Quadcopters for camera use

[Jakob]

Curious to what the problem was. That's the A3 FC, right, with it's fancy decision making algorithms?

[benborp]

I can't say where, why or for whom or give too much else away, but -

A miscommunication led to the driving of a winch operated system through the drone flight path. As the drone is dragging around a drogue on a 20m tether it was, unsurprisingly, caught. Although it was caught by a winch line landing on top of the drone so the tether wasn’t a complication. Four of the six props appear to have made contact with the dyneema line which was under tension and running across the space approx. 20 degrees off horizontal. The props caught below the line have remarkably little damage. The two above look to have been destroyed almost immediately​. The drone continued to fly in a stable upright manner for a good thirty seconds despite losing props, having remaining props beating against an obstacle and being dragged off station. That was down to the FC system working well and it bought us some useful time. The M600 as supplied has no sensors to aid awareness of its environment, it is blind and just knows where it is, which way is up and what forces are acting upon it, but it does that really well.

[Jakob]

Ah fair enough. Was just curious if it was a FC failure. Thanks for clarifying that

[LEE]

My first attempt at a "proper" video.

We just got back from a 2 week "road-trip" in the motorhome.  The Peak District, Lake District and Scotland's west coast.

It was almost constantly very windy and the drone struggled to hold its position.  That makes the footage all the more amazing.  Clearly the 3-way gimbal was working overtime to stabilise matters.

>>> CLICKY <<<

[Kim]

Stunning!  Smooth drone footage always makes people and vehicles seem a bit matchbox to me.  Real flying cameras aren't supposed to move like that...

Feels like overuse of fade in/out in the final video, but it's hard to join that sort of footage up another way.

[LEE]

Stunning!  Smooth drone footage always makes people and vehicles seem a bit matchbox to me.  Real flying cameras aren't supposed to move like that...

Feels like overuse of fade in/out in the final video, but it's hard to join that sort of footage up another way.

I used fade in/out because I didn't have time for slick edits to the music beats, it covers up lazy editing quite nicely. 
Only got back around 3pm today, after 2 weeks on the road and was desperate to put something from the Mavic out there.  I have hundreds of photos and videos from my DSLR to edit as well. 
Work really does get on the way, even when I'm editing on my laptop while in the motorhome to cut down on the time it takes at home.

On top of that I'm learning how to best use the drone.  It's sooooooo "feature rich" that it's a bit overwhelming once it's in the air.  A fully featured video camera, with all that entails, combined with a 2 joystick flight controller, plus camera tilt wheel (and several other buttons to contend with).  It's by far the most feature packed tech gadget I have ever used.

The pro film-makers tend to use 2 operators and I can see why, one to fly and one in charge of the camera.  However, if you look at the short footage of me cycling, that was fully automated.  The drone was auto-tracking me.

[Kim]

The pro film-makers tend to use 2 operators and I can see why, one to fly and one in charge of the camera.  However, if you look at the short footage of me cycling, that was fully automated.  The drone was auto-tracking me.

I was wondering about that.  Cool stuff.

[TimO]

...if you look at the short footage of me cycling, that was fully automated.  The drone was auto-tracking me.

Oooh, neat!  I guess you're somewhat dependent on the obstacle avoidance with that, but it appears that you want to make damned sure the flight path doesn't intersect any phone lines, or worse, electrical lines, because that's probably going to mean "burny melty" death, for the drone.

DJI Mavic Pro - Obstacle Avoidance - How sensitive is it?

[LEE]

...if you look at the short footage of me cycling, that was fully automated.  The drone was auto-tracking me.

Oooh, neat!  I guess you're somewhat dependent on the obstacle avoidance with that, but it appears that you want to make damned sure the flight path doesn't intersect any phone lines, or worse, electrical lines, because that's probably going to mean "burny melty" death, for the drone.

DJI Mavic Pro - Obstacle Avoidance - How sensitive is it?

It was flying sideways whilst tracking me so no chance of avoiding anything.  There were rural power lines around but it was flying above them.  I'm very wary about wires and, since getting the drone, have noticed just how "polluted" the skies are with them.

You can also have it circle you whilst tracking, which looks amazingly slick, but there was the complication of a steep hill to my left which would have meant flying it higher.

[geraldc]

I'm looking into doing one of those CAA drone courses, so I can use a drone for aerial photography projects, and get proper insurance etc, however seeing as it seems each authorised establishment handles the exam bit and accreditation themselves, I guess they're much of a muchness. Don't suppose anyone has done a course around London or East Anglia they can recommend?

[Ham]

No, but I'm interested in your experience/investigation

[Jurek]

If only I had the free time.... I think I would've clicked 'Buy now' on a drone by now.
I confess to a twinge of envy over some of the footage Lee has posted (and Dez, come to think of it)

Years ago (about 30) I built kit using RC servos (Kids, pay attention. There was no Bluetooth then,  and the only IR available was in a lamp with a big reflector, for treating  your lumbago - here endeth today's lesson) to control direction and shutter release on an  SLR, and had a kite with a 4m wingspan (think small hang glider) to loft all of it into the air.
It remained an unfinished project. I still have parts of the kit lying around somewhere.
The kite worked. The RC kit worked comme ça
I never got round to marrying the two.
Building the kit from scratch was, I suspect for me, the greater part of the fun. And let's be honest - if it had successful, it would've been much more 'flying by the seat of your pants' than anything that is slickly available today.
But the appeal of 'affordable' aerial photography continues to haunt me.

[alexb]

Is anyone playing with any of the little indoor drones?
I'm tempted by a Hubsan X4 at about £50 including a bunch of spare batteries.

Of course, I'd really like to try my hand at FPV, but I figured buy something cheap, see if I have the coordination to fly it and then take it from there.

[tom_e]

My daughter bought an Eachine e10c.  Great fun little thing.  Like the IR controlled indoor helicopters from a few years back, but with a bit more auto stabilisation built in.  Yaw axis is more or less perfectly stable.  Other three axes require a fair bit of practice.

It's great fun.  It is not a miniature version of those more expensive self stabilised drones.  It is a cool toy you can get out and fly round your living room in any spare three minutes.

Camera on it is not too shabby, but I'm not sure what you could really use it for.

[tonycollinet]

DJI now have the spark. A fairly full featured drone with mech stabilised camera and at a much more affordable £500 or so. (controlled from phone, standard remote transmitter extra)

Doesn't have pro video features (or at least not 4k) - more aimed at "social" videography.

Think flying selfie platform

[Cudzoziemiec]

Is the Mavic in DJI Mavic Pro the same Mavic that makes rims etc? Can we expect Shimano v Campagnolo to take on an aerial aspect?

[Andrij]

Overflowing Glory Hole Spillway at Lake Berryessa

[Kim]

Overflowing Glory Hole Spillway at Lake Berryessa

Swirly thing alert!

[TimO]

That sort of footage impresses me, because it would probably not be safe, or cost effective to film it otherwise.  Flying a helicopter that close to things which it could easily hit, would be unnecessarily dangerous, and probably cost a lot more than a comparatively simple drone, albeit in this case probably a relatively large and expensive drone with pilot and cameraman.

Drones open up all sorts of possibilities, that would simply not have been practical a few years ago.

[rafletcher]

Drones open up all sorts of possibilities, that would simply not have been practical a few years ago.

Indeed - we watched "Wild Alaska" last night, and a lot of the footage was drone filming. They're more expendable than helicopters, and a lot quieter and therefore less disturbing to wildlife.

[Kim]

Drones open up all sorts of possibilities, that would simply not have been practical a few years ago.

Indeed - we watched "Wild Alaska" last night, and a lot of the footage was drone filming. They're more expendable than helicopters, and a lot quieter and therefore less disturbing to wildlife.

The traditional way of sneaking up on wildlife from the air in order to film them is by hot-air balloon.  Sort of thing that's barely practical and requires the patience of a well-funded wildlife photographer.

[TimO]

...
The traditional way of sneaking up on wildlife from the air in order to film them is by hot-air balloon.  Sort of thing that's barely practical and requires the patience of a well-funded wildlife photographer.

I wonder if lighter than air drones could become a thing for this sort of purpose?  A drone may be quieter than a helicopter, but it's far from silent !

A helium balloon for most of the lift, and smaller motors for directional control and stability would seem to be a possible approach.  For even a moderate payload, the balloon will be large, and prone to being caught by the wind, which I suspect would be an issue.

[Little Jim]

...
The traditional way of sneaking up on wildlife from the air in order to film them is by hot-air balloon.  Sort of thing that's barely practical and requires the patience of a well-funded wildlife photographer.

I wonder if lighter than air drones could become a thing for this sort of purpose?  A drone may be quieter than a helicopter, but it's far from silent !

A helium balloon for most of the lift, and smaller motors for directional control and stability would seem to be a possible approach.  For even a moderate payload, the balloon will be large, and prone to being caught by the wind, which I suspect would be an issue.

This would be like a small scale version of the Airlander that they are building at Cardington so I guess it is possible, although there must be a trade-off between it being blown about by the wind and the size of the engines needed to keep it stable.  As you decrease the size of it you reduce the payload capacity but does the engine size decrease accordingly or do you rapidly get to the point where it is just balloon and engine with no payload capacity?

[Kim]

It would seem like a good option for indoor use, where there's going to be approximately zero wind, and spinny blades are worth avoiding.  I suppose the limiting factor there is keeping it practically small.  I'm thinking Festo air penguins and such.

[TimO]

I was thinking from the perspective of a quiet camera platform, for wildlife observation, without needing a mega long range lens !

I fear that you're right, and that the size of the balloon would possibly be too large, so it would need large engines, and possibly still not be terribly stable.

I wonder what the alternative is?  Possibly large slow rotors, to reduce the frequency of the noise, which may help with mammals and animals that hear in a similar audio range ?  How about, very small, very high speed rotors, to move the frequencies so high, that they're way above the range of the target animals?