To take your Mavic Air drone footage to the next level and capture even better shots it’s worth considering investing in a few of the best DJI Mavic Air accessories. We’ve travelled around the world with our drones for the last few years and know the importance of having the right drone gear you need to capture epic footage. We’ve put together this list of the best DJI Mavic Air accessories that every drone owner should consider investing in. The accessories in this list will allow you to fly longer, safer and capture the best footage possible with your Mavic Air drone.
1 | Extra batteries
Like all drones, the DJI Mavic Air has a limited battery life. With a maximum flight time of 21 minutes, you will definitely need extra batteries to allow you to fly and shoot with your Mavic Air without worrying about charging your battery or missing a shot. You never know when you’ll need extra flight time for another cinematic drone flight! We recommend 3 to 4 of the official Mavic Air batteries – check prices now!
Mavic Air accessory tip: generally speaking the more drone batteries you have the better, however you need to consider that you’re going to have to carry the batteries with you while in transit. We find that 3 or 4 batteries is the best balance between size and weight for drone batteries and allow you around an hour of real world flight time. Always make sure you label your batteries and have them all charged before intend to fly.
2 | Neutral Density (ND) Filters
After batteries, neutral density (ND) filters are the single most important accessory you can buy for your DJI Mavic Air. Simply said ND filters are like sunglasses for your drone which limit the amount of light entering the lens.
So why would you need to do this? To get the best quality footage from your Mavic Air you need to shoot video in manual format. This makes editing your footage in post-production much easier as the footage settings are static and don’t change depending on the light. If you shoot in auto applying colour grading and adjustments is very difficult.
DJI Mavic Air tip: When shooting manual the rule of thumb is that the shutter speed should remain at twice the frame rate so if you’re shooting at 30fps at 4k on the Mavic Air your shutter speed should remain as close to 60 as possible. This will ensure you get more cinematic footage on our drone with these settings.
Maintaining these settings while shooting with your Mavic Air can only be accomplished by using ND filters. This will allow you to capture buttery smooth cinematic footage on you Mavic Air using a fixed shutter speed. This also makes editing and colour correcting your footage in post-production much easier.
PolarPro Filters
PolarPro make the best ND filters for DJI drones and the Mavic Air is no exception. PolarPro has two main filter collection sets for the Mavic AIr:
- shutter collection – check prices now!
- vivid collection – check prices now!
These PolarPro filters are made from airframe aluminium and high-quality glass which ensures the filters are of the highest quality. We’ve used PolarPro filters for over a year and in our experience, they are the best ND filters for DJI drones.
Mavic Air Tip: All of these filters can be attached to the Mavic Air prior to flight/turning on which avoids any Gimbal overload errors. and means you don’t have to the gimbal while the done is turned on.
2.1 | PolarPro Mavic Air Shutter Collection:
The shutter collection consists of an ND 8 (for cloudy weather), ND16 (bright weather) and ND32 (very sunny day) – check prices now!
2.2 | PolarPro Mavic Air Vivid Collection
The Vivid Collection is both ND and polarised. A polarising filter helps to remove reflections and enhance colours which drastically improves the vibrancy of our shots, especially water where the surface reflection and glare are reduced – check prices now!
2.3 | PolarPro DJI Mavic Air 6-Pack Collection
This combination pack includes the 6 filters from the Shutter and Vivid Collection for those who want to be prepared for every environment condition – check prices now!
Specialty Filters
The specialty filters are used in particular situations when the standard filters are not suitable. The filters are not included in the standard packs.
2.4 | PolarPro Limited Collection – bright light
The limited collection is for use in very bright conditions and consists of 4 UV filters: ND32, ND32/PL, ND64 and ND64/PL. Definitely get this if you’re planning to shoot with your Mavic in very bright sunlight/bright environments – check prices now!
3 | Spare propellers
Accidents happen and this is definitely true with drones. The first casualty in a drone crash is doing to be the propellers. Even a minor glance against a surface is enough to crack or damage a propeller. Therefore it’s super important to carry a number of spares with you. So grab at least 4 spares and throw them in your bag – check prices now!
Mavic Air Accessory Tip: We highly recommend buying official DJI replacement propellers for your Mavic Air. They are specifically made for the drone and alternative brands will simply give you issues due to the delicate balance of the drone in the air
4 | Car Charger
There are a number of options for charging Mavic Air batteries on the go. We highly recommend buying a dedicated car charger for your Mavic Air. The best option for charging your Mavic Air on the go is a car inverter. We’ve used a car inverter for a few years and it’s proved invaluable. We currently use two types of car inverter.
Cup holder car inverter
We’ve used this compact inverter from Bestek for around two years on our road trips and it’s been fantastic. It sits neatly in the cup holder of your car and allows easy access to the socket and usb ports- check prices now on Amazon!
Dual Inverter Charger
A more recent addition to our travel gear is the more powerful Bestek inverter which allows you to charge two plugged in devices. If you need additional power for charging check out the more powerful version of this Bestek inverter. It won’t fit in your car cupholder but it will power both the Mavic Air charger and a larger device like a laptop charger comfortably – check prices on Amazon!
5 | Charging Hub
A hub charger will allow you to charge 4 batteries at a time. The DJI charging hub folds down so you can easily throw it in your bag with the standard charging cable that comes with the Mavic Air and keep your batteries charged on the go – check prices now!
6 | Mavic Air Bag – LowePro Protactic 450
The Mavic Air comes with a number of accessories which includes a carry case. While this is useful you will also have a number of important accessories to carry with you. I’ve used the LowePro ProTactic 450 camera bag for our drone and camera equipment for the past year and it’s probably the best camera bag I’ve ever used.
The customisable interior and quick access zips allow you to access your gear quickly and easily. If you’re considering a bag for your Mavic Air I highly recommend this bag – check prices now!
7 | SD Cards and Hard Drives
The DJI Mavic Air shoots up to 4k video which means you’re going to need a lot of high capacity SD cards and a method of backing up that footage so you can edit on your computer. The Mavic Air uses micro SD cards and we find these Sandisk 32GB micro SD cards work best – it forces you to backup your footage regularly and you can carry multiple in your pocket. Make sure to throw some spare micro SD adapters in your bag too.
For backing up footage we use the rule of three – three copies, in three different locations. We keep a copy on a micro SD, and two more copies on separate hard drives. We carry each of the drives in separate bags so the chances of losing all three copies are reduced. You cannot be too prepared for a data loss. After all, you’ll likely only be in a location once with your drone so you don’t want to lose that footage!
Our personal choice for hard drives are these Seagate passport drives. They’re cheap and reliable and come with us everywhere – check prices now on Amazon!
8 | Video / Photo Editing Software
Once you’ve got that killer footage on your Mavic Air it’s time to turn that footage into a video. We use Adobe Premiere Pro for our video editing. It’s widely accepted as the best video editing software. Try it for the free trial and we promise you’ll love it!
We also use Adobe Lightroom for managing and editing all our photos and highly recommend it. To take your photos to the next level we highly recommend you try Lightroom, it’ll change the way you manage and edit your photos for the better. The combination of Lightroom and Photoshop for a small monthly fee is a fantastic deal – check prices now!
Click here for the best Adobe Lightroom prices
9 | Sun Hood
On bright sunny days, it can be very difficult to see your phone screen when you’re flying your drone. Even at full brightness, there will be times you struggle to see the screen, so a sun hood is an invaluable accessory for your Mavic Air. – check prices now!
10 | Landing Pad
A landing pad is useful if you need to take off or land on rough ground or long grass. This landing pad folds up to a small form factor that you can pop in your drone bag – check prices now!
Other Mavic Air Accessories
There are a number of additional accessories that will suit some drone owners depending on the footage they’re trying to capture.
Mount
The controller for the Mavic Air is great and most phones fit into it no problem but it’s not perfect. The main disadvantage is that you need to remove your phone from its case before putting it into the Mavic Air remote. Mounts for the controller overcome the shortcomings of the controller by allowing you to use your phone in its cover or attach tablets to the controller
Tablet Mount
Some drone users also prefer to use a tablet with their drone and to use this you’ll need a tablet mount for your remote controller. The mount works by attaching it to the cellphone holder, while the tablet is affixed to the larger tablet holder in front of the controller. The best tablet for the DJI drones is the iPad Mini due to its price point, form factor and excellent compatibility with the DJI Go app – check prices now!
One of the best tablet holders available is produced by FS Labs. The mount is constructed of lightweight aluminium and requires no tools to install and works perfectly with the iPad Mini for controlling your Mavic Air – check prices now!
PolarPro Mount
One disadvantage of the controller for the Mavic Air is that you need to remove your phone from its case in order to fit it into the controller. PolarPro have found a fix for this with this mount, which clips to the controller and allows you to hold your phone in it’s case on top of the controller – check prices now!
PolarPro Katana
The PolarPro Katana is another great add-on for your Mavic Air. The Katana turns your Mavic Air into a handheld, stabilised 4k rig capable of capturing really stunning footage. The handles allow you to easily position the Mavic Air for ground level shooting while watching the footage on your phone which clips to the top of the rig. This allows you to capture great drone footage from ground level and indoors where flying the Mavic Air would be very difficult or not allowed! – check prices now!
Summary
Happy droning!
