GoPro Mission 1 review: The action camera gets serious

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Skiing, parachuting, surfing, paragliding or mountain biking: if you’re into outdoor pursuits like these, then at some point you will have considered buying a GoPro, or one of its many clones. But GoPro’s Mission 1 Pro wants to be something different. It aims to replace your point-and-shoot camera and deliver the high-end specifications that professionals appreciate. On the surface, it appears to have nailed the brief.

It’s one of three new cameras from the action camera specialists, and I got the chance to give it an early trial run by documenting my weekend of celebrations as Arsenal finally got their hands on the Premier League trophy after a 22-year wait.

GoPro Mission 1 Pro vs GoPro Hero13 Black

The first question on your lips, though, might well be: isn’t this just another action camera? Well, yes, it is, but it is quite different from the Hero13 Black that preceded it. It comes with a 1in sensor, which should deliver cleaner image quality in both stills and video. If you purchase the Grip Edition bundle for £680, you can slot the Mission 1 Pro into a chunky grip frame that makes one-handed, from-the-hip shooting much more comfortable.

It’s a larger camera than the Hero13 Black – 9mm wider and 10.6mm deeper (including the much bulkier lens housing) – but it’s the extra weight that you’ll feel the most. At 207g vs 158g, this camera will wobble about a bit more than its nimbler sibling if you’re not careful about how you mount it. It certainly won’t be the best camera for sticking on your lightweight road bike helmet.

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In recompense, you get up to 8K open gate video recording at 30fps, which means the whole sensor is captured at a 4:3 aspect ratio) or 16:9 8K at 60fps. The Hero13 Black could only manage 5.3K at 30fps. And it can capture photos at an impressive 50MP resolution.

The Mission 1 Pro comes with some seriously impressive slow-motion modes, too. You can capture 4K at up to 240fps, which is impressive enough, or go crazy with Burst Mode, which captures 1080p footage at 960fps in ten-second bursts. The GoPro Hero13 Black’s best was 720p at 400fps or 240fps at 2.7K. This is a big step up. 

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It’s fun to play around with these modes – I got some fantastic results with the 4K 240fps mode walking around central London – but you’ll need to be careful or your SD card is going to fill up quick: a 56 second 4K clip recorded at 240fps results in 7min 28sec of 4K/30 footage, and every time you shoot ten seconds in burst mode at 960fps, you’ll get a 5min 22sec video.

Battery life from the camera’s rechargeable 2,180mAh battery is better, too, according to GoPro. It’s capable of recording more than three hours of 4K footage at 30fps before needing a top-up or a battery swap. The Hero13 Black, with its 1,950mAh battery, is quoted at 1hr 48mins, so that’s another big improvement.

Pricing

The GoPro Mission 1 Pro sits smack bang in the middle of GoPro’s three new models, and the most basic package is £599. With the grip that I’ve been testing, it’s £680. That’s a lot more expensive than the smaller, less capable GoPro Hero13 Black, which currently retails for around £300.

The regular Mission 1 is a touch cheaper at £529, but can only shoot 8K at up to 30fps, while the Mission 1 Pro ILS is £599. The latter will come with a lens mount that’s compatible with the popular Micro Four Thirds lens system and is due for release later this year.

And, of course, there’s a whole host of bundles available aimed at specific types of activity. The Dive bundle is £720 and includes a protective housing that is waterproof right down to 60m, along with other accessories. There’s also a Creator bundle (not out yet) that will set you back £950 and comes with a wireless microphone kit, a mini tripod with a built-in battery and various other accessories.

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Image quality

I’m going to spend a bit more time with the camera before delivering my final verdict on image quality, but after my first few days with it, I must say my experiences have been mixed. First off, though, I must say that general video quality in 4K is exceptional.

I took the camera along to the celebrations at Arsenal’s Emirates Stadium on Sunday evening, and it captured the chaotic energy of the scene perfectly, despite tricky lighting. I shot entirely in 4K mode because I didn’t want to run out of space on my SD card, but this coped beautifully with the detail, the movement of thousands of people, and the vibrant colours in the scene: exposure was perfect, image stabilisation smooth, and details captured exceptionally clearly.

I’ve posted a short clip of the celebrations on the Expert Reviews Instagram account, which you can watch here to see that it performed almost as well as Mikel Arteta’s men in red and white!

All of my slow-motion shots looked pretty amazing, too. I’m no professional videographer, but I’m sure that with a bit of thought and forward planning, you could capture some stunning shots with this thing, especially in 8K. It’s a shame the ski season has finished because I’d love to experiment with them out on the piste.

In other areas, however, I was a tad disappointed with the Mission 1 Pro. Shipping the camera with a grip (or at least offering customers the option to buy a bundle that includes the grip) suggests GoPro wants to position the Mission 1 Pro as a camera for stills as well as professional action video. However, I found its photographs a little lacklustre and images captured in low light looked quite noisy and soft.

That doesn’t bode well for using the camera as a social media vlogging tool, so I tested it out using the camera’s dedicated vlogging mode, which automatically detects your face and keeps it in the centre of the frame.

Video captured this way looked much sharper and cleaner, although it’s still a bit behind the quality you’ll get from the DJI Osmo Pocket 4. You’ll need to remember to tell the GoPro Quik app to play your video in full resolution; otherwise, it plays it back at a weirdly low 960 x 720.

GoPro Mission 1 Pro review: Early verdict

The GoPro Mission 1 Pro is an insanely capable action camera, and (mostly) it lives up to its billing as the ultimate pocket cinema camera. Video quality is exceptional. It can shoot 8K video at up to 60fps, the new slow-motion modes are great, and it’s packed with high-end features.

However, it does have some surprising weaknesses. I haven’t been impressed with its image capture so far, and it just isn’t as good a vlogging camera as the DJI Osmo Pocket 4.

Ultimately, though, I think the price will be the GoPro Mission 1 Pro’s main issue. At £599, I think it’s just a bit too pricey, especially since you can now get the Hero13 Black for £300.

Written By

Jonathan Bray

Head of reviews at Expert Reviews, Jon has been testing and writing about products since before most of you were born (well, only if you were born after 1996). In that time he’s tested and reviewed hundreds of laptops, PCs, smartphones, vacuum cleaners, coffee machines, doorbells, cameras and more. He’s worked on websites since the early days of tech, writing game reviews for AOL and hardware reviews for PC Pro, Computer Buyer and other print publications. He’s also had work published in Trusted Reviews, Computing Which? and The Observer. And yet, even after so many years in the industry, there’s still nothing more he loves than getting to grips with a new product and putting it through its paces.

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