At What Aperture is the Mavic 2 Pro Sharpest?

The Mavic 2 Pro’s has an adjustable aperture from f/2.8 to f/11, which makes it our favorite Mavic to date, and sets it apart from the rest of the Mavic series including the Mavic 2 Zoom, which all have fixed apertures around f/2.4 - f/2.8.

Our team recently ventured to the San Juancito Mountains to run some aperture tests and find out where the native aperture of this lens is and where sharpness starts to fall off.

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Our team tested a few different scenes, starting with a side profile of Tom’s helmet. To pick up as much detail as possible, Tom’s helmet filled up the frame almost entirely. We fired a shot at each aperture and then compared the results. From previous shoots, we noticed sharpness to visibly fall off at f/5.6 and that is also what the crew saw here.

 

 

Let’s take a look now at the f/2.8 aperture. The widest aperture on the Mavic 2 Pro, f/2.8 provides that classic cinematic, shallow depth of field everyone loves. You can use the f/2.8 aperture to capture small, highly detailed subjects, isolating them from the foreground and background in your scene.

For our second aperture test, the team tracks Tom as he scales Tahquitz Peak.

Even with the ability to change aperture, shutter speed, and ISO you may need to use an ND filter when shooting at a wide open aperture like f/2.8 to get the right exposure on a bright day since so much light is entering the lens.

We then changed scenes, where we had Tom climb halfway up the face to get a static, side profile shot of him to further test sharpness. The idea was to capture Tom as a smaller subject in the frame in order to show the wall’s expansiveness.

 

 

It looks like again we start to lose the detail of Tom around f/5.6. On the monitor in the field, our team couldn’t see the difference between f/2.8 and f/4, but guessed there would be a noticeable difference on a computer screen.

 

For the final test, our team wanted to change the scene dynamic up by switching subjects. This time, the goal was to shoot a green sports car taking up ½ to ¼ of the frame. To make sure we had lots of defined edges to test the sharpness of the lens on, we shot the sports car from a side profile.

Our team had a blast out here with our friend Tom, who absolutely crushed a 400-foot multi-pitch climb, and they we able to capture some unique shots with the Mavic 2 Pro’s Hasselblad camera while testing out the lens sharpness at each aperture.

From the day’s results, you can see this lens is sharpest at f/2.8 or f/4, with sharpness falling off at f/5.6.

If you are in a bind, or left your filters at home, you may have to shoot at the higher apertures. Just know the sharpness will not be ideal, but at least you can still get the shot.

If you thought this article was helpful, be sure to let us know in the comments below and feel free to ask any questions, we love hearing from you. If you haven't already, be sure to check out the full video.