As a UK resident who currently does not have the certificate, I had to be very careful where I flew the Air 3S. Living on the coast at least meant I could fly it over the sea, where it could easily stay the required distance from people, buildings, parks and beaches. However, if I lived in the middle of a large town or city, I would find the restrictions too frustrating and would opt for an ultralight drone that can fly anywhere, like the DJI Mini 4 Pro. I suspect most casual drone users feel the same way.
Twice as nice
Those who decide to pass the courses and take care of the paperwork will enjoy excellent rewards for their time, patience and money. If the camera performance of the previous Air 3 was impressive, that of the Air 3S is impressive. The new 1-inch sensor offers 14 stops of dynamic range and excels in challenging lighting, producing images rich in detail and with little noise at dusk and even at night. I took the sample photos (above) in DNG RAW (the wide-angle camera shoots at 50 megapixels; the telephoto lens at 48 megapixels) and edited them with Adobe Lightroom, while the sample video was captured in D-Log M 10 bits. and color graded and corrected with DaVinci Resolve Studio. I had a great time editing the footage, as the original 10-bit files offered a lot of possibilities to work with. However, it is not necessary to shoot in D-Log M; The cameras support standard color profiles in 8- and 10-bit quality and 10-bit HLG.
There is a wide selection of great video and photography options available. While the Air 3S can’t record 5.7K footage (something the DJI Mavic 3 Pro offers), it can record regular 4K video at up to 60fps, 4K slow motion clips at 120fps, and Full HD slow motion clips at 240fps. fps. It can also record videos in 9:16 vertical format, ideal for quick posting to social media channels, with a more than acceptable resolution of 2.7K and 60 fps.
Of course, I wouldn’t say the cameras are perfect. The lack of adjustable apertures makes a set of neutral density (ND) filters almost a mandatory purchase for anyone shooting video during the day, and even then, changing filters is a complicated process. Hopefully, that’s an update we’ll see DJI introduce with the Air 4, when it arrives.