The title pretty much says it all, I just pulled my first dumb-arse trick of packing all the gear and driving 140 miles to shoot some material with no SD card in the aircraft. My own fault entirely, but it occured to me that there should be no reason why the lower resolution copy that is normally saved to the mobile device, could not be recorded and thus save the situation to some extent.

Instead, it appears that the application advises you there is no SD card and that's that. In the bright summer sun, I did not spot the warning, nor did I notice until some time later the red record button was not showing recording mode.

I cannot see any reason to not record the image at the controller end, can someone from DJI please consider this as a new feature to add to the firmware?

      bump

Hi Geebax,

As far as I know, you won't be able to do much without an SD card.


Thanks.

Paniza Posted at 2015-11-16 11:31
Hi Geebax,

As far as I know, you won't be able to do much without an SD card.

I think you misunderstand my point. You are correct, the aircraft cannot record without a card, but a reduced resolution version is sent to the RC unit and recorded on my iPad Air 2 normally. But it does not try to record on the iPad if it detects no card in the aircraft.

What I am saying is that even if there is no card in the aircraft, it should still record on the iPad so you have a reduced resolution back-up copy.

Geebax Posted at 2015-11-15 18:00
I think you misunderstand my point. You are correct, the aircraft cannot record without a card, bu ...

Even with an SD card on board photo images are not transfered to the iPad / Android device.  You have to transfer them after the flight.  On the other hand 720P video is recorded on the iPad / Android device.

hummingbird.uav Posted at 2015-11-16 13:22
Even with an SD card on board photo images are not transfered to the iPad / Android device.  You h ...

"On the other hand 720P video is recorded on the iPad / Android device."

If your re-read my post, that is exactly what I am talking about, by lower resolution version, I am referring to the 720p version, I did not mention the still images.

I would imagine it is possible to do in the firmware, at present, not seeing an SD card in the aircraft it gives up on the recording process in the RC, even though the same video is still being sent to the RC unit.

Geebax, I agree.   You're already seeing the video sent by the FPV on your viewing device.  Why not have the option to record it?
Let me re-word this.....

The only way the DJI app could know that there is an SD card (or not) in the SD card slot on the aircraft is if a signal is sent from the aircraft to the DJI app back on the ground.

Seems it would be easy for there to be a setting to record (or not to record) if no SD card is in the aircraft since the video is still sent back for viewing....regardless of the presence of an SD card in the gimbal or not.

Geebax, we have the feature of "recording the image at the controller end" you can cash videos on your mobile device, but you still have to get your aircraft SD in

Rebel Posted at 2015-11-15 21:34
Gotta love people. Yes it would be nice to be able to cache/record  video to the device without ha ...

Agreed.....this technically should be possible.....hope someone from DJI reads this and at least puts the request on their 'list'.

However, I've made this bonehead move twice before, so now I ensure I have a 2nd MicroSD card in my case at all times.  I've actually had to use this backup on 2 occasions....and, when I finished shooting for those days, I immediately pulled the movies off my card when I got home and stuck that spare MicroSD right back in the case!

With the 64G Samsung MicroSDXC being so decently priced on Amazon, I just couldn't live without the spare:
Samsung Ultra 64GB microSDXC card

Cessna172 Posted at 2015-11-16 14:24
Geebax, I agree.   You're already seeing the video sent by the FPV on your viewing device.  Why not  ...

I guess I am still not getting the message across. Under normal circumstances, when there is an SD card in the aircraft and I press record, the video is saved to the SD card in the aircraft, and at the same time, the downscaled 720p version at the RC end is also saved to my iPad Air 2.

My issue is when there is no SD card in the aircraft, the 720p version is NOT recorded on the iPad Air 2. Why not, there is technically no reason not to, it is already available at the RC end, why does the system decide NOT to record it?

If you like, it is as if the controller is saying, 'Idiot, you have no SD card, so I am not going to bother recording it at this end either".

Flight Raptor, you are right, this little black duck will be carrying a spare card with me from now on.

I went ahead and bought extra micro sd cards and decided to use the included card mainly for future firmware updates and not be dedicated to my videos and still-photo captures.
It was far too easy I found too, to fill that factory installed 16gb card when recording in full 4K format.

Having a clean 64gb sd card in the bird on Takeoff's is rather awesome. Now I may Record to my hearts content.  
Getting quite a nice collection of my "High-Times", & must start editing ~ piecing some of this Phantom 3 recorded awesomeness together to share my goodness with the world.
I only have a 2 terabyte data drive, in my HP 'puter & I don't want to fill it too. Hahaha

RedHotPoker

Rebel Posted at 2015-11-16 16:31
"so I am not going to bother recording it at this end either"
Technically its not recording at the  ...

The word cache is misused here, there is no separate copy being made, the iPad is simply recording the data that is sent for viewing on the tablet when you are flying. The version on the iPad is a downscaled 720p version of the 4K file on the aircraft, the downscaling is being done in the processor on the gimbal board, and then sent back via the radio backlink.

Geebax Posted at 2015-11-16 12:56
I guess I am still not getting the message across. Under normal circumstances, when there is an SD  ...

It should be a setting.   The only way the DJI app knows whether or not there is an SD card is if the Aircraft sends that signal back.

Agreed.

Also, the setting shall allow the GO app to cache the downlink video for the whole flight, regardless if camera is recording or not.  In case of unexpected event happened (bird, crash, etc), the cached video would help.  Since the video will be send to RC by the drones anyway, this will not even affect the flight time.

Geebax Posted at 2015-11-15 20:00
I think you misunderstand my point. You are correct, the aircraft cannot record without a card, bu ...

Hi Geebax,

I didn't misunderstand your point.

What you are saying makes sense but, won't work at this point.

Rebel Posted at 2015-11-17 08:41
I stand corrected. I flew the other day and had a brief video transmission disconnect which of cou ...

Yes, that would be handy in being able to diagnose a problem to the aircraft end or the transmission link.

Almost 1.5 years have already been passed, there is no software improvement on the app. I fully agree Geebax, the app should record the flight even there is no sd card on the drone camera. Why not? However for the time being the best option is having a spare micro sd card in the gear box as Flight Raptor mentioned Unfortunately I had the same trouble twice.

Sorry for not responding to your question. But on the note of NOT having an sd card. Is it also the Reason why al the camera setting options are NOT available? I can only take normaal pics and video. So no pano shalow....