REVIEW: DJI Phantom 3 [Standard]

REVIEW: DJI Phantom 3 [Standard]

A few months ago I purchased my first ever drone… I can’t believe they were out for so long before I chose to buy one! They’re awesome! Anyway, I opted for the DJI Phantom 3 Standard Edition. Here is my general overview of the Phantom 3 and I will be uploading a few ‘how-to’ videos or my own shortly.

DJI Innovations may easily be seen as being the market-leader of everything drone and the DJI Phantom their flagship. The Phantom is the perfect craft for those new to the hobby (like me!) and provides a ready built, calibrated and ready to fly craft direct from the box. Furthermore, DJI was the first to offer a simple GoPro mount on the base enabling you to film incredible bird’s eye footage.

This is most certainly the go-to craft for capturing awesome video and photo stills; this is now its major selling point. The Phantom 3 Standard model joins their latest line-up of Phantoms and features a 2.7K camera capable of capturing both video and stills, live view option for streaming to a mobile device, an intelligent flight controller and over 20 minutes of flight time (I managed to get mine to do 26 minutes last week).

The DJI Phantom Standard, like the rest of the range, comes equipped with a excellent quality camera mounted on a motorised gimbal. The camera itself features a 1/2.3-inch, 12M pixel sensor; capable of capturing 2.7K video @ 30fps, 1080p @ 48 fps or 720p @ 60fps. The ability to capture 2.7K video puts it slightly ahead of the next model up in one respect, but the Phantom Advanced can shoot 1080p at a higher frame rate of 60fps, which will probably be more appealing to the higher end videographer. The lens is a fixed F2.8 with a 94 degree field of view, which is a 20mm equivalent lens in 35mm terms. This lens helps to avoid any kind of fisheye distortion that is often seen using cameras of this size; instead, this camera gives a pleasing distortion-free image. The Standard’s camera offers a variety of modes and settings thus enabling you to shoot both video and stills in Program or Manual mode. These settings can all be easily adjusted through the DJI Go app. Adjustments include an ISO range of 100-3200 (video) 100-1600 (photo), electronic shutter speeds of 8s – 1/8000s and a choice of resolution resolution.

The Standard is quite different to the Professional and Advanced models, despite also having many similarities. The style and overall design remains much the same and as with the other two models the spacing of the landing gear has been widened in order to avoid it appearing in your footage. The battery is the same new 4480 mAH 15.2 v LiPo which I managed to squeeze out 26 minutes of flight the other week. The camera and gimbal also look the same but there is a difference in camera recording sizes and output – like the other models, the camera takes a MicroSD card to store all video and stills files. The difference between this and the other two models visually is subtle but the major differences are in the technology. Visually the motors are all positioned upright in line with earlier models, rather than the slight tilt that are seen in the Professional and Advanced Phantoms. This tilt makes a small but noticeable difference to stability so it’s a shame not to see it here. Of course, the technology is where the real differences lie, with ‘live view’ streaming from craft to mobile device using WiFi (rather than DJI’s lightbridge technology) so connection and streaming isn’t at quite as high a quality or as smooth by comparison, but it’s by no means bad. The sensor and lens may be small but they produce superb, crisp quality footage that captures plenty of tone and detail. The ability to adjust the exposure and sensitivity enables plenty of creative control.

Looking through our test footage far shows the video is rich in colour and tone, and the lens and sensor combination captures a good sharp image across the frame. Paused footage does show signs of detail and tonal graduation loss, but no more than you’d expect from any other camera of this size.

The remote controller is similar to the one supplied with the older Phantom 2, and features two sticks to control the throttle, rotation and tilt of the craft. There are also two switches on the left and right, S1 and S2, and depending on the mode and status of the craft these are used for configuration and automatic home recall. There is also a dial on the left to control the gimbal’s tilt either up or down – but no direct control to operate the camera. The Standard model is far more reliant on the app than the other two Phantom 3 models for the basic operation of the camera because start stop recording cannot be activated either directly on the camera or through the controller. Once the DJI Go app has been downloaded the connection process is shown on the interface.

The Phantom 3 appears directly in the WiFi devices list of your mobile device and once it’s selected and the app re-opened, clicking the ‘Enter Camera View’ button launches the app interface and the LiveView starts. Even over a WiFi connection the quality of the feed is surprisingly good and although there is pixelation in the footage it still gives you a really good idea of the composition and exposure. The delay between real events and what appears on screen is a fraction of a second, far better than you’d expect from the majority of action cameras that offer a similar feature. The range of the WiFi link is limited compared with the Lightbridge connection of the other two Phantom 3 models but is still impressive; in an open space we managed a good 200m with only minimal dropout.

The app gives you direct access to the camera settings. Both video and stills have Program or Manual modes and here you can adjust the exposure compensation in Program mode and ISO and Shutter Speed in Manual. Once you’ve selected the setting you want, the red shutter button on the interface can be clicked to start and stop recording. Once recording has commenced a small red light on the camera indicates that recording has started. Further settings can be changed in the camera settings section with access to resolution and file formats. In stills mode this gives you the option to shoot in either JPG or RAW.

The Phantom 3 Standard may be the entry level model, but it offers everything that the videographer or photographer could ever want when first starting out. Its simple design and operation make it incredible easy to fly, and the ability to control settings along with a reliable live view stream make it easy to compose and adjust exposure in order to easily capture the footage you want. The Standard model misses out on some of the features available in the Professional and Advanced models but that doesn’t lessen the fun and usefulness of this small craft.

In my opinion, the Standard is like nothing else on the market for the price – It is as easy to use and boasts such high quality footage comparable to drones twice the price!

This guy does an awesome video review of the drone... please take a look!