Rapid movements of the drone with the accompanying rapid light changes overwhelm the automatic exposure of the camera (as seen in the first seconds). In addition, the dynamic range of the lighting situation is much too high if the camera points towards the sun.
Solution: Fixed exposure.
But this means that very dark and very bright areas of the image will be underexposed / overexposed. However, this is a way of viewing that the image processing in the human brain knows and perceives as "natural".
In contrast to an ambitious photo camera with various setting options, the SPARK does not have the option of setting appropriate picture parameters - even if the built-in camera is of very good quality. Therefore you need a set of neutral gray filters of different density as an aid. (An UV filter hardly changes the amount of light entering through the camera lens and is therefore unsuitable for this purpose.) The usual filter sets reduce the amount of light by twice the amount: 4x, 8x, 16x, 32x, 64x. Each filter level corresponds to reducing a camera aperture by 1 level (e.g. from aperture 2.8 to 4.0) = halving the amount of light that falls through the lens onto the camera chip.
The shutter speed also has an influence on the exposure - but also on the sharpness of fast movements.
Any changes in exposure will change the quality of the photo or video and can be used as a creative tool.
With most cameras you can also set the "sensitivity" (ISO value). This simulates digitally the way in which the different analog film material of the past reacted to light rays. Back then, a "
Kodachrome 64" required a large amount of light, but was able to convince with its
extreme sharpness, contrast and reproduced colors (e.g. at sunsets) in such a way that it almost blew your mind (compared to other photographic results of the time). Later
Fujicrome was able to imitate these phenomenal properties very well. The increases in sensitivity
(ISO 100, 200, 400, ...) each doubled the sensitivity (the picture only needs half the amount of light),
but the sharpness suffered and the picture looked "muddy". But with ISO 400 you could take an atmospheric
portrait by candlelight.
These settings are also available with the SPARK and the digital simulation of sensitivity results in similar results: ISO 100 requires a lot of light, provides sharp contours and clear colors - ISO 400 and more leads to "
image noise" and weak colors.
Therefore you should start with the ISO value as small as possible and be very "stingy" when increasing the value.
In order to find the right exposure, it has been advised since analog photography to measure the amount of light WITH the light (i.e. in the direction of the light source towards the illuminated object). So point the drone in the direction of the light at the scene to be photographed / filmed and use the manual settings menu and ND filter set to set the result in such a way that the result corresponds to your personal preference ("right" and "wrong" exist in theory, but a photo / video is an "artistic work" that only needs to please the author.)
Then take all pictures with this setting. There will be too dark and too bright areas of the image, but no jumps in brightness, because the automatic exposure control is switched off. Despite these "exposure errors", the image will appear calmer and "natural".
However, handling the manual settings takes practice and experience and a lot of "trial and error" - that is, time.
If you want to go quickly or if you just need a good snapshot, you can help the automatic camera by avoiding pans / movements from the sun into the shade or vice versa. Just make sure that the drone only has the sun or light in its back or at most from the side.
Even if the proportion of sky in the picture changes significantly, it becomes extremely difficult for the automatic system: Everything is relatively dark on the ground and the sky is extremely bright, even when it is cloudy. Always pan the camera so that the horizon is roughly on the same line (the switchable line grid helps a lot) or "hide" the jumps in brightness in a quick (gimbal) movement.
In summary: Learn to work with the manual settings (there are great instruction videos on YouTube, especially for SPARK and in general on the subject of "professional (drone) videos" and all technical terms are well explained on wikipedia) and on the way there help the camera by making it easier for the automatic.
