I'm very new to drones, with this being my first serious purchase. I have had the Mavic Pro for about a month now. I took it out on the lake for my second time yesterday and learned a valuable lesson about watching my altitude. Normally the drone maintains its altitude very well so I completely wasn't paying any attention to how high I was, but if you watch in the video (at the 30-32s mark) you'll see that the drone was slowly descending and got uncomfortably close to the water.
(apparently I need to learn how to upload in 4K)
Now, I'm guessing this was because I had it in sports mode and/or was going max speed, but I'd love to get some confirmation on that. If I know when the altitude might not be maintained I can be more vigilant in the future at keeping an eye on it.
Looks like this was manually flown vs active track?
If manual flown then my guess is that your left stick was very slightly down of centre caused inadvertently when you were very carefully keeping the flight line straight.
4k looks great - if you gonna fly so low to water you must keep an eye on altitude as yr most important referance data.
Maybe do some low alt practice runs over grass to get more of a feel for this kind of flying
Dont drown yr drone
Yes, manually flown. Can active track go close to 40mph? I guess it can. I would love to use Active Track but I don't think it will be able to start a lock on the person in the water and maintain that lock after they get up, and especially not with the spray of water blocking its vision.
kirkbauer Posted at 2017-8-6 05:42
Yes, manually flown. Can active track go close to 40mph? I guess it can. I would love to use Active Track but I don't think it will be able to start a lock on the person in the water and maintain that lock after they get up, and especially not with the spray of water blocking its vision.
kirkbauer Posted at 2017-8-6 05:42
Yes, manually flown. Can active track go close to 40mph? I guess it can. I would love to use Active Track but I don't think it will be able to start a lock on the person in the water and maintain that lock after they get up, and especially not with the spray of water blocking its vision.
so manual flown and surely quite nervous (at least a little bit) - then your muscles were flexed and you slightly slipped the height down - good save though -
i guess we must keep practicing till our skill level is such that even/especially during nervous situations that we fly with relaxed muscles.
kirkbauer Posted at 2017-8-6 05:42
Yes, manually flown. Can active track go close to 40mph? I guess it can. I would love to use Active Track but I don't think it will be able to start a lock on the person in the water and maintain that lock after they get up, and especially not with the spray of water blocking its vision.
Active Track doesn't work in Sport Mode and therefore not at 40 mph.
In Sport Mode you'll see the clearance between the Mavic and the water, but it will hit the water, unless you correct it manually.
Yes, water has its challenges. I also configured it to hover if signal is lost (as opposed to returning to home, since I'm launching it from the boat). Retrieving it is tough if the boat is drifting quickly because I want to lower the drone with my left hand on the left control and catch it with my right hand, but that gives no control for moving the drone during landing. In that case I had somebody else put their hand out and I was finally able to land it on their hand by using both hands on the controls.
But landing it in calm conditions was pretty easy.