I'm learning to use the Mavic pro and it's awesome. I'd suggest purchasing an extra battery and extra propeller blades when you purchase the drone. Have fun

Old topic, but since it's coming up to Christmas it's probably relevant again. I just want to give any potential buyers a few things to think about, and I'll apologise here for length of the write up.

Using a popular brand drone (such as a DJI drone) has it's advantages. There's going to be more of a user base to draw knowledge from via forums etc. Parts are going to be more readily available also (props, filters, batteries). However some of the DJI drones (spark, tello, mavic air) may be a bit too lightweight do film in anything but the calmest of weather. So whereas some of these options are cheap, they may not be capable of getting the footage you want in the conditions you'll be in.

I film with the 3DR solo, a much older platform, but the thing is also built like a tank. I consider it capable of flying where a lot of drones can't, but I wouldn't recommend it as a buy. It was good when you could get them on ebay for $70 a pop, but due to the company going out of business, spare parts (gimbals, batteries, replacement bodies) are simply out of the question for now (there is 3rd party projects out there to solve some of these issues, but whether or not they come to fruition is another thing). However if I'm going to go somewhere that has gusting winds, I know the solo will stay steady in the air.

You also want to consider portability. More modern drones tend to be able to fold up and be easily transportable (unlike the above mentioned Solo which huge to lug around). If cargo room isn't an issue, that's not a problem, but if you wanted to land somewhere and go on a small hike, it's good to have something that can fold up and doesn't take up much room (the Mavic for instance folds down to about the size of a litre soda bottle).

Probably the most important consideration to keep in mind is your ability to fly said drone. Most drones out there are quite easy to fly, they have onboard flight control computers that do most of the hard work for you, and they are also assisted with onboard GPS and a compass. That makes them easy to fly by just about everyone. However if you lose GPS or have a compass issue, you need to be able to take full manual control and know how to fly your drone. I've read a lot of stories about people who have lost control of their drone (the fabled "flyaway") and had them crash into buildings, tree's or people. In just about every case it was operator error and lack of skill behind the controls that caused the issue. The reason I mention this is that you don't want to spend $1000 or more on a drone, thinking you going to get great footage if you don't have the skills or knowhow to operate it safely and avoid such accidents. If you're just starting out with drones, you may want to get a cheap model that if you crash it, it's not going to be a big hit on your bank account. So before you make a major investment in a drone, you want to be able to fly it properly and with confidence.

I honestly think the best drone I got was a cheap $30 airhog drone. It's foam, it's got no live camera feed, no GPS and it's next to impossible to control. You turn on the fan in the room and that thing is all over the place. Why is this so good? Because it's exactly like flying drone in full manual control in the worst possible conditions when you have a GPS or Magnetic compass failure. If you can maintain control of your $30 drone inside your house, then you'll have no problem with a "real" drone. Plus if you fly your $30 drone into a wall or hit the floor... it's just going to bounce and still be able to fly. So as silly as that may seem, it's actually the best training tool out there if you're new to drones.

Please note, that if you plan to use any drone footage for commercial purposes (this include monetizing the clips on youtube) you will need to obtain a commercial license (part 107 drone license). However if you're a Part 61 certificate holder, you can get your Part 107 without having to sit the test.

IrishmanPDX wrote:I film with the 3DR solo...

As all truly elite camera ship pilots do.

Welcome, Irishman. Good first post. How is your new Maule?

True story; our son was "experimenting" with his drone and it's vertical assent capability, we never saw it again. he combed all around our property and the adjacent one high and low GONE.

Hopefully it's staying toasty and warm in this foggy weather. Not trying to disparage the solo, but I'd more recommend them to people who actually want to tear apart their drone, upgrade and have an interest in actually building their own drones down the road. I also see that the battery issue may be resolved soon and Matt's solved the twitchy gimbal in ChiBios. So works still progressing!

IrishmanPDX wrote:Hopefully it's staying toasty and warm in this foggy weather. Not trying to disparage the solo, but I'd more recommend them to people who actually want to tear apart their drone, upgrade and have an interest in actually building their own drones down the road. I also see that the battery issue may be resolved soon and Matt's solved the twitchy gimbal in ChiBios. So works still progressing!

Does the gimbal have its own BIOS? I don't really understand the architecture of the Solo. I haven't updated since the early revs of OpenSolo, not because I'm not interested, but because I've been buried in the avalanche of life, work, airplanes. I still love my Solo, but flying side by side with a Mavic Air in a breath of wind did reveal some inferior flight software characteristics. Maybe I just need to upgrade again.

Do you know of a good solution for slip-on ND filters for M12 lenses? I run a ND inside my Backbone cage but it's still not quite enough for 1/50 sec at 24 fps.

Some cheaper drones will try to drown you a whole bunch of terms like "headless mode", "altitude hold", "gravity sensor" while leaving out the important term "GPS". A drone without GPS is sure to fly away. Now you could prevent this by incorporating a Static Tether Recovery Instrument Negotiation Gizmo into your drone. Although a Recovery Operations Pairing Equipment is more robust if a little heavier....

The gimbal is a bit of a pain. The reason we haven't seen real movement on that one is because the Gimbal was designed hand in hand with GoPro. GP and 3DR had a co-development agreement and as a result the Gimbal code was designed to work specifically hand in hand with a GoPro camera. This meant that when 3DR released the source code for their drone (which enabled people to work on Open Solo) that was great. Unfortunately they couldn't release the source code for the Gimbal as part of this code belongs to GoPro. 3DR did promise to release it at some stage but it looks like there's been an indefinite hold up on that.

Right now you're better off having the Solo updated to OpenSolo 3.5.4. That's the most stable release available. If you're flying with a green cube you get a lot of advantages using that firmware.

ChiBios is basically new operating system for the drone, it results in it using a heck of a lot less overhead during processing and it's going to free up a lot of resources as a result, but it didn't interact too well with the gimbal, it resulted in erratic twitching. Matt did narrow that down as to why and is going to introduce a patch to the code shortly. I believe this introduces an improved RTL system, but I haven't seen the latest release notes on that one.

PEAU productions do an ND filter for the GoPro that will work with M12 lenses. However it's a filter that slips behind the lens itself. So you'd have to take apart your gopro, pull out the lens, put the filter in and reapply the lens. It is a glass filter though, so straight away that's going to be better than using plastic. Although if you're using a Backbone Cage that might make things go a bit quicker.

I had an opportunity to play with the DJI Mavic Air at the Idaho Aviation Association's NYD Fly-in at Dug Bar.



I would recommend this drone for excellent design features and remarkable quality. It's eerily easy to fly. It handles wind well. The gimbals make for super stable shots. And...it hasn't flown off on me yet.

Scolopax wrote:I had an opportunity to play with the DJI Mavic Air at the Idaho Aviation Association's NYD Fly-in at Dug Bar.

I would recommend this drone for excellent design features and remarkable quality. It's eerily easy to fly. It handles wind well. The gimbals make for super stable shots. And...it hasn't flown off on me yet.

I've been a pretty staunch supporter of the Phantom line. I guess I still am.

But I had an opportunity to shoot with a Mavic 2 Pro for a commercial the other week and was very impressed. Great platform.

I don't have any experience with the Mavic series but I've been flying the Phantom 4 Pro for a few years. It's not the latest and greatest, but it has a pretty good camera. This is un-edited video shot in the dark on a friends farm: https://vimeo.com/256769874

If anyone is interested I have a DJI Inspire 1 with three batteries, x5 gimbal ( uses panasoinc 3/4 frame lenses,or Olympus ) two controllers, case,car battery charger ect. Excellent condition as I dont fly it much .