I got my Spark mid season with some idea that I could use it with my boat. Being new to any form of Drone flying it was a scary thing to try so I have been practicing and practicing in fields just to get the basic flying skills.

Of course, when in a field an accident is recoverable because you can pick up the pieces and repair, losing in the sea is a different matter. Having racked up a few hours in the field and not having any incidents and with it being the last boating trip of the season it was really a case of now or never.
I launched with the drone off the cabin roof which is fibreglass and has no electronics nearby. I then flew pretty much as a "tripod" with the drone simply going up and using rotation and gimbal up/down to film. I avoided ActiveTrack at this time to limit the potential for problems, the movement shots were purely with the drone being still and the boat doing figures of 8.

The only intelligent mode I tried was Circle when at anchor, this worked ok but seemed to be confused when the glare from the sun hit the lens.

Anyway, I am pleased with my first results and I still have the Drone!

Good job! It is impressive that you manage to shoot it without using active track.

Nice! I assume the jittering, sometimes, is from Youtube rendering, right?

Looks great Martin.

S-e-ven Posted at 2017-11-2 02:14
Nice! I assume the jittering, sometimes, is from Youtube rendering, right?

Do you have a specific time point in the video you can point me to. I do not have good Internet bandwidth so cannot tell myself. A couple of shots were speeded up and the overall frame rate was set to 24 in post production so perhaps there is some contention between that and the original frame rate?

The only instance I think I can see some jitter in the master is during the panoramic sweep which I understand is a limitation of the Spark Gimbal as it is only 2-axis and electronically corrects the 3rd axis. There is possible some in the gimbal downwards sweep in the action shot as well?

Martin Lines Posted at 2017-11-2 02:26
Do you have a specific time point in the video you can point me to. I do not have good Internet bandwidth so cannot tell myself. A couple of shots were speeded up and the overall frame rate was set to 24 in post production so perhaps there is some contention between that and the original frame rate?

The only instance I think I can see some jitter in the master is during the panoramic sweep which I understand is a limitation of the Spark Gimbal as it is only 2-axis and electronically corrects the 3rd axis. There is possible some in the gimbal downwards sweep in the action shot as well?

Ah, ok: "A couple of shots were speeded up and the overall frame rate was set to 24 in post production so perhaps there is some contention between that and the original frame rate?"

That may explain it then.
I guess the 24 fps can be responsible
For example, the drone hovering, you driving around and below the drone (just before and after 1:05ish of the video)

Nice video, and glad you were able to not lose the Spark.

Great video!

I take my drone fishing and was worried about an emergency landing on water. I knocked up some floats which work well. Many others have done the same if you check youtube. This is my version.