Instant replacement of DOA products, including fault diagnosis over the phone with one of our 4 technicians, free returns and replacements of faulty items. Many customers ask us questions around how to start a drone business, which drones are best for different operations, and which training is required to pilot those drones. After completing the mission, retrieve your images using the preferred method , and upload them to Site Scan Manager for ArcGIS for processing. If using a network base station, any previously saved stations are seen in the list. To add a new station, tap Create New RTK Network Service Provider Source. If using D-RTK 2 mobile station, select D-RTK 2 and skip to step 11.
In our testing, battery life averaged above 25 minutes, which is equal or better than comparably sized camera drones. The remote control can be charged at the same time as the battery and in our testing lasted through three full flights without a problem. The Phantom line was already the nimblest of the half dozen drones I’ve tested, but the sport mode puts it in a class all its own.
The rolling electronic shutters of the Skydio, Parrot, Autel and even the most recent DJI Mavic models simply cannot provide the same level of still photo quality at typical flying speeds that the Phantom 4 Pro can. Third-party solutions like Litchi handle waypoint missions extremely well, and MapsMadeEasy MapPilot provides a terrain following solution. But I generally prefer proprietary software provided by the drone company since it has likely been the most tested and vetted for their own platform. I look for the universal basics – the offline ability to set flight line overlap, design polygon missions , set AGL, gimbal tilt, etc. Then I look for the camera settings crucial for successful photogrammetry missions. Once you’ve got your location set, make sure that the Pro’s firmware is up to date, and ensure that both the flight battery and remote control are fully charged.
When placed in long term storage, batteries will discharge power to maintain good health. Supporting both 2.4 GHz and 5.8 GHz, OcuSync 2.0 scans for the frequency band with the lowest interference and switches accordingly to maintain clear transmission. Thanks to OcuSync 2.0, the dji mini 2 fly more combo Pro V2.0 connects wirelessly to the DJI Goggles for an even more immersive experience. Draw a flight path in real time on the camera screen, and the aircraft will compute a corresponding route, making aerial photography a more streamlined experience.
It’s been less than a year since the release of the Phantom 3 Professional, but drone technology is advancing rapidly, and now DJI has introduced the . It’s a refinement of the Phantom 3 Professional, with a beefed-up design, improved intelligent flight options, and a new and very clever object-avoidance system. There are tweaks to the camera’s performance, but the major upgrades are the robust design, improved materials, and clever flight aids using new sensors.
DJI has been a major innovator in the drone market with its ready-to-go Phantom series. The most important enhancement in the Phantom 4, however, is the new object detection and avoidance feature. The pitch is that the Phantom 4 will stop you from flying your drone into trees, and will somehow miraculously make it possible for anyone to fly no matter what their skill level. The obstacle detection features only work when you’re flying forward. It relies on forward-facing cameras that can recognize large objects. Those cameras cannot warn you about obstacles when you’re flying in any other direction.
The Pro offers two remote controllers, one with a dedicated screen (Phantom 4 Pro+) and one without. The Phantom 4, released in March 2016, introduces a safer and better quick release propeller system. It also improves usability by adding obstacle avoidance and an ability to track subjects , thanks to its five sensors.
Phantom 4 supports writing GPS coordinates to EXIF data of every individual image on the fly. It means no manual geotagging is needed when importing images to 3Dsurvey for processing. Further quality control was achieved by placing GCPs and establishing independent validation points. A simple small-size landfill was chosen for testing purposes to recreate the conditions we think Phantom 4 is most suitable for. With a flight time of 28 minutes it is not meant to be used on large-scale projects but proves ideal for small and mid-size land surveying tasks .
But, if you are flying below 200ft AGL on a cloudy day with your drone snapping away pictures on “Auto” your photos will likely be rendered useless due to motion blur. That’s because the auto setting of your drone camera software likely set the shutter speed too slow to allow enough light to come in . The internal hardware—dual inertial measurement units , along with satellite stabilization that utilizes both GPS and GLONASS—are the same as you get with the Phantom 4. Indoor flight, without the aid of GPS, utilizes the downward-facing Vision Positioning System sensors. They examine the ground below the drone and keep it steady, though they are ineffective when flying over reflective surfaces. First, you get tried-and-true options, including Point of Interest, Waypoint, Follow, Course Lock, and Home Lock.
For small businesses in aerial mapping, all that was needed was access to a high-quality photogrammetry processing software like Pix4Dmapper (which costs $350/month). At press time the Phantom 4 is selling for about $300 less than the Pro, and remains a superb option for videographers who are happy with the excellent video quality it delivers. If you have the budget, though, and you’re serious about aerial videography, the Pro’s extra cost is justified. There’s a third, more expensive option, the Phantom 4 Pro+, at $1,799. It has an integrated tablet, which means you don’t have to connect your own smartphone to the remote controller.