• Shoot in RAW for flexibility — RAW files retain more detail for editing, while JPEGs are better for quick sharing.
• Use visual aids like histograms and gridlines — These help with exposure and composition, making it easier to capture balanced, well-framed shots.
• Enable focus and exposure tools — Peaking levels and overexposure warnings help ensure sharp focus and avoid blown-out highlights.
• Choose between Auto and Pro modes — Auto adjusts settings for you, while Pro lets you manually control ISO, shutter speed, and more.
• Customize settings to streamline workflow — Set white balance manually for consistent color, and use custom file names for better organization.

In this lesson, you’ll learn about your drone’s camera settings. Many people are intimidated by all the different settings and options in the drone flight software. Please don’t feel that way. A lot of this is easier to understand than you might think, and that’s really the goal of this lesson — to make you comfortable and confident with your camera settings.

I’ll talk about the different shooting modes and specific settings including file formats, histograms, peaking levels, gridlines, white balance, all kinds of fun stuff.

And I will be using the DJI Fly app on my DJI Mavic 3 Pro to teach these concepts. Now, it might look different from the specific drone you’re using, or maybe DJI will update the firmware and this’ll all look different in a few months, but the idea is the same. Most professional camera drone models have comparable settings. If you have any questions about your specific drone model, don’t hesitate to reach out.

OK, let’s jump in.

I’m in the DJI Fly app, and again, you might not be flying a DJI drone, or maybe your DJI Fly app looks different from mine, and that’s OK. 

I want to start with the two different modes — photo and video. Make sure you understand how to flip back and forth between photo and video mode. When you’re in photo mode, at least in the DJI Fly app, you’re being shown photo settings. And when you’re in video mode, you’re being shown video settings.

There are two ways to flip back and forth between photo and video mode. First, you can do this on your remote control by clicking the camera icon button to initiate photo mode and the red circle icon button to initiate video mode. Again, camera icon for photo mode and the red circle for video mode.

The second way to toggle back and forth is by using the app. Within the DJI Fly app, if you look on the right side, the small white box above the circle lets you toggle between the different modes. And you can see that, with the DJI Mavic 3 Pro model, this column on the right here is the primary set of modes, and I’m not just getting photo and video. I’m seeing things like MasterShots, QuickShots, Hyperlapse, and Pano. Let’s set those aside for now, because they’ll be covered later in the course.

You can see that when I switch back and forth between Photo and Video, I’m given an additional set of options in this secondary menu column on the left.

We are in the Photo section of this course, so let’s set the mode to Photo and then Single, which simply means we’re taking a single photo. And now that we have selected our mode, I’d like to show you the general camera settings, which can be found in the top right of the screen, by clicking the three dots. Then we select Camera from the menu at the top, and I want to spend some time going through this area of the software.

The first thing I’d like to talk about is the file format. Here, you get to decide the file type of your saved drone photos. You can save your photos as JPEG files, RAW files, or as both JPEG and RAW files. 

JPEG files are great for quick sharing or previewing, but you don’t get as much image data with them. If you plan to do any kind of professional post-production, I’d recommend shooting in RAW. RAW files give you the maximum amount of detail and flexibility in post-production. Now, something to keep in mind is the file size. JPEG files are typically 5-10 MB, while RAW files are much larger at 30-40 MB. If you’re shooting with a large SD card, this shouldn’t be a problem, but it’s definitely a consideration.

OK, next is the Aspect Ratio. I’d recommend keeping this at 4:3, which is the standard photo ratio, and you get maximum data this way. You can always crop to 16:9 in post-production. 16:9 is that wider, more cinematic look. 

I always keep the Anti-Flicker settings to Auto. This is only a consideration if you’re flying your drone indoors with a lot of artificial light, or more commonly at night, and we cover that in a separate lesson in this course.

OK, next is the histogram, and this is a great tool to help you capture well-exposed images in different lighting conditions. By turning this on, you get a small box on your screen, and the graph inside this box represents the exposure of your image. It shows the distribution of brightness, from shadows on the left side to highlights on the right side. And what you want is a balanced histogram, where your image is not too dark or too bright. On the graph, you’re looking for a spread across the middle without peaks on the left or right sides. If your photo or video is underexposed, the histogram will spike on the left. If it’s overexposed, it’ll spike on the right.

OK, next is the peaking level, which helps you identify areas of sharp focus in your shot. If something is in focus, it gets outlined in this red color. It’s a quick way to confirm what’s in focus, especially on a small screen like your phone or the screen on your remote control. If you’re using manual focus, I definitely recommend turning this on.

Turning on your overexposure warning helps you identify areas in your shot that are too bright, or "blown out," where details are lost because there’s too much light. It does this by overlaying a zebra-striped pattern on the overexposed parts of the image, making it super easy to see, and as you adjust settings like ISO, shutter speed, or aperture, the stripes will appear or disappear accordingly, helping you fine-tune your exposure.

Gridlines are visual guides that divide the screen into sections. These lines don’t end up in your final image. They’re just helpful for composition. Common grid options include center or diagonal lines, and my favorite is this tic-tac-toe looking one that divides the screen into nine equal parts. This might look familiar, as we learned in a previous lesson that aligning your subject along these rule-of-third lines or at their intersections makes for a more engaging composition.

White balance adjusts the color temperature of your shots. You can set it to Auto, or you can give yourself more control by selecting Manual. It’s also common to see modes like Shade or Cloudy. Most of the time, being in Auto is fine and the most convenient choice, particularly for photography. One benefit of choosing a custom white balance — for example, Sunny — is that the image will appear warmer in color. If you’re shooting during sunset or sunrise, this can give you a boost in confidence as your images will generally look better straight out of the camera. This can lead you to seek out different compositions and get more creative when flying.

OK, next is Storage, and on this model, you can see that I’ve got an SD card that I put into the drone with 128 GB free, or I can also use the drone’s internal storage of 8 GB. I prefer using SD cards, but the drone’s internal storage is a nice back-up option.

Finally, and this is relatively new in the DJI Fly app, you’re being given the option to customize your folder and file names. This lets you assign a prefix to each file, so instead of the default file names, you can label files with meaningful identifiers (e.g., "BeachShoot_001"). This can be really helpful when managing large volumes of footage, or if you’re moving around to multiple locations, as it helps streamline sorting and reduces the time spent organizing files in post-production.

OK, these are your general camera settings. I want to hop out of this menu now and show you one more area, the bottom right. Because this is where you toggle back and forth between Auto mode and Pro mode. In Auto mode, the drone automatically adjusts certain camera settings for you, while Pro mode lets you manually fine-tune the settings. So here you’re looking at Auto mode, and you’re getting some of the same settings we went over. If you click on Storage, you can see whether or not you’re storing files to your SD card or internally to the drone itself. If you click on Format, you can toggle between JPEG, RAW, and JPEG + RAW, and if you click on EV, you can adjust your exposure levels, even in Auto.

Now, if you click on the camera icon and switch things to Pro, anywhere you click on the left will open up a menu of options. On the bottom, there are two icons. The one on the left lets you adjust White Balance, Format, Aspect Ratio and Storage, and the one on the right lets you adjust some other settings that I will go over in the next few lessons.

But I do want to call out M.M., which stands for Manual Metering or Metering Mode. It indicates the exposure value difference between the current camera settings (ISO, shutter speed, and aperture) and what the camera considers the "correct" exposure based on its metering system.

When M.M. shows 0.0, the exposure is balanced according to the camera's light meter. Positive values (e.g., +1.0) indicate overexposure, while negative values (e.g., -1.0) indicate underexposure. Adjusting the ISO, shutter speed, or aperture can bring the M.M. value closer to 0.0, helping you achieve a well-exposed shot.

OK, those are your general camera settings, and getting comfortable with them will ultimately give you more creative control over your drone shots. Don’t worry about getting it all perfect right away — try experimenting with one setting at a time until you see how it affects your photos.

I’ll see you in the next lesson!