DJI Air 3S Drone Review: One Feature Changes Everything!

Hi everyone, welcome back to 51 Drones. Today we’re talking about the brand new DJI Air 3S. This drone just came out, and I’m going to do a little bit of a different style video today. I’ve never done this before; I’m going to do a vlog-style video. I’m going to take you guys along for the ride as I learn all about this drone.

Of course, I’m not just going to give you a bunch of specifications. The leakers have pretty much done that already, so you kind of know what to expect. But what I want to check out are the most impressive features that have been added to the Air 3S to make this the A3S.

Key Features to Explore

1. Sport mode up to 60 MPH: A folding drone that can go 60 mph is pretty impressive, so I want to check that out.
2. Improved maximum active track speed: Now up to 33 mph, so we’re going to check that out.
3. LiDAR sensor: Located on the front of the drone, it’s going to help with obstacle avoidance in challenging situations. I want to see if this drone can actually avoid something that kills a lot of drones.
4. Real-time onboard mapping: When you launch this drone, you don’t have to wait for it to lock onto the home point before flying away. As it flies away, it’s mapping itself, so if it loses satellite signal, it’s going to come right back to where it launched from. This is very significant if you lose signal.
5. Improved camera: The biggest improvement on this drone is going to be the 1-inch sensor on that wide-angle camera, promising improved low-light performance and better overall image quality.

Setting Up The DJI Air 3S

Let’s get everything charged up. I’ve got the batteries charging, and the remote looks like it’s just charged. We’re going to activate it and then head out to test the A3S. Of course, I had to pick one of the coldest days of the year to do this. It’s 32°F out right now. Winter’s coming, but at least it’s kind of nice right now.

Video Production Notes

The other reason I wanted to do this video this way is that I’m also testing the DJI Action 5 Pro. I’ve never done a complete video just with an action camera. I want to try to minimize the equipment for my videos. If I can make a video by just using an action camera and my DJI mic, that would be awesome.

Secondly, I want to see how this goes, taking you guys along from start to finish on flying a drone for the very first time. It’s another thing I’ve never really done before – kind of a raw video. Hopefully, it’s a little bit different. Hopefully, you like it. If you do or if you don’t, let me know in the comments.

First Flight and Speed Test

Alright, let’s hop in the quad and head out of town a little bit, get on the edge of town, get away from people, and test out the A3S.

Ready to go! So, 60 MPH – again, I am not confident that it’s going to be able to get 60 MPH, but let’s put it up and see what it can do.

It sounds pretty good, sounds pretty much like the Air 3. It’s got a nice low hum to it.

We’ve got a southeast wind, so I think I’m going to go downwind and have it fly over us this way towards northwest.

About 53 miles per hour is all I could get on there. Of course, there’s hardly any wind right now. It’s really calm out, so we’re going to have to find a day where it’s a little bit windier to get a little bit of a tailwind.

One thing I want to do is fly this right over my head going full speed because it sounds amazing when it flies that fast. So sport mode and here we go right at us. Wow, wow, wow! Was that too much? Oh, that is cool.

Obstacle Avoidance Test

The next thing I want to try is using this power line right here. The rumor is that with this LiDAR, it’s going to be able to recognize power lines. I honestly don’t know if LiDAR helps that much during the day. I think it relies on the regular obstacle avoidance sensors. If you know, let me know down in the comments.

Let’s bring her back and see how the obstacle avoidance works on power lines. First, let’s do the pole. We know it’s going to work with that. Okay, it works there. Full stick ahead, not going into the pole.

Now, let’s go up and see how it does on this power line. I see orange on the screen like it’s recognizing an obstacle, and it is not letting me go forward. We’re getting a little high. Look at that, it is not letting me go. Stick forward, drone staying still. We’ve got red on the radar.

Is that because of LiDAR or is that because of the improved obstacle avoidance algorithm? I don’t know. You guys tell me. I’ll do a little more research too, and if I find anything out, I’ll put it on the screen.

If this LiDAR can help avoid crashes, I think that alone is one of the most important improvements on this drone. So many people who start flying drones for the very first time are so worried about crashing into something. If the obstacle avoidance is that much better, to where it can avoid pretty much anything now, we’re going to have a lot more people buying drones for the first time.

Camera Test Planning

What should I check out next? I think we’re going to check out the camera system. Basically, I want to see if the video and photos look better on this drone than the Air 3.

Obviously, I’m not going to do it out here. It’s kind of boring right now – everything’s brown, with a little bit of green left and some yellow. I want to go find some areas that have a little more color or scenery.

There’s not much around my community. If you know me at all, if you’ve watched any of my videos, mostly I go to the Norwegian Park (Scandinavian Park), which has some pretty cool buildings. We also have a pumpkin patch about a mile out of town, so I’ll get a little bit of footage there as well.

I want to see if this image quality is really that good because honestly, I think that’s what most people are looking for. They’re looking for that really improved image quality, and there are a lot of expectations with having a 1-inch sensor. I’ll also have to do a low light test later today. Obviously, it’s a very sunny day, but I do want to do a low light test too just to see the comparison between the A3S and the Air 3 – is it that much better?

Off-Road Advantages

You know, I was looking at buying a new four-wheeler. I told my wife, “Well, you know, I really need it for the channel. It’s really important to have something that I can go places where my vehicle can’t.” I don’t think she really bought it, but I was able to buy it anyway.

But it’s true – there are a lot of places that I want to fly where if I’m parked there with my pickup, people are going to be like, “What’s that guy doing?” But if you’re in a four-wheeler, it’s like, “Oh, this is just a four-wheeler.” Maybe he’s hunting or looking for his lost dog or something like that.

People are less likely to be concerned about a four-wheeler than they are about a car parked on the side of the road or in the ditch. It’s just more normal. Also, it’s good for pushing snow in the winter.

If I could have – if I had the time to do like an ATV Channel, I would. I wish I could do like a drone ATV barbecue Channel. Wouldn’t that be awesome? Maybe would you subscribe?

Scandinavian Heritage Park Footage

I like to record from this Scandinavian Heritage Park because where else can you find a giant red horse and a Gol Stav Church replica? There are just some interesting things here to record, and it’s in the center of town, so I really don’t have to travel very far to get some appealing footage.

What I want to do here is just fly and sit on the park bench over here. I just want to get some video and photos of this area. First, I want to compare normal color profile to D-Log M on the A3S, and then I also want to look at the photos.

I really think this drone is great for photographers. That’s one group that often gets left behind with these camera drones. Everyone focuses on the video quality, frame rates, and resolution, but not enough people talk about photos. I think with this drone, they finally made one that’s going to be appealing to strictly aerial photographers.

I’m just going to capture some photos here with the A3S and see what it looks like. I’ll do some panoramas too. I’m going to head over to the pumpkin patch right after this and get some shots there too, just because it’s interesting. There are a lot of colorful things; it’s just a fun scene to capture.

Footage Analysis

Okay, so here I did normal color profile in the Gol Stav Church in the Scandinavian park. It looks pretty good, but as you can see, there’s quite a bit of noise in the dark shadows and the color just doesn’t really pop.

Then here’s D-Log M, and this is non-edited. This is just a flat color profile. It brings up the shadows a lot, and all you got to do is turn up the contrast, turn up the saturation a little bit, mess with the curves a little, but it’s just so much better balanced. Also, the colors just pop. The yellows look a lot better, and overall, it’s just a better look.

Here’s just kind of a static video of the Gol Stav Church. This is normal color profile – lots of dark noise there. And then here’s D-Log M, and then just a really simple edit. Again, just bring up those shadows, a little contrast, and then more color.

Here’s another shot, just from a different angle. This is actually facing into the sun, and the colors in this park right now are just so beautiful – all the reds and the yellows, and just everything looks really great right now. Normal color profile file there, here’s D-Log M edited. Just more pop on those reds and it just brings the shadows up quite a bit. So yeah, a lot better looking there.

And then here’s the pumpkin patch. This is normal color profile – everything’s really boring and flat, and the grass doesn’t even look green here. It looks awful. And then here’s D-Log M, nice flat color profile, and then just turn up the saturation and the contrast and you’re good to go. D-Log M is so easy to edit, you guys, and it just gives you so much flexibility.

Photo Quality

All right, let’s talk about photos on this drone. The photographs from the A3S are amazing. So here’s a regular JPEG photo, right? And then here is the RAW edited version. RAW, it’s just so fun to take photos and edit the RAW photos. It’s just a click, you guys. I just use Lightroom, and it’s just the auto editing of a RAW photo.

So there’s the Gol Stav Church regular, and then there is the RAW image just with one click of the button in Lightroom. Look at how much better it is.

Here’s the pumpkin patch, a nice wide-angle view. By the way, you guys, the panoramas from this drone are just stunning. So that’s the wide-angle one that takes, I think, nine images. And then here’s the 180-degree one. It’s just so nice. The panoramas from this drone are absolutely beautiful.

Focus Tracking Test

Okay, let’s head out now and let’s check out the focus tracking on the A3S. I want to see how it performs, how fast you can go. Also, I want to check out this autofocus tracking thing. I don’t know what that’s all about, but I want to see how that works.

And then finally, I do want to see about this onboard mapping thing, like where if you lose GPS signal, the drone is still going to find its way back home. So let’s head out and see how these things perform.

Return to Home Function Test

Before we run the speed test, I want to test out the return to home function if you don’t allow it to capture the home point. So I’m going to turn on the controller, turn on the drone, and as soon as it allows me to launch, I’m going to launch. I’m not going to wait for the home point to get locked on. I’m not going to let it hover. I’m just going to launch it and fly it.

All right, so let’s see how this goes. I’m not going to take the time to start the screen recorder because that’s going to allow it more time to capture the home point. Let’s start, let’s go up, and let’s fly away.

Okay, let’s just go out about 300 feet and let’s hit return to home. Let’s see if it comes right back to where I launched it from without capturing a home point.

Wow, look at that! Look at that, it’s exactly in the same spot that I launched it from, and it did not lock onto the home point before it took off. So yes, that is going to be so valuable, especially if you’re flying in an area where it’s really hard to get a satellite signal.

Focus Tracking Speed Test

Okay, so I got the A3S up in the air right now, and I’m going to highlight my vehicle. There you can see Active Track, Spotlight, and Point of Interest. We’re going to do Active Track, and when you hit Active Track now, you have the option of choosing Auto or Manual.

Focus Tracking Speed Test (Continued)

The Auto Focus Tracking, they call it Static Active Track, and what it does is it looks at the environment and figures out, using the obstacles around, what is the best direction to follow you from. I’m not fully confident in that, and I’m not really sure how that’s going to work, so I’m going to play with that a little bit later. For now, I’m just going to do Manual.

So I’m going to hit Active Track, leave it on Manual, hit go, and then it seems to take a little time before it actually figures out what direction you’re going, before it decides where it’s going to go. Right now, I’m just going to draw on the screen. I’m just going to tap on the left side, and it looks like it’s doing well.

Let’s hit record here. Good, so it went right to the left side. Let’s tap on the F, so it should move over. I think I have to swipe up there. Yep, so put it on the F, which means front. So now it’s going to track me from the front. Very nice. And let’s go to the back, so it should swing all the way around to the back side now.

Okay, and we’re going about 16 mph, so 16 should be no trouble for it. You know, it does take some time for it to go where I want it to go. That’s really nothing new for the focus tracking. Eventually, it does what you want it to do; it just takes longer than I would like it to.

So there, now it’s tracking from behind. Let’s take a look and see on the screen here. We are going 27-28 mph. Nope, excuse me, 23… There we go, 28-30 mph, no trouble at all. Look at that. For those of you that are wondering if I have a spotter, I do. She’s a little shy; she doesn’t want to be on camera.

There we go, 29.4-30 mph. All right, we got to turn here. Already much faster than the Air 3. Okay, so let’s turn the corner here. Of course, I chose the most washboardy road that I could find.

All right, so now we’re going 30 mph, 31. Let’s see if we can get up to 33. So I’m going 37 on my truck, but it looks like 31.3 is the fastest that the drone is getting up to. So there you can see 35, and the drone’s going about 31. So it is starting to lose me, but 31 mph is pretty good. It’s a lot better than the Air 3.

Auto Focus Tracking Test

Let’s turn around here and let’s just do a little more focus tracking. I’m going to put it on that Auto. Let’s see what happens. I’m just going to turn around here because I really don’t want to go down a dirt road. Sorry, my spotter fell down. Pick yourself up.

All right, so now it should swing back around, follow me from behind. But let’s do stop Active Track and let’s do Auto, go. Let’s see what it does. So I’m going to keep it slow until I figure out how this actually works. It does not have the circle for you to direct it to which direction to go.

So this is the Auto Focus Tracking feature on the A3S. It’s following me from the left side. I am going 30 mph, and it’s keeping up pretty good. I’m going to have to read up on this a little more on the Auto Focus Track.

So now it’s following me from behind. Yeah, I really don’t know what Auto Active Track means, but it is doing a really good job keeping up with me. So yeah, very cool. Oh, there it’s moving around by itself. It’s kind of deciding which way to go. I don’t know why. Apparently, this is the most aesthetically pleasing viewpoint.

Oh, and now it’s swinging back around to the other side. It’s still random, so I really don’t know what’s going on with this.

Additional Tests and Conclusions

I do want to mention that I took the A3S on a walking trail, like through some pretty challenging situations. I took my dog on a walk. Unfortunately, I did forget my microphone, my camera, and then also my battery was about to die on the A3S. I was not very well prepared, but just so you know, it did perform quite well in this situation.

I plan to do another video on this Focus Tracking in challenging environments for the A3S because I really want to test it out and see if that LiDAR really makes a difference. And I also want to do that in low light conditions, so watch for that video coming real soon.

All right, Focus Tracking works really well. There’s a little hesitation when you’re doing the manual focus tracking of, you know, where it’s going to follow you. That’s always been an issue, but for the most part, it’s able to track you faster, and that’s really cool.

Auto Focus Tracking – not sure what that is really or how it chooses the direction from which it’s going to follow you. I’ll do some more research on that, and I’ll probably do a separate video on that because I know a lot of people are going to wonder, “Well, what is the difference here between the Auto and the Manual Focus Tracking?”

Final Thoughts: DJI Air 3S Review

Couple other things I want to mention about this drone:

1. The onboard storage is clutch. I forget my memory card all the time. Thankfully, onboard storage – 42 gigs. That’s massive, you guys. I think the Air 3 had 8, which is pretty much pointless. So I’ve always complained about that, and I’m glad that they did that.
2. Flight time – it’s about the same as the Air 3. 45 minutes is advertising flight time. I’ll put it up on the screen here what I got for actual flight time and the percentage of actual flight time. Nowadays, I’m not ever going to complain if I’m getting over 80% on advertised flight time. I am extremely happy on a DJI drone. So no problem there as far as flight time.
3. It has O4 transmission, and that works great. It’s going to fly further away than you ever need it to.

Overall, I’m pretty happy with this drone. Is it a major upgrade over the Air 3? I wouldn’t call it a major upgrade, but there are some pretty significant improvements that make it so much better. The camera quality, the Focus Tracking speed, the photo quality – much, much better. Definitely improved photos. So I think that’s going to be really appealing for a lot of people.

The included LiDAR sensor for obstacle avoidance – I think that’s going to be really important, especially for new pilots, people that are just looking to get their first drone but they’re really worried about crashing it. I think that was a wonderful addition.

Advertised maximum speed, 60 mph in sport mode – I did not get that. I did fly around a little bit more. I got 53. All right, correction: I just did another speed test. I got it up to 57 miles per hour, so pretty close to 60. It’s not – yeah, I mean, it’s not that big of a deal if you don’t get it up to 60. It’s still super fast for a camera drone. So yeah, pretty fun.

The purpose of this drone is not to fly super fast. The purpose of this drone is to get really cool cinematic footage, and I think that’s the highlight of this drone. The 1-inch sensor, the improved low light capabilities of it, and just overall camera system – I think that’s what makes this drone really, really appealing for a lot of people.

So I’m going to have more videos on it. Thank you for bearing with me on this vlog-style video. I just wanted to give it a try, and let me know again – let me know in the comments if this is something you prefer. Like, do you prefer more raw, or do you prefer more fine-tuned, you know, higher production quality video? I will have more of those coming up on the A3S.

So still a lot to test on this, a lot to learn about this drone, but overall, I think I gave you guys a pretty good synopsis of what it’s all about. If I did and if you appreciate that, click on the thumbs up. Thank you so much for doing that. Have a wonderful day, and as always, fly safe and fly smart.