LEVEL UP my DRONE game: "Why?" and "How?"

I am super excited for my new tool for video making!

After some weeks of thinking about my real needs and plans for the future and questioning them over and over again, I decided to buy a new drone for my video making workflow. It costs around 5 times more than my current drone but the specs are minimum 5 times better.

the DJI mavic 2 pro

picture from dji homepage

It has got some awesome features including a 3-axis gimbal, a 1 inch camera sensor, around 30 minutes flight time, 100 Mbps video bitrate, max 5km range (CE) and much much much more.

now let's head over to my background story of this purchase:

For some months now I am using the Yuneec Breeze 4K which is an awesome little drone for beginners with pretty good video quality. It costs around 290€ with 2 battery packs and a controller what makes it absolutely affordable and outstanding on the drone market. But please keep in mind: this is a selfie drone and it is designed to make videos or pictures in short distance and without challenging weather and light conditions.

picture from yuneec site

Because I learned a lot with this drone I think it was the perfect purchase at the beginning of my "drone flying career" and I am super happy that I bought it some months ago. But there are 3 main things I am not satisfied anymore on my current level of drone flying and led me to search for something new.

image and flight stability:

The Yuneec Breeze 4K has a 2-axis gimbal which delivers good stabilized footage in 2 directions. The max resolution is actually 4K but then without digital stabilization (which is enough for pictures - but not for videos). But if the wind is blowing a bit and your drone is rotating in the Z axis - you see this on the footage in little stuttering movements.
But: When there is no wind - you don't have any problems. Especially with the controller, you can record super nice and smooth footage and the drone is worth the money when you are open to record just in these situations or if you are okay with a bit shaky footage.

missing possibility to record a sunset:

The second problem is the low light performance. "Low light" begins with the best time to capture videos: sunset. I tried to capture some usable footage for 3 or 4 times in the sunset (beautiful red sky and soft shadows..) but I was never able to use it in one of my videos. The camera sensor is just too small to capture enough information about the scene why the result will be pretty dark, noisy and flat. Of course again: If you are recording in daylight - you will not have any problems with the low depth of information of the image. I captured super nice and detailed footage in sunlight.

wifi and range:

The Yuneec Breeze 4K open up its own wifi you need to connect in order to control the drone. This is a bit annoying before the first start because the wifi needs some seconds to minutes for establishing. The main problem for my purposes of a drone is the limited range of that kind of network. I was able to fly over 80 meters (which is pretty far for a "Selfie drone") but after this, the connection gets lost and the drone returns to start point. Also, the transferred camera image is in a pretty bad 720p with a lot of latency depending on weather and surrounding houses.

my conclusion:

I was super satisfied with this drone, its footage and its capabilities for several months. But with practice, you are coming to a level where you want to try out other things and you want to reduce the restrictions to fly time, weather and area. Because I love drone flying and capturing videos in the air, I decided to level up my drone game. Now I am binge watching drone tutorials and cinematic Mavic 2 Pro videos and I am happy to have it in my hand... tomorrow.

The price point of my new drone is 5 times higher than my old one. But I know this will lead to much better video quality, much more flying fun and better use of my abilities and the spots I am planning to record.

Thanks for your time and your feedback in the comments!

P.S. Thanks to @captainbob and @art.visuals for their good tips and suggestions!
I value your opinion really high and will let you know what I experienced with my new tool.

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