The Curious Case of the Stacked Camera Sensor (It's a Bit of a Rant)
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 29 ก.ย. 2023
- With the Air 3’s release some TH-cam influencers dropped a new buzzword - stacked sensor. Wanting to know more about it, I went to DJI’s website to find out more. After coming up empty, my curiosity intensified and down the rabbit hole I went.
Do the DJI Mini 3/3 Pro/4 Pro and Air 3 all use the same stacked camera sensor?
As always, thanks for watching!
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Ha! Perfect Steve. I've heard so many contradictory reports of what sensor is stacked which one isn't Air 3, Mini 3, Mini 4 etc.! The most important metric is how the finished product looks, and DJI just keeps improving. Thank you for this video!
Thanks for watching Marcus and thanks for the comment! Yeah, you're right, it's really all about image quality, not sensor size. This whole exercise was all about getting a straight answer because it was driving me crazy to hear all the conflicting opinions. Cheers!
Great video and finally answers the question once and for all for me.
Thanks Charles!
Hi Steve. I think you'll find this interesting:
I'm not into sensor formats/sizes, so I just thought that 1/1.3 was bigger than 1. Because I thought 1/1.3 means height x length or something like that. And now I understand it means X divided by Y.
Thanks
Yeah, I think I made that same mistake when I first saw that notation. Most of my sensor knowledge came from the good old DSLR days, now mirrorless, when you had sizes like Full Frame, APS-C and Four-Thirds. The biggest worry was crop factor with your lenses. Thanks for watching and thanks for the comment!
Thanks for the informative videos regarding the stacked sensor. Really appreciate it, Steve. 😇
Thanks and thanks for watching Nazwan! Cheers!
Love you Steve, thanks for doing the research for the community.
Haha! Thanks so much for the kind words. My pleasure, it was driving me CRAZY! Cheers!
Great,thanks!
Thanks for watching!
Thank you Steve 👍
Thank you for watching!
Great video !! I totaly agree ! 👍👍
Thanks! I really appreciate the view and the comment. Cheers!
Excellent. Thank you for all your efforts on this Steve and for consolidating what I have thought to be the case all along - and thereby saving me a shed-load of money!
Through all the marketing HYPE (!! 😉) I see absolutely NO reason - at all - to move away from my Mini 3 Pro. It delivers everything I need!
(Thankfully, I am NOT one of those that 'must be seen using the latest and 'greatest' equipment'!)
Haha! You're welcome and thanks for watching! The Mini 3 Pro is an AWESOME drone and improved on the previous generation of Mini in EVERY way. The low-light improvement from Mini 2 to Mini 3 Pro was stunning all in itself. Cheers!
Thanks for the research, I did much the same thing looking for information & pouring over numerous spec sheets, listening to TH-cam videos & basically churning out no real clues over several weeks of randomly searching for data on this. I'm going with the Air 3 regardless of the sensor b/c I need the additional lens & eventually I'll jump up the ladder to the Mavic 3 Pro Cine anyway. At the end of the day if DJI has achieved a better image with a smaller sensor by upgrading their processor's transmission speed & the image has improved over the Mini 4 Pro I don't think it matters that much how they achieved it. A larger sensor is nice but my work is going to be viewed on phones, tablets & laptops for the most part any way. Being able to have the flexibility to get shots that differentiate from the standard 24mm in 4K is fine for now. Keep up the good work this was very helpful.
Thanks so much for the kind words and the comment. I appreciate both. You're totally right - better is better regardless of how it's achieved. Happy, safe flying!
Was torn between the air & mavic classic. Thanks for the information, i know to go for the classic now without a doubt.
Glad it was helpful, cheers!
Not a drone enthusiast (yet) but I design CMOS image sensor for a fortune 100. A stacked sensor simply means all of the peripheral circuitry (everything except pixels) is placed another chip (ASIC) and the pixel chip is stacked on top of the ASIC. And yes, because the ASIC is no a separate chip, more computational power can be incorporated on it
Cool. Thanks for the technical explanation. Cheers!
This has been a hot topic in the community since before the release of the MIni 4 Pro. With some saying it's stacked, and others saying it isn't stacked. Even when you contact DJI support, you get different answers depending on who talk to that day. So thanks for making video, and giving us a bit of clarity on whats going on. Thanks for sharing Steve, and I hope you are doing well.
Yeah, it's been driving me crazy and I finally had to get it of my chest. Without someone actually ripping apart the camera, it's impossible to know for sure but there is certainly a lot of evidence supporting that it's the same stacked sensor from the Mini 3 Pro. Thanks for the comment, thanks for watching and I hope you are doing good as well. Cheers!
Thank you! I liked and subscribed .
Thanks for watching and thanks for the sub!
Hi Steve, very good ! Thanks for the info. Just got my Air 3 ... I love the Air series, upgraded from Mavic Air 2.
No much restriction here in Israel ... for now.
Enjoying you videos very much. Best regards, Roni:.
Thanks Roni! The Air 3 seems like a sweet little bird and a really nice upgrade from the Air 2. Happy, safe flying!
@@SteveCoutts Thanks.
@@SteveCoutts Congrats ... you're a "Drone Nation" celeb :) very good !
@@RoniWay Haha, thanks Roni! They are a great group of guys and it was great that they asked me to come on the show. Fun conversation! Cheers!
All of the semicon companies now do stacked sensors. I work in semicons and it is an industry standard. We do stacked sensors for everything, not just photo/video cameras, but also obstacle sensing (not just for drones, actually drones are the smallest industry for obstacle sensing, automotive is the biggest industry using obstacle sensing cameras), IR/thermal, LiDARs, everything. And usually these stacked sensors aren't even manufactured by a single company, but ASIC part is one manufacturer and sensor is another. We started stacking 3 years ago in our company, but sony has been stacking for 10 years already because before a chip gets into production, there is roughly 5 years of R&D. Air 2s is a stacked Sony sensor. Also, air 3, mini 4 pro, mini 3 pro, mini 3 and mavic 3 pro 3x telecamera use the same sensor die, only the ASIC die that gets hybrid bonded to the sensor die and handles signal (image) processing is updated. Well, to be exact, chip stacking has been here for ages, only difference it has been done by bonding two dies through bondpads and now we do it using hybrid bonding. Bondpads were around 100 micrometers big metal pads that you placed a solder on and solder the other die onto. So basically we shouldn't be really talking about stacking, but rather hybrid bonding, since that is the terminus technicus that hides in the "stacking" buzzword. Now it is done using "pads" of 1 micrometer size and smaller. They just create copper squares on the chip as if it was any other metal routing, push the two dies together using high pressure and temperature and they bond together just like that, without any solder. It is tricky to center the both dies, it is tricky to keep them from warping, but it results in significantly smaller chips. And that is all there is to it, it makes chips smaller so you can cramp more things into smaller form factor. So you can have 4 cameras in your phone, so you can have small drones record high FPS video and stuff like that. It does not improve image quality, it improves image processing and image processing chip size.
Cool! Thanks for all the extra detail.
How mad is this, i was literally looking up similar info as yourself re the sensor, and as you say, the lack of info re the 'stacked' sensor etc. great to see you back Steve as youve not been as prolific with videos as i remember. Stay safe buddy.😀👍
It was driving me crazy for two months and I finally had to get something out there. You're right, I have not been as prolific, especially compared to those early years on TH-cam. A combination of burnout and competing priorities has made it difficult at times. 2021 was terrible, I bounced back in 2022 but 2023 got off to a rocky start. I feel I have a bit of momentum now so I'm just trying to get that going without burning myself out.
Thanks for sticking around through the lean years and thanks for all the comments and support. I feel like I knew your name at some point but have forgotten. Please remind me. Cheers!
@@SteveCoutts i know that feeling, i used to get stuff out virtually every week but when youtube moved the goal post for monetising it left me feeling worthless and with no incentive. I still dont have huge numbers of followers but here i am still banging stuff out, ha ha ha why oh why do we do it.
@@inkyspider1 Yeah, TH-cam can definitely be a demoralizing experience. As long as you enjoy it, stay the course.
Thank you Steve for, yes, cracking this mystery that DJI wouldn't put it out for us to see. Are you planning add (or upgrade to) the Mini 4 Pro to your collection and do more videos with it? Really glad you made this video - I like rants myself.
Haha! Thanks Dan! It was seriously driving me crazy so I wanted to say my piece and move on.
I have a Mini 4 Pro on order. It wasn't even on my radar however after it was released, I read all about it, made a video and I convinced myself it was a worthy upgrade. Cheers!
so good .... I HAD TO SHARE IN THE FACEBOOK GROUP !! Would be great to get you back on the show to talk about all this !! ;)
Haha! Thanks Bill! It's been bugging me for a while so I finally decided to put it out there and see what the community thought. Cheers!
@@SteveCoutts sent you an email !!
Great rant! For someone with an a DJI Air 2 S, a smaller sensor would seem like a step backwards. I can do a lot in post processing once the image has been recorded. Is the Air 3 better than the Air 2 S when it comes to the camera? Who knows, but it's not enough to make me throw out my drone and buy a new one 😆
Thanks! In my opinion, the Air 2S was one of the best drones DJI ever made. Near perfect combination of image quality and features in a compact package. Cheers!
Steve, you've made a great video about this 'stacked sensor'👍👏I've decided to upgrade from the Mini 3 Pro to the Mini 4 Pro for other reasons then the slightly better video quality (by the software) and will make my first flights with it soon. Also decided to keep my Mavic 3 Classic for now. The bigger sensor is more important for me now for higher quality video when needed compared to the smaller telephoto lens on the Air 3. In details on darker parts you can really see the advantages of a bigger camera sensor with variable aparture compared to a small stacked sensor. I will probably upgrade the Mavic 3 Classic drone when there comes a next version of the Air or Mavic series with also a C1 label in Europe with a bigger main and telephoto sensor (very tempting). For now I'm very satisfied with my Mini 4 Pro and the Mavic 3 Classic for different use cases. Greetings from 🇳🇱
Thanks Geert! After doing my research for another video, I came away quite impressed with what the Mini 4 Pro offers over the Mini 3 Pro. That upgrade is not going to make sense for everyone and the Mini 3 Pro is still an excellent drone, however some folks with benefit from 4's new capabilities.
The camera sensor in these Mini's now is VERY good but I agree with you, the larger sensors definitely bring the quality up several notches. In some respects I wish DJI had of fractured the Air line and offered a dual-camera version as well as one that continued with a one inch sensor. Same capabilities on both models, just larger sensor for the folks who wanted that over dual cameras. Who knows, maybe we will see something like that in the future.
Sounds like you've got it figured out regardless. Thanks for the comment and happy, safe flying!
Also not that the Mini 4pro side by side image comparisons look nearly identical to the Air 3 based on footage reviews. The Mini 4 Pro reviewers do not boast that it has a "stacked sensor" but better image processor. As you said, I think the image processer is the key to the superior image quality. Furthermore, I am still getting extremely great footage on my Air 2s as long as I am filming in Dlog and doing my own grading. All of these products produce great results. Will upgrade when there is a more substantial difference.
Without someone tearing the cameras apart, we will never know for sure but I am pretty confident all the drones I mention in the video are using the same, stacked sensor. The differentiator is better image processing, which as we can see, makes a HUGE difference. The Mini 3 Pro is an excellent drone but I feel DJI underpowered it a bit in both general processing (CPU) and imagine processing (ISP, DSP...) so it wasn't as capable as it could have been. It was something I speculated on in my Mini 3 Pro review.
I was ever so tempted to pick up an Air 2S when the price dropped before the Air 3 was introduced. I still think that is one of the best drones DJI has ever produced. The perfect balance of capability and image quality in a small package. I was really hoping DJI was going to stick with the 1" sensor but perhaps it will resurface on an Air 3S - single camera, larger sensor. 😀
Thanks for watching and thanks for the comment! Cheers!
Would you mind talking about the Master Airscrew propellers you have on your Mini 3 that you have in this video? Master Airscrew says they make the drone quieter but I find that the original propellers work better. The original ones seem to be more resistant to the wind, don’t chip as fast & they seem to be just as quieter as the Master Airscrew ones. Could be an interesting idea for a video.
I did a video review about Master Airscrew propellers for the Mini 2 quite a while back. Those propellers had a lower pitch, which was easier on the ears and perhaps a touch quieter. I did manage a few extra minutes of flight time with them too. I feel like those props were more brittle than the DJI ones and I suspect the Mini 3 Pro version is the same plastic.
I've been rolling with the MAS props on my Mini 3 Pro, almost exclusively, for about a year now. I haven't had any problems with them. I don't notice any difference in performance or flight time but I have not really focused on that. I posted a TH-cam Short comparing the sound and they are actually a decibel or two louder than DJI OEM props. I did manage to break a couple of MAS blades and I do feel like they are more brittle. Where a DJI propeller might tear, the MAS props will break. Regardless of the damage or which brand of propeller, any damaged blade should be replaced immediately, so really it's kind of a wash in that regard.
For me personally it's all about the colour. I love having anything other than boring black. Even if they're not quite as quite, robust or efficient as long as they are reliable, which they seem to be, then I would rather have the colour.
I have really never understood why DJI doesn't offer some colour options. Seems like easy money to me.
Anyhow, I may still do a MAS propeller review for the Mini 3/4 Pro in the future so stayed tuned. Happy flying!
5:43 unless it's raw. This only applies to photo and video codecs of which raw isn't one of them
There’s more to cameras than the sensor. Lens quality, drone stability, and image processing probably all have an effect. A lot of cell phones will use the same camera from a previous generation, but advertise better photos, and it’s all because of better processing.
100%
Great video. I too do not care what sensor they use, but I can't stand when businesses aren't up front about their products. DJI didn't lie in this case, but they came awfully close to dishonesty.
Thanks for carrying out, as well as presenting, this research.
Thanks for watching and thanks for the comment. I agree 100%! Cheers!
5:15
The way I see it, if it looks better, it IS better.
Today interesting topic
Thanks! 🙏
I thought air 3 has a stacked sensor and the minis use single sensor
What I'm hypothesizing in the video is that the Mini 3, Mini 3 Pro, Mini 4 Pro and Air 3 all use the same stacked die sensor. Advantages between drones are accomplished with better or more powerful processing.
Really, what prompted me to make the video in the first place was DJI was acting like this was something new and spectacular when the technology been around for a lot longer. Cheers!