#quadcopter video

[dronetribe]

Parrot Updates Bebop2 with Follow me on iOS

WTF? You need to have an iOS enable smart device to enable follow me for Bebop 2?

Well it is no secret I am a fan of the Bebop regardless how awful the video recording is, but the worst of the lot has to be the Parrot Disco fixed wing drone which I never wrote about for good reason. The French are not known to be sensible, preferring to eat garden variety snails and torturing geese for their livers which only Hannibal Lecter would approve of. They started to tell people how wonderfully easy it is to fly the Disco fixed wing drone, I had to  feign incontinence to take an unwated piss.

As the Christmas season draws near, and the success of the Bebop 2 as a gotta have seasonal gift tanks, they have come out with a new feature, albeit only software enabled.

This only applies to those with an iOS device for now,  and it allows for people tracking themselves for selfies in wide open spaces (as you can tell from the video).

From the looks of it, the tracking isn’t fool proof. It needs lots of free room and if you happen to be chased by a very large brown bear, the Bebop 2 won’t know if it should follow the bear or follow you into the woods as you run for dear life.

Without front sensor intelligence, you could just as well wrap this around a lamp post when filming in the city. In the woods, you have to make sure trees are less than five foot for it to track you like a hawk.

Apparently the update isn’t coming to Android as yet and no word if it will before the end of the year.

So will you buy this over the Mavic Pro during Christmas? Well that depends how desperate you are in filming yourself doing stunts in the snow to claim insurance should you be unfortunate enough to hurt yourself in the process.

[dronetribe]

Tencent introduces a remodeled Dobby Drone.

If self promotion and downright narcissism hasn’t gotten any worse, Tencent Weibo has finally launched the Ying drone in China. This drone was previewed earlier this year at CES but the details were a bit sketchy.

So now we have the final product and is shipping in China. Welcome to the Ying Drone.

So it comes in two colors, black and white but the black one isn’t a Yang drone nor the White One being a Ying drone.

The point is, the drone itself isn’t a Tencent invention but one that is developed by Zerotech, the makers of the Dobby selfie drone which we wrote about a while back.

Now both the Dobby and Ying drone do about the same thing except that the Ying drone is made for streaming video to Weibo/WeChat users. The app connects the drone to give you instant video calling. Retailing for US$300, the drone is capable of 4K video and 13 megapixel stills.

Flight time should be in the ball park of 10 mins and the range will probably be limited to 50 meters since it is after all a WIFI enabled controller from your smart device.

The Ying drone platform was built around the Quaalcom 801 Flight Controller and should be quite agile in the air except maybe when it encounters typhoon level winds. For now, it is just another selfie drone and if you are looking for some loving, there is always the Dobby.

Zerotech is already shipping its Dobby drone world wide so it remains to be seen if the Ying drone would get the same treatment. Right now, it is a China only product.

It could of course ship later to countries where WeChat is a leading IM client, though we are not precisely sure. This is probably a unique selling point for the Ying drone since it is a Tencent Weibo/WeChat product.

Whereas DJI, through the Mavic Pro, can already be used to broadcast live through the use of Periscope, there is little prospect of that suceeding in China as Periscope is a virtual unknown in those shores.

As a co-branded product, don’t expect too much from ZeroTech. They have had limited success with the Dobby drone and from the looks of it, the fight for marketshare will be a tough one.

[dronetribe]

DJI Mavic Pro to Blast Past GoPro’s Karma

If you didn’t know what is bad karma, well you can look no further than GoPro’s Karma drone. Released just prior to the Mavic Pro from DJI, the folks from China have wiped the floor off American innovation.

How could this happen?

First, you gotta remember that the Karma Drone is an accessory for GoPro Hero 5, what the GoPro dudes didn’t tell you was that they weren’t interested in building a drone but rather to build a drone around the GoPro camera!

DJI on the other hand built their drone around video and still photography so it’s not about the camera but rather on the art of taking aerial videos and stills. I am sure the GoPro Hero 5 is heaps better than the camera on the Mavic Pro but the Mavic camera is no slouch either.

Here is a drone worth waiting for, the DJI Mavic was announced last night and it has sex appeal. Like the GoPro Karma, the drone comes in a compact case with foldable arms. When we say compact, it is way smaller than the GoPro Karma. In fact, the Karma drone looks like a whale when folded compared to the DJI Mavic Pro. That is how embarrassing it gets. Whatever happened to American innovation is beyond me but to take this long to release the Karma drone only to be bested by DJI in just weeks spells doom for GoPro. What’s more, to add insult to injury, DJI also included its state of the art altitude and collision sensing capability to the Mavic. There are two front sensing sensors and two bottom ones just like the P4!

Most of the features found on the DJI Mavic are pretty much the same with the P4 except maybe the transmitter which by  DJI standards looks pretty cool. Coke heads who wanted to snort a couple of lines on the old DJI transmitter would be lost in confusion. Gone are the all white surgical feel of the P4 controllers and what you have is a slick, state of the art, sci-fi gadget that runs on Android. The display shows you the important stuff, and the grip below it is for you to attach your 5 inch smartphone for FPV flying. The Mavic Pro with this particular controller will set you back US$999. And if that isn’t badass enough, this set up will also allow you to fly up to 7km. The secret is that the controller itself has a built in DJI LightBridge with allows for long distance 720p video.

But you can also buy the Mavic without this controller at the same ballpark as you would pay for the GoPro Karma drone without the Hero 5.

So to add fuel to fire, you are pretty much fucked if you bought a GoPro Karma without the camera as you’d be able to own the DJI Mavic that you can also fly with the DJI Go app that runs on both iOS and Android. The range however for flying on the app is limited to 80m.

DJI is taking a soft approach to getting you to part with your money and with the Mavic Pro, they have also released a FPV headset.

The headset promises 1080p displays but it is fugly. If you ever suffered from microcephaly, wearing it would tip you over. But DJI has casually mentioned that for immersive flying using FPV, you can also have a partner ride along the flight by tethering a second headset to the same drone. This single headset unit package comes at the same ballpark as you’d pay for a GoPro Karma with a Hero 5 camera.

The camera is mounted on the front along with a gimbal, and to complete the drone experience, that is to take into account the many frontal crash landings you will experience from first time pilots, a bubble glass enclosure is fitted on the camera to take away the shock and damage.

What I like about the drone is the well thought out package. The camera is almost flushed with the drone’s body with the gimbal hidden in the canopy. Two sensors hidden in the underbelly will help to detect the altitude so the only way it will come crashing down is for you ram it onto a tree in sports mode, hurtling at 65km an hour without the aid of the front sensors.

The size, and a claimed flight time of 27 mins is all you’d need to capture great footage while outdoors. And there are tracking modes too just like the P4 where you can get the drone to follow you around.

For those of you who already invested in a Hero 5 from GoPro, there is no sin in buying the Karma Drone…..only if you wish to live with regret for the rest of your life.

[dronetribe]

This is Karma from GoPro

The much awaited drone from GoPro is available on preorder but does it live up to expectations?

Built as a selfie drone, with a foldable design and carry on backpack, it looks pretty much like the first drone you’d buy.

Unfortunately it doesn’t have collision sensing capabilities or tracking to shoot those awesome selfies as you want of yourself in the most narcissistic way. What you do have is the usual flight features like orbit mode and dronie shots. The folks at GoPro also feels that the less you know about the technical specs, the better.

Specifications are missing

Judging from the size, the flight time isn’t great. You are probably looking at between 10 to 15 mins max. Coz if the Karma made it past the 20 minute mark, GoPro would have shouted it out.

Range is also not mentioned. The reason is clear. You cannot possibly compete with DJI’s P4 so let’s not talk about it. Expect this drone to go no further than 1.3 km before it loses contact with the transmitter.

This is probably the only thing that I like about the whole drone. The compact controls with a bright display for FPV is just awesome. This compact form factor with a host of detailed instructions for for first time fliers will be a boon for those who hate to read the manual.

Everything you need to know is via a guided screen from how to take off and fly to a training program that teaches you how to fly via a simulator.

This alone would have won full marks for me but it isn’t the case. What they don’t tell you is that the damn drone doesn’t come with a camera. You need to ante up to a Hero4 or Hero5 for that privilege.

You pay US$800 for the drone, that also comes with a handheld gimbal and a backpack which you can use with the GoPro Hero5 but there is no Hero5 in the package.

The drone is compact, this much I do like but they are asking for the same ballpark that the P4 is at to own it.

For this alone I think it is a bad marketing move by GoPro.

Let’s wait for the Mavic from DJI.

[dronetribe]

Yuneec Breeze Selfie Drone

It’s one of those selfie drones that is all the rage now but this one is from Yuneec and codenamed the Breeze. It is another one of those narcissist drones where all it does is film you whoring around and giving you instant access to post to social media.

Flying isn’t much of a problem since it has limited range, for about 80 meters and you need the Yuneec Breeze app available for iOS and Android to control all its features.

The built in GPS will ensure that it won’t wonder far from you and the altitude sensor won’t go crashing down all a sudden. What it doesn’t have is collision detection and that is a real bummer if you suddenly run into trees or a lamp post.

Flight time is only 12 mins, and records video in 4K at 30fps.

Small enough to fit into your backpack and is somewhat foldable, though not entirely, the drone will set you back about 500 bucks.

Not sold on this entirely but it would be good to have if you are out on family trips where there are no obstacles to bring the Breeze drone crashing down.

[coolerator]

Sumba, Indonesia by quadcopter. Via Jason Wolcott