Are waypoints useful while staying within VLOS?

[Johnmcl7]

On reading discussions about newer drones there's frequent references to them not supporting waypoints as the M2P so I've been wondering if I'm missing out by not using them on mine, I understand how the waypoints work but when I read about people using them, it's for missions well outwith visual line of sight. I don't fly outwith VLOS (and not wanting to debate it) so I've been wondering does anyone use waypoints while flying with VLOS and if so, what sort of missions do you fly to take advantage of the feature?

 

[Tufargon]

I think the biggest thing would be missions that you'd want to repeat and be exactly like the previous mission (repetative tasks). As good as anyone can be I seriously doubt they can duplicate a flight exactly more than once.

 

[akdrone]

also the movement may be less jerky than some people can do

 

[brett8883]

Mapping missions for all intents and purposes can’t be done efficiently without waypoints. You probably could technically do it without waypoints but you’d either miss some sections or have more overlap than you need causing the mission to take longer than needed

 

[Dronut]

Plus it's fun to just watch your drone fly around taking pictures and video while changing altitude and direction without any input from yourself.

 

[Jet skier]

On reading discussions about newer drones there's frequent references to them not supporting waypoints as the M2P so I've been wondering if I'm missing out by not using them on mine, I understand how the waypoints work but when I read about people using them, it's for missions well outwith visual line of sight. I don't fly outwith VLOS (and not wanting to debate it) so I've been wondering does anyone use waypoints while flying with VLOS and if so, what sort of missions do you fly to take advantage of the feature?

Set for shooting a hyperlapse it worked great

 

[IronSky1]

You will get a more controlled flight . I use on DJI with Litchi Parrot Anafi built in. They are also handy for repeating and testing .

 

[JoelP]

No matter how I set the Exp or smoothness, I will never fly as smoothly as with Litchi waypoints. Virtual Litchi allows you to go to Google Earth and simulate your flight to see if there is a better height or angle for the shot. When flying along a slope from close to the ground I have found a rise in the terrain in Google Earth, which I hadn’t noticed. That caused me to set another waypoint and avoid contacting the ground when I flew that mission.

When flying in the same spot from year to year this is handy for showing how it changes. On one repeat flight I did, however, clip the top of a fast growing tree, so a degree of caution is needed when flying a repeat mission to provide enough margin.

 

[buddb55]

90% of my missions are for catching sunrises at the golf course I work at, the rest are for flying fields at the family farm.

 

[akdrone]

90% of my missions are for catching sunrises at the golf course I work at, the rest are for flying fields at the family farm.

Yep...that's corn... ...my god...look at that alfalfa... Jokes aside I am wondering if you are doing interesting photographs of field patterns and such or are simply inspecting things. What does one fly farm fields for?

 

[buddb55]

Yep...that's corn... ...my god...look at that alfalfa... Jokes aside I am wondering if you are doing interesting photographs of field patterns and such or are simply inspecting things. What does one fly farm fields for?

Early Spring growth, wind/rain damage, etc.

 

[akdrone]

Early Spring growth, wind/rain damage, etc.

Pretty darn convenient.

 

[buddb55]

Pretty darn convenient.

Beats walking the fields that I had to do as a kid.

 

[Johnmcl7]

Thanks for all the responses and it's clearly worth the effort and time to have a play with the feature. I tend to just take photos and not that bothered about video however when I was moving the drone into position for a set of photos I was accidentally recording video which when I looked back at later I did like although way too jerky since I was just positioning the drone. That had me wondering maybe I should have set it up with waypoints and since a few people have specifically mentioned flying smoother it sounds a good approach.

 

[IronSky1]

You can still get Jerky video if your flight is to slow and the drone heavy . I had problems with Inspire when speed set to low. They still are invaluable for repeat flights and controlled accuracy.

 

[Tufargon]

You can still get Jerky video if your flight is to slow and the drone heavy . I had problems with Inspire when speed set to low. They still are invaluable for repeat flights and controlled accuracy.

Actually with the newer drones having to use virtual sticks it's quite the opposite. You have to slow it down to avoid the jerkiness. Danstube has helped narrow down how to get smoother results from Litchi.

 

[IronSky1]

Good to know.

 

[buddb55]

Here is a sunrise, I just change the POI for the time of year.

 

[Aerialskape]

I use waypoints to do flights that repeat every few weeks and need to follow the same flight path. This is to let the garden team review changes, both natural and their interventions.