other for your specific situation now also I've created beginner guides for each one of these drones and so if you really want to see fully in-depth how these drones work and all the features that you get in each drone I'll include links to all of those beginner guides Down Below in the description and if you want to know which drone that I person personally like the most it's the air3 I think it has the best combination of being a super portable drone but the flexibility of having those multiple cameras and I like the fact that both cameras are the same sensor so it makes it a lot easier to work with it when I'm in my editing software and I like the smaller footprint of the air3 so I have a little bit more space in my backpack when I'm out filming now if you're going to be using your drone to make YouTube videos well I have a whole course series that teaches you how to be a Creator and how to grow a YouTube channel and everything that I did to get this channel over a million subscribers you could check it out over at the Creator film school.com and if you haven't already make sure you hit that subscribe button and let me know down in the comments which drone is the best for you but next you should check out one of these videos over here which shows you how to use these drones to get the best looking footage when you're out flying I'll see you on the next one

Channel: Jeven Dovey

Views: 112,906

Keywords: jeven dovey, creator film school, ultimate drone comparison, Ultimate Drone Buying Guide for Total Beginners, drone buying guide, drone buying guide for beginners, best budget drones, ultimate drone buying guide, best beginner drone, best drone, best dji drone, best drones for beginners, best beginner drones, drones side by side, drone buyers guide 2023

Id: 3v3zt9fK5Sw

Length: 19min 47sec (1187 seconds)

Published: Thu Nov 02 2023