Does anyone have a work-around for the silly leg problem and random start points in P1 missions?

Here is a single wasted leg across the entire area...



Here are two wasted legs...



You can try to find some sort of happy medium by tweaking the mission angle, but it sometimes takes a lot of time, and sometimes appears to not be possible at all.

A solution would be to have the ability to choose a start point.

In the situation above, a start point on the SE side of the island with a mission angle of about 50 degrees would be an easy solution with long legs and a minimum of wasted turns.

To get the island covered, I finally settled for a missions angle of around 140 degrees, with the first 10 minutes of flight having the M300 spinning around the SW end of the island with little 10 meter legs. At the end, the same thing happened at the NE end of the island.

Not being able to choose the start point also got me this week when the random start point happened to be over water. The P1 took its only autofocus attempt, failed to get a good focus, and although the focus seemed OK on the tiny screen, the entire missions images were all out of focus.

Any suggestions appreciated.

Selecting a starting point has been a wish of mine for many years but DJI mapping programs will not allow it. I really don't use the first waypoint autofocus because it's a hit and miss at best. Overwater you can't get a good focus unless there is some whitecap action and it would be a luck shot anyway. You will be better off using infinity. Just calibrate the camera before you fly and don't do it over the island. You really need a good spot with good contrast and color to get a good calibration. Using infinity will get you good pictures. What altitude were you flying?

Between 30 and 50 meters

I still don't know how to calibrate infinity.

I have done the process at various altitudes, but it still displays some message about calibration after takeoff that is only visible for about a second.

In the bright sun I have never been able to read it.

Someday I'm going to have to record the screen with video so I can go back and see what it says

one idea is to split the mission up and rotate the path until the start point is where you want it, once a mission is complete it will appear on the map in grey (last time I checked) and then plan another mission to have some overlap for processing later.

You are also almost too low for the 35mm lens, you could get away with 80 to 100 meters easy and get sub 2cm GSD
Infinity focus calibration has on screen instructions on what to do to calibrate it as well when you select it in the options menu

I have done the calibration, it still gives me a message right after takeoff about calibration I need to try to read sometime.

We fly as low as possible to be able to identify birds and sometimes other wildlife.  For that, the lower you fly, the better the resolution.

We don't do DEMs or anything else, just mapping and counting birds.

With a P1 at 30 meters, you can usually even tell adult from juvenile

fans5b25584c Posted at 7-3 19:27
I have done the calibration, it still gives me a message right after takeoff about calibration I need to try to read sometime.

We fly as low as possible to be able to identify birds and sometimes other wildlife.  For that, the lower you fly, the better the resolution.

You are correct, I have now done it 3 times and it still states it has expired...
I thought the drone at 60 or below would disturb the birds and the reason they made the P1 such a beast was so you could fly higher, but then again it was suppose to have more lenses so you could fly higher so I see your point.

I found those wasted legs only are made when you input a KML/KMZ. if you manually input the coordinates (I know, FAR from ideal), the flight plans are perfect and clean.

Thanks,

That's good to know.

Don't know if I'll ever be able to use it, though, as I just fly inshore islands. They change so often that the out-of-date image on the mission page doesn't make a very good representation of what's there today.

The new advertisements DJI shows are up to date, but not the satellite image.

Walk around for starting point:

1. For KML import - just put a point manully as last point point in google earth or so where you need.
2. When you need manually start from #1 point where you need your starting point

found it here - and it still works

This looks very good

I'll try it


First waypoint for manual area definitions, LAST waypoint for KML imports

fans5b25584c Posted at 12-10 09:20
This looks very good

I'll try it

Take a look at this : https://github.com/JMG30/flight_planner/wiki/Guide
When it works, its great

Looks very nice.

Great to know about.

Apparently then you fly the mission with Litchi?

For my flights,  Pilot does quite well, and being able to make changes in the field is huge, as we fly islands whose shape might have changed since the last Google Earth image available.

Also, if the wind is blowing more than anticipated, for us, we can field change the altitude to make fewer mission legs to compensate for battery capacity lost due to wind.

Understanding the DJI Pilot bug about first and last waypoints is enough to work around this problem for me.

It will remain on the list of bugs DJI apparently has no intention of fixing.

fans5b25584c Posted at 12-11 06:01
Looks very nice.

Great to know about.

No iam not using Litchi, but Pilot 2 + UGCS.

UGCS allows me to avoid all the problems encountered by many M300 owners.  Unfortunately it's a paid solution, that's why I'm trying to provide open source answers first.

LV_Forestry Posted at 2022-12-11 06:19
No iam not using Litchi, but Pilot 2 + UGCS.

UGCS allows me to avoid all the problems encountered by many M300 owners.  Unfortunately it's a paid solution, that's why I'm trying to provide open source answers first.

I just downloaded UgCS trial, have been playing around with it and watching a few videos. I haven't been able to find if I need to set the camera tilt to 90 or if it does that automatically like it does for the L1..I have the P1.
Was also looking to see if you export the flight plan from UgCS and choose the DJI Pilot option then import it into the Pilot app does it do terrain following. I can't tell after importing it.
Thanks

anejojoe Posted at 1-20 12:56
I just downloaded UgCS trial, have been playing around with it and watching a few videos. I haven't been able to find if I need to set the camera tilt to 90 or if it does that automatically like it does for the L1..I have the P1.
Was also looking to see if you export the flight plan from UgCS and choose the DJI Pilot option then import it into the Pilot app does it do terrain following. I can't tell after importing it.
Thanks

Choose the angle of the camera in "camera attitude"

What I do I also import a DSM in pilot 2. But you don't have to. If you choose the Pilot 2 export option the altitudes will remain. Chose AMSL.

anejojoe Posted at 1-20 12:56
I just downloaded UgCS trial, have been playing around with it and watching a few videos. I haven't been able to find if I need to set the camera tilt to 90 or if it does that automatically like it does for the L1..I have the P1.
Was also looking to see if you export the flight plan from UgCS and choose the DJI Pilot option then import it into the Pilot app does it do terrain following. I can't tell after importing it.
Thanks

Found the answer on the UgCS facebook group. Yes need to set the tilt and interval...time or distance and yes if you export using the DJI Pilot option and import into Pilot and does terrain following.
Planning to test it out in the field this week using both the Pilot app and UgCS app. If the Pilot app works with terrain following that goodness as I don't really want to bring my laptop into the field with me.

LV_Forestry Posted at 1-20 13:20
Choose the angle of the camera in "camera attitude"

What I do I also import a DSM in pilot 2. But you don't have to. If you choose the Pilot 2 export option the altitudes will remain. Chose AMSL.

I tested this out a couple of time, build the flight plan in UgCS export using the Pilot 2 option, import into Pilot 2 as a waypoint mission. The issue I'm having is it's stopping to take a picture at each waypoint in the forward pass. Tried a couple of things didn't work.
If I was flying Lidar, or could get past the stopping to take a picture in the forward pass using the Pilot 2 app I'd probably go with UgCS but at this point it's not worth it to me. Plus I don't want to have to bring my laptop into the field with me just to make a change to my flight plan.
Thanks for the response.

anejojoe Posted at 2-17 13:20
I tested this out a couple of time, build the flight plan in UgCS export using the Pilot 2 option, import into Pilot 2 as a waypoint mission. The issue I'm having is it's stopping to take a picture at each waypoint in the forward pass. Tried a couple of things didn't work.
If I was flying Lidar, or could get past the stopping to take a picture in the forward pass using the Pilot 2 app I'd probably go with UgCS but at this point it's not worth it to me. Plus I don't want to have to bring my laptop into the field with me just to make a change to my flight plan.
Thanks for the response.

Yes bringing the laptop can sometimes be an inconvenience.  

Have you tried with the UGCS application for DJI to install on the RC?  It simply replaces DJI Pilot2.  You still need a computer to modify the trajectory.