Free Form Mission
I am a noob here- In the past I have used Litchi and Auto pilot ..... I would like to use dronelink to do something that was easy to do in Litchi which is create a mission that is some way points with altitudes and a path. In Litchi I could do this without programming POI's or anything to do with speed or where the camera was pointed. This is essentially what I called a MOCO mission. I could start the mission , have the aircraft fly the path , hit the elevations and I could do camera moves with yaw control and gimbal control while the aircraft hit the waypoints and altitudes I assigned. By doing this I could vary the feel of the move by how i operated the camera which felt very organic to me. I could also run the flight plan multiple times, in quick succession which helped me get the shots I wanted very quickly. as the software was in control of the flight path and I could pay attention to operating the camera. My question is : Can Dronelink do something similar, the same or better?
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Assuming you are using a drone that supports it, you can convert your mission plan to DJI Waypoints and select Controlled by RC for heading mode:
And uncheck Rotate gimbal pitch.
Thanks Jim - Flying a M2 Pro so a converted mission will work for me. I may add a Evo 2 pro sometime in the future or some drone to be named later. I'm still digging through the possibilities Dronelink presents- I bought it to do mapping missions but clearly if I can do things that I used to do in Litchi that is a bonus. I'll do some test missions with the settings you suggest and test. I'm like that I can have one software package that can cover a multitude of needs
I tested the DJI waypoints as you suggested and it works, allowing me to fly the camera to while the drone flies the route. TBH - Litchi has a few more options in this department : I can set the drone speed to zero and control speed with the stick ( I did not test this on my Drone link flight ) Litchi also has the option to reverse the flight path once the aircraft reaches the end of the route which is also a nice feature. If I am flying a long route and manually controlling the camera, I can with one flight plan shoot a pass in one direction then the reverse, and repeat that mission as many times as I need without having the aircraft RTH each time. I'll admit that I have not explored to the fullest what is possible in dronelink with regards to DJI waypoints mission, so more to do on that front. For now I'll need both apps to accomplish all the flights I need to do, which is ok.
mark smith
I know exactly what you are talking about with those functions. If you learned about those from the Phantom Filmschool then that was my videos you watched for that :)
At the moment Dronelink doesn't have the reverse option, which I agree would be a benefit. Until then there are some things you can do to get close.
1. You can fly backward by pulling back on the stick in exactly the same way as you did with LItchi. The speed will be the difference between the flight speed you set and the flight speed that would have been applied from the stick movement.
2. At the end of the mission - put a loop so that it will slow down and then start coming back. This will give you time to pull back on the stick (see 1) before it says "mission accomplished" and exits.
Hope that helps.
I picked up Litchi after Autopilot and found the waypoint mission settings that I like just by tootling around in the app for a while and trying things out. It turned out that those functions- to program a waypoint flight, with the capability to control speed, yaw and gimbal pitch were a huge benefit, allowing me to make multiple passes altering speed and pitch between waypoints without flying the aircraft path in a very efficient way. I got a many more takes on a mission with variations on speed and camera movement per battery than any other method. This is almost as good as having an Inspire with one operator having control of the aircraft, and a second operator ‘flying the camera’ . I work in some remote places and having a second operator is a deal breaker budget wise - flying that person to the location, putting them up, meals etc. I can build a series of missions and fly them with variations - sort of like having a piece of music as a basis for improvisation.
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