I spent my first year flying a DJI Mini 4 Pro without any filters on the camera. The footage looked fine on the little screen, but when I got it home and watched it on a real monitor, something was off. Water looked like sanded glass, the sky washed out to a pale blue, and every time the drone turned, the whole frame seemed to shimmer. A friend at the field told me to try an ND filter set. I picked up the NEEWER 4 pack about a year ago, and it changed more than I expected.
The NEEWER 4 pack covers the two stops you'll use most
ND8, ND16, ND32, and a CPL in one case, so you can match the light instead of fighting it.
Amazon Check Today's Price on Amazon →Here are the ten reasons I keep reaching for the NEEWER set on almost every flight. None of them will make you a better pilot. They just let the camera show what the drone already sees. If you fly a Mini 4 Pro in bright conditions and your footage shimmers, these are the reasons that matter.
I bought the NEEWER set after that friend let me borrow his for a morning. I flew the same field with and without the filter, and the difference was obvious even on the phone screen. I ordered my own that week.
It kills the jello effect before it starts
The Mini 4 Pro reads its sensor a line at a time, which is how a rolling electronic shutter works. In bright sun, the shutter gets so fast that the readout makes straight lines wobble like gelatin. Power lines, fence posts, and roof edges vibrate on screen even though the drone is hovering still. An ND filter slows the shutter down to a normal speed, and the wobble disappears. That is the difference I noticed first, and it is the reason I stopped flying without a filter on sunny days.
Motion blur looks like motion, not a slideshow
At a shutter speed of 1/2000 of a second, every frame is frozen, so a slow pan stutters like a slideshow. The standard fix is the 180 degree shutter rule: set the shutter speed at double your frame rate. At 30 frames per second, that means 1/60 of a second. An ND filter gets you there in bright light, and the motion blur smooths the pan into something that looks like film instead of a security camera. The footage still looks sharp, it just moves the way your eye expects. I noticed this most on a flight along a tree line east of Spokane, where the whole scene looked calm instead of choppy.
The sky stays blue instead of blowing out
Without a filter, a bright sky overexposes and the blue turns white. The ND8 in the NEEWER set drops the light by three stops, which is usually enough to keep the sky saturated while the ground stays properly exposed. You still have to set the exposure yourself, but the filter gives you room to work. I use the ND8 more than any other filter in the set for that reason. It is the one I leave on when I am not sure what the light is going to do.
Water goes from glowing white to see-through
Rivers and lakes reflect the sky, so without a filter they blow out into a bright sheet of white. With the ND filter, the surface keeps detail and the water looks like water. You can see the bank through the shallows instead of a glare. The CPL in the NEEWER set helps even more by cutting the reflection itself, which is why I carry both. On a sunny day over a north Idaho lake, the difference is the whole shot.
The CPL cuts glare on wet roads and windows
The circular polarizer in the NEEWER 4 pack rotates to block reflected light. I use it for shots over parking lots after rain and for any building with glass. It does not replace the ND, but it does a job the ND cannot do. Having it in the same case means I actually carry it, and on the right scene it is the difference between a glare and a clean shot.
The camera exposes the scene, not the sun
In auto mode, the Mini 4 Pro sees a bright sky and darkens the whole frame to protect the highlights. Your foreground goes black, and the footage is unusable. With an ND filter, the overall light drops, so the camera can balance the whole scene instead of just the brightest part. The result is a usable shot straight out of the drone, which matters when you are flying over the Palouse and the sun is bouncing off every wheat field. I have come home with footage I thought was ruined, only to find the filter had saved the exposure.
Leaves and grass stop crawling
A fast shutter makes individual leaves and blades of grass look like they are vibrating or crawling across the frame. It is a subtle effect, but it makes tree lines look busy and unnatural. Slowing the shutter with an ND filter gives each leaf a little motion blur, so a tree line reads as a tree line instead of a screen of static. This is the reason I notice most when I watch footage back on a big monitor.
You can fly in the middle of the day and still get usable footage
I do most of my flying on weekends, which means I am often out at noon when the sun is harsh and the shadows are short. The ND32 in the NEEWER set handles that. I swap to the darkest filter and the camera behaves like it is shooting in softer light. It is not a replacement for flying at golden hour, but it means a Saturday afternoon over the farm fields east of Spokane can still produce footage worth keeping.
Swapping filters is fast enough that you'll actually do it
I used to leave the same filter on all day because changing it meant fiddling with a tiny ring while holding the drone steady. The NEEWER filters seat with a firm click and come off with a gentle pull, so switching from ND8 to ND16 takes a few seconds on the ground. That sounds small, but it changes how you shoot. When the light shifts, you switch instead of settling.
Scratched filters ruin footage, so I keep mine protected
A scratch on an ND filter shows up in every frame as a soft smudge, and you cannot fix it in editing. I keep my NEEWER filters in a small padded case when they are not on the drone, and after a year of riding in my JSVER hard case they still look clean. Filters are small and easy to lose or damage, so the habit of putting them away matters as much as the glass itself.
What I'd Skip
I would skip the idea that you need every ND value ever made. The NEEWER 4 pack gives you ND8, ND16, ND32, and a CPL, and that covers almost everything I shoot in eastern Washington. If you only fly at dawn and dusk, you might get away with just the ND8 and the CPL. And if you are still learning the basics of flying, buy filters later. A filter will not save footage from a drone that is fighting the wind.
The NEEWER filters did not make my flying better. They made the footage look like the scene I was actually looking at.
One more honest note: the NEEWER set is built for the Mini 4 Pro, so it will not fit a different drone without an adapter. Check your camera size before you order. And if you fly in heavy rain or snow, take the filter off before you land, because water spots dry into streaks that are hard to clean.
If your footage still looks jittery in bright light, this is the fix
The NEEWER ND and CPL 4 pack is the first thing I recommend to anyone with a Mini 4 Pro who asks why their video shimmers.
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