Mr Viral
DJI has got a new drone, the DJI Flip and its design is unlike anything we’ve ever seen before.
The DJI Flip is being pitched as an All-in-one Vlog camera drone, its built for people who love to create content and want to get a different perspective for your videos (the Y axis). There are times you find yourself in an amazing place and want to capture yourself in the space.
Like the DJI Neo drone we reviewed at the end of last year, the Flip features a dedicated hardware button to select one of 6 flight modes (Dronie, Circle, Rocket, Spotlight, Helix, and Boomerang). The Flip moves the visual indicator from the top, to a small display on the front of the drone, above the camera array, allowing you to see this when you’re launching with the drone facing you, an improvement from the Neo.
I find the decision to call this drone the Flip, an interesting one. I think most people would assume the drone could do some kind of acrobatic flips (it can’t), instead the Flip name comes from the foldable nature of the design – flipping down the props before flight.
Having had access to the drone for a few weeks now, it’s time for a full review to tell you what I like and what I don’t and let you know if you should buy this over alternatives.
If you haven’t already seen it, start with my unboxing video from Christmas Day.
Design
The Flip’s propellers are large in size, much larger than something like the Mini or Avatar or Neo drones, but doesn’t skip on portability, as the props flip down to condense the form factor, allowing you to take it with you to capture more places.
As drone pilots know, the best shots come with an element of danger, getting close to objects like trees etc. If you hit one of these objects, you’re drone could be damaged or even permanently damaged, as such, DJI has started implementing prop guards in a number of their drones.
We seen the Avata offers horizontal protection, so bumping into something like a pole, would be survivable, while the DJI Flip takes this to the next level.
Flying safe and reliable is achieved by full-coverage prop guards that guard the propellers to avoid injury or damage to the drone. Made of lightweight and strong carbon fibre string, the guard’s support structure is only 1/60 the weight of guards made with traditional polycarbonate material while maintaining the same stiffness and durability to ensure safe flights.
The prop guards on the Flip are Full-Coverage Propeller Guards, meaning that they have vertical and horizontal protection. Taking inspiration from a bike wheel, the spokes above and blow the prop, reduce the opportunity for objects to reach the spinning propellers, while still allowing the airflow to move unobstructed. While nothing is 100% fool proof, this certainly goes a long way to providing pilots protection of their investment.
Given this protection it’s also more approachable for people learning to fly, as their mistakes are unlikely to destroy the drone.
Performance
Before we get into performance, I want to say how much I enjoy the Automatic startup of the drone, when you flip the props down. This is a smart feature that is similar to Tesla’s approach to vehicle startup in the car, once the necessary requirements are met, simplify the experience for the user.
To get started, just fold open the props, the drone starts up in seconds, turn on the controller and you’re ready to fly.
When you do take off, you have a couple of options.. the first is the palm-take off option. This doesn’t require a controller, just press the flight mode button, similar to the Neo and the drone will launch into action, film content for you and return to land.
I got the Fly More Combo for review, which comes with DJI’s great awesome RC2 Controller. This gives you access to the manual controls to showcase your pilot experience and capture the perfect shot, while also offering the touchscreen to select subjects and leverage the AI Subject tracking.
Focus Track (ActiveTrack 4.0, Spotlight 2.0 and Point of Interest 3.0)
To test the Flip’s ability to track subjects, I recruited my daughter and her electric scooter, heading to a quite sporting field precinct, largely empty on the weekend. They have some great paths which offered a great opportunity to test this feature.
To get started, simply draw a rectangle around the subject on the screen, hit go and the drone starts tracking. This works on vehicles, people, bikes etc and as I found out, works really great for scooters.
The drone followed the scooter incredibly well, despite getting some distance between the two, meaning the camera had a fairly small amount of pixels to track to.
We did push this to the extreme and found it does have it’s limits, but overall, it’s incredible effective and the best part is, you have that prop protection, so if anything happens, you’ve got great chance of the drone surviving.
Wind
We had a storm this past weekend and I sent the Flip up to capture it. I was seriously happy with the footage it obtained, although the experience unveiled an important aspect of the drone. Before the rain arrived, we had high winds. The drone detected the resistance and alerted me to this fact on the controller. With 8 minutes of battery life and only about 2 minutes to return home I thought the alert was a little early, at least at first.
The alert suggested battery was low and I should return home, so I began the journey home and in Sport mode, fly as fast as I could. The drone had typically travelled at as much as 10m/s but during this headwind, it was slowed to just 3m/s meaning I actually got started to be concerned if the drone would/could make it home in time.
I reduced the altitude and as I got closer to the ground, the wind reduced and the speed increased. I made it home safely, but this was a great reminder, a 249 gram drone, which is great for portability, does have a downside, compared something like the the larger, more capable Mavic series.
Sound
From the time I unboxed the drone till the time of the first flight, I had one simple question.. how loud was this going to be? With larger pops, the theory is they can rotate slower to achieve the same velocity.
Given the size of the propellors was clearly something DJI maximised in the whole flip design, I expected that would be largely in an effort to deliver lower noise. Having flown now with a variety of background noise and compared to other drones I have, this is surprisingly loud for it’s size.
Video quality
Drone photographers can capture 48MP photos, while videos can be captured in 4K at 60gpf with HDR from the drone’s 1/1.3-inch CMOS sensor.
It also supports slow-motion recording at 4K/100fps and 10-bit D-Log M colour mode. A 4:3-aspect-ratio CMOS sensor provides enough space for vertical crops while maintaining a 2.7k resolution, optimised for smartphone viewing and social media without any cropping needed.
Features
DJI’s drones are well known for their great battery life, but also their shooting modes that help you achieve professional-grade work and the Flip is no exception.
MasterShots: Allows DJI Flip to automatically perform diverse camera movements, shooting multiple clips and editing them with music, cuts, and effects for fast and simplified cinematic footage.
Hyperlapse: Select from four options, including Free, Circle, Course Lock, and Waypoint to capture timelapse footage at up to 4K horizontally or 2.7K vertically.
FocusTrack: Find creative ways to follow your subject with FocusTrack. The suite includes ActiveTrack 4.0, Spotlight 2.0, and Point of Interest 3.0, three powerful storytelling tools.
Panorama: Supports shooting 180°, Wide Angle, Vertical, and Sphere panoramic photos to capture magnificent landscapes.
Other Standout Features
Fly With or Without Remote Controller
The DJI Flip can be operated with the DJI RC-N3 or RC 2 remote controllers. It can also operate with the DJI Fly app or Voice Control1 for hands-free flying. When connected to your phone, it can capture audio and intelligently reduce noise, automatically filtering out propeller noise.
31-minute Max Flight Time
DJI Flip’s Intelligent Flight Battery delivers up to 31 minutes of flight time, ensuring seamless creation without battery concerns.
Automatic Braking
DJI Flip’s 3D Infrared Sensing System supports automatic braking for enhanced safety, even at night.
Next Level Video Transmission
When paired with the DJI RC-N3 or RC 2 remote controller, DJI O4 video transmission supports up to 13 km of 1080p/60fps video transmission and has excellent anti-interference capabilities, allowing you to explore vast landscapes with clarity.
Fast Charging and Data Transfers
The DJI Flip Parallel Charging Hub charges two batteries simultaneously, significantly reducing charging time. With the DJI Fly app, footage can be transferred at speeds up to 30MB/s.
Issues and Opportunities
While there’s a lot to love, not everything is perfect. The following items are suggestions for improvement in future editions of the device.
When we first got the Mini 3 Pro, with it’s rotating camera that offered native vertical video, I assumed that we’d see that come to a number of drones in their lineup. Since then, we really haven’t seen it flow outside the Mini line.
The Flip also lacks a native vertical camera option, instead offering cropping to achieve the vertical. For those who are chasing the highest quality from their video, cropping the video means you’re losing some of the shot. That issue aside, your TikTok videos will still look pretty great from this drone.
Something else worth noting. is the lack of side or rear-facing sensors. Found in higher tier drones, these offer protection against the drone crashing but the Flip instead relies on the hardware protection of the prop guards. This is likely an exercise in keeping the price point down and more approachable, that said, we know DJI have some of the best collision avoidance tech, where the drone has the sensors to detect potential collisions.
Price and Availability
DJI Flip is available to order from store.dji.com/au and authorised retail partners, with shipping starting today, in the following configurations:
DJI Flip retails for A$699
DJI Flip (DJI RC 2) retails for A$949
DJI Flip Fly More Combo (DJI RC 2) retails for A$1,159 (reviewed)
At this price point, the Flip is filling in a tight slot between a number of other DJI drones. Personally, I think DJI should simplify this offering now as there’s not a clear enough feature differences between this many models.
When people first get into drones, its understandable they want to dip their toe in the water, not spend the world on it, in case this hobby doesn’t turn out to be for them.
If it does, the lineup should be there to provide a great on-ramp for those who invest in time as a pilot and can then save their dollars to invest in more capable hardware. For comparison, below is a list of DJI’s other consumer grade camera drones.
DJI Neo – A$299 (drone only).
DJI Mini 4k – A$499 (drone + basic controller)
DJI Mini 3 – A$599 (drone + basic controller)
DJI Mini 4 Pro A$1,119 (drone + basic controller)
DJI Avata 2 – A$1,499 (drone, headset, motion controller)
DJI Air 3S – A$1,699 (drone + basic controller)
DJI Mavic 3 Pro – A$3,099 (drone + DJI RC controller)
Overall
I have really enjoyed my time with the DJI Flip. The unique design was certainly different than any other drone I’d seen, once I started using it, it really grew on me.
I used the drone in the same way I use other drones, fold it up, transport it and the controller in the center console of my car and I’m happy to report this fits just fine, despite having larger props.
Perhaps the most magical moment was when I discovered through trial and error that the drone offered something new, an auto-on feature when you unfold the props. This is smart and something I’d love to see on all foldable drones now.
In terms of visual quality, I just expect great things from DJI now and this didn’t disappoint, shooting gorgeous 4K/60fps video.
Would I recommend this? Sure I would, it does a great job at delivering a mix of the basic no-controller features of the Neo, but it’s more grown up and far more capable.
Now the question is, should you buy this over the alternatives? Having owned a DJI Mini 3 Pro, it’d be a close race between the two, at this price point.
For more information, head to store.dji.com/au
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