For several years now I have been traveling with a quadrocopter, I have visited many countries and I want to give advice on personal experience.
1. I have a Mavic Air, it’s ideal for travel: compact dimensions and light weight, with excellent 4K picture quality. You can any other model as per your need, but recommend to you to checkout potensic d85 review once before making any purchase.
2. In our police state, radio communication is limited, only the frequency of 2.4 GHz and a maximum of 500 meters of communication in an open area will work. It will be almost impossible to fly in the city.
Everything is decided by a temporary “move” to America and vice versa, Android owners will find it easier – there are programs for replacing GPS coordinates, although you may need root rights.
For iPhone, you can change GPS only under the account of the developer of mobile applications, I have such an account, it costs $ 99 per year, look among friends who develop applications.
3. After activating the frequency of 5.8 GHz by the method above, the communication range is significantly increased. If there is no interference, the communication is kept at a distance of one and a half kilometers – then I did not fly further, but in the tests they reach the 3rd. It is rare when there is a need for such a long flight.
4. Is the drone a toy? Yes, definitely! At first you want to fly always and everywhere, especially if you run one battery all the time or you go to charge it and then fly again on a new one.
A year later, I had a feeling of novelty, and now even in beautiful places I often feel too lazy to shoot something. But this is with me, maybe you will be wrong. You’ll shoot your hometown very quickly and you’ll get bored, but if you travel regularly, there will be variety.
5. How many batteries do you need? I get along with two. This is optimal. Usually one is enough, but if the day is busy and there are a lot of shootings, and the take-off and landing skills have already been worked out, then two batteries are enough.
You can do one if you are ready to recharge in a car, for example, but again you can fly with two on one, charge the second and your possibilities become almost limitless. Three or more – only if you go to the mountains and autonomous trek.
6. Is it difficult to learn to fly? I previously flew toy helicopters and minidrons without a camera and am able to visually control and do different maneuvers. This will take some time. But most people stupidly fly around the camera, there are no special skills needed.
7. It is very important to wait for the search for satellites and check the coordinates of the starting point on the map. In the event of a disconnection, the drone will return to its take-off point.
8. Always set the return height 20-30 meters above the tallest item in the county. Then, if the connection is lost, the drone will fly up and return above all obstacles, it will not crash anywhere.
9. Although the drone is equipped with sensors, you cannot blindly trust them. Always control the entire space, visually, by camera and messages in the program.
10. There are no sensors on the sides, with a beautiful flyby you can fit into an obstacle. Therefore, or look at the drone from the ground all the time (ideally, an assistant is needed). Or we stop, turn the camera in all directions and only then fly.
There are two cameras in professional drones – one looks in the direction of flight, the other shoots beautiful shots. They are also managed together: one pilot, the second operator. You do not have such an opportunity, so caution should not even be double, but in a cube.
11. There are no sensors on top either. With all my great experience, I recently almost blended into the wires. Spin in all directions – the area is clean; you can take off. But he didn’t raise his head . Always look in all directions.
12. If you grab the drone and sharply turn it upside down, it will turn off the motors. This is an emergency flight stop method.
13. For all the time I had only one complete loss of connection, and on a desert island in the middle of the ocean where there is no interference. The drone returned according to the program to its starting point, the remote control did not work.
I had to act in an emergency way above. I think that the problem was in the firmware, after the update nothing of the kind was repeated.
14. Many times there was a loss of the picture. You can almost always turn around and fly back on telemetry. The image and control of the drone go through different communication channels, if one is lost, the second may be available.
15. Always calibrate the compass on a new flight. If this is not done, the drone can spin in all directions, poorly managed.
16. I take off and landing with my hands. Extreme caution is required, but the drone does not suffer from dust, sand and dirt. You can’t take off from the sand at all – it will get inside.
17. If you take off from the earth – think of what you will use as a platform. I previously used a plaid. So the drone does not suffer from grass, stones and bushes.
18. In the event of a strong wind, landing and even catching a drone will be extremely difficult. He will chat in all directions. An extreme method of emergency landing: either throw a jacket on it from above, blocking the propellers, or hold the sticks down and on top of each other (emergency engine shutdown) and catch the drone from a small height in the rug.
19. One foreigner told me that his drone just blew off the wind at sea, and he lost it. Always check the possibility of take-off and wind using the UAV Forecast app. If the drone blows above the ground – do not care, plant in the grass immediately. If above water – go into sport mode and immediately to land.
20. According to the laws. In our fabulous country, compulsory registration was invented. As I understand it, it does not give any benefits. But problems can add.
It’s like with foreign accounts – you are silent and everything is good, even if they catch it, nobody will catch anything and don’t catch anything, but if you fool yourself, then besides annual hemorrhoid reporting, which physically often doesn’t work out, you can still take a bunch of fines. Perhaps this will be the case with drones. First you register, and then they come up with the idea that you need to take tests for worms three times a year and bring a certificate.
