This is an exclusive hands-on review of the brand-new ANAFI drone from parrot
it features 4k HDR video 3-axis image stabilization ultra portable 25 minute
flight time and a whole lot more now I'm Ben from Authentech let's check this
drone out now first up my fault disclaimer huge thanks to parrot for
sending me this sample unit before public release but know this video is
not sponsored they just sent me the drum and remember parrot is one of the
biggest competitors to DJI in the world market and I believe competition is
healthy for us consumers know without further ado let's jump right in package
contents includes the nfe drone with one battery remote controller a 16 gig micro
SD card USB cable and eight additional spare props
first impressions right off the bet I was super impressed with how lightweight
this drone is and there's still nice attention to details like low rubber
feet on the skids or the batteries are rechargeable via USB type-c I really
like this convenience and efficiency from here or I can charge it out on the
go with a battery bank also cool it's quick and easy to fold and unfold each
wing pops into place and unlike other drones out there there's no order in
which you need to open or close some before others it's a small detail but
nice and on that note I'm working on a full in-depth side-by-side comparison
video of this drone versus the DJI Mavic err stay tuned for that one coming soon
the included carrying case is nice quality well padded inside and the drone
fits in there perfect unfortunately there's no room for the controller but
not a big deal it's semi small as is the transmitter feels good in hand both left
and right rubber sticks are spring-loaded to Center up top there's
plenty of buttons for taking photos and video tilting the gimbal and more the
cell phone clamp is pretty cool designed with Wi-Fi antenna built-in once you
flip it up it auto turns on the controller and then you just simply
slide it in your phone the USBC cable includes for connecting your phone to
the transmitter and from in the app you control your
camera and other settings more on all this shortly now let's go out for my
first test plate
we're windy out here but they say it can withstand some good winds we got some
nice blue sunny skies
first flight hit 2% auto landed that is mighty close to the water you Jesus we
can fly okay sweet pup phone out just connect or off
drone pull down
my worth no questions I won't very good there's two main flying mode film mode
where all the controls are slow and precise it's really nice for getting
your shots I also was in sport mode a lot and it is fast i maxed out most of
those settings and it whips around fast I tried 4k video with and without HDR
for to Billy and compact miss is nice I was able to unfold and get in the air
fast and battery life lasted pretty long not sure fill 25 minutes but I was out
there for a while
here's some my first flight impressions precision and finesse in the transmitter
is really nice even in sport mode I was able to capture some really cool
cinematic looking shots the horizon level was a little bit wonky and giving
me a bit of troubles but thankfully we can tinker with gimble calibrations in
the settings battery life is actually really good too they rate it up to 25
minutes of flight time and looking at my time codes I took off at 149 and final
landing at 215 which is 25 minutes exactly however I did land once or twice
with short breaks so actual flying time is a bit shy of that 25 minutes but it
was extra windy out there and overall it's impressive amount of flight time
for just one single battery one last thing I noticed which is actually pretty
huge this drone is quiet and I mean it super quiet when flying this is
fantastic to be subtle and discreet wherever you're at not bothering any
neighbors or pedestrians it also just sounds less scary and intimidating
there's a lot to cover on this drone actually a whole lot more than I
actually thought for example their new free flight 6 app has a ton of
customization settings and smart shooting modes all for me to experiment
with so make sure you're subscribed and ring the bell to be notified when I post
my super in-depth testing review of this drone the camera the app and more now
let's quick cover some of those main specs and features of this nfe drone 4k
HDR video this is one of if not the first drone that I know of that shoots
video in HDR and that's really cool to see HDR feels like the new 4k trend max
video bitrate is a hundred megabits per second which is great and it can record
4k cinema video as well that's 4096 by 2160 here's some test footage of HD are
turned on and off and you can clearly see the differences
I like how there's a lot more details maintained for example in those bright
highlights of the sky and you have to remember all this footage is straight
out of camera no editing applied however it seems way oversaturated in some other
shots as well in lower light conditions like the sunset for example the HDR
seemed to jack up the noise and grain quite a bit with that processing at
least the sunset and the skies and reflections in the water looked really
splendid i'll keep experimenting with this when I turn HDR off we can see a
bit of that noise is removed and the image looks a bit more standard but
still nice and usable the camera also features 21 megapixel photos and in my
test shots they look good nice color reproduction and sharpness it's a great
a satirical wide-angle lens with an F 2.4 and 69 degrees horizontal field of
view and this is to help limit lens flares and less image distortion if i
zoom way in and we do some pixel peeping we can notice the details look a bit
muddy and grainy but I think this is pretty standard and normally I'm never
zooming or cropping in this close a big feature to talk on bit of a controversy
the gimbal now they're smart and marking it as a three axis image stabilization
which technically it is but the gimbal is only to access tilt and roll however
sadly the yaw or pan axis is not gimbal stabilized instead it relies solely on e
is or electronic image stabilization now I normally dog on AIS and of course it's
not as optimal as gyro stabilized but in some shots and testing especially when
you flip your speed controls into film mode I could capture some really nice
and smooth panning and dolly tracking shots I couldn't tell the difference in
other times though yes especially if you whip left and right fast there's some
stuttering in the footage and it can look a bit jittery I just think it's a
camera limitation that we'd have to learn though workarounds for like I said
filming and film mode not sport mode though helped a ton on a positive note
for that gimbal another feature i've never seen on a consumer drone before
the gimbal allows you to tilt down 90 degrees and up 90 degrees as well this
opens up a whole world of creative shooting perspectives and fresh
is not possible before even when flying max speed Full Tilt ahead there's no
props in the shot this is really great to see I tried a little test I flew
under some trees and look straight up and it was almost trippy I've been
flying drones for years and never been able to look straight up while flying
it's very cool and I'm excited to see the creative uses people will find for
this feature the camera also features what they say is a 2.8 X lossless zoom
now I tried this with one photo zoomed in and out it seemed to just crap in on
the sensor the photo res is smaller on the zoomed in shot so I'll probably just
be sticking with full-frame photos myself for video however they say we can
have lossless zoom capabilities for 4k uhd up to 1.4 x and up to 2.8 ax at
1080p it also has that feature of vertigo effect you know when you're
pulling back but zooming and it's a very cool and unique feature they say each
drone lake contains a dual band antenna 2.4 and 5 gigahertz with optimizing HD
video transmission we can fly up to 4 kilometers or 2 and a half miles away so
far in my testing the video feed has been really good especially for Wi-Fi
there was just one sit hiccup two smidge when I was way across the lake
approximately 1,000 feet away I'll keep testing this so stay tuned
also sport mode is crazy fast seriously this drone rips through the air which is
a lot of fun to fly they say can hit up to 33 miles per hour or 55 kilometers an
hour my official radar gun speed test coming
soon now I also just got back from flying
that Anna fee and a big storm rolling in the wind gusts were ripping hard and
this drone held its position like a champ angled like this they say it can
handle wind resistance 50 kilometres an hour or 31 miles per hour now there are
some negatives and wishlist items I found no drone is perfect unfortunately
here's what I found so far I wish it had that third axis gyro gimbal for image
stabilization this would be cool to see maybe in their next model remember when
I was talking about how much I loved that bats are charged via USB type-c
well I still really like that however as a downfall of that system recharge times
seem to take a lot longer like two to three hours for a full recharge
in comparison a Mavic battery for example recharges in about one hour
again stay tuned for that full comparison video coming very soon I
found this little design flaw in the transmitter phone holder when I clip my
lg v30 into the clip my phone kept slipping or popping out of the holder a
few times actually kind of dangerous in my opinion the top rubber grip needs a
little lip to keep the phone held in tight kind of like seen here and of
course the issue is exasperated with the phone case I wish the drone had obstacle
avoidance these provide a whole level of flying confidence and protection
especially for beginners getting into drone flying and lastly in the app there
are free smart features like return to home cameraman and other fun shooting
modes actually worked great in my first test I'll be showing all those in my
next video but there are some in-app purchases required to unlock like
advanced Follow Me mode and flight plan which I wish were free and included I
heard some of these aren't allowed in certain countries I didn't know that and
the other reason is so that they can keep the price down on the drone package
itself I understand where they're coming from I myself might not even use those
features so it's not a big deal but it's just one of those things you kind of
wish it was free so price on that nfe drone is $6.99 and it comes out on July
2nd all links down below this could be a great compact lightweight drone that
still has awesome camera for photo or video enthusiasts make sure you stay
tuned for my side-by-side comparison and in-depth testing vids coming soon thank
you all for watching and making it this far let me know if you have any
questions or thoughts down in the comments and until next time let's live
off Vento