Hobbyist Mapping & Surveying w/ M2Pro&SC

[Deleted member 140880]

Hello friends!

First post, and apologies in advance for what I think might be a quite novice question in nature. I have been reading previous posts addressing similar but slightly different use cases, and am a bit overwhelmed by what seems to be a variety of answers and solutions for my question and design problem.

I have recently began monitoring a dozen acres or so of lakefront property. I am interested in using my Mavic 2 Pro and Smart Controller to begin systematically observing changes in the environment over the course of the next year. For the most part, I think one approach is to set a flight path and run it a few times a day to gather data to construct a collection of maps that will visually indicate by comparison things that I am interested in such as: areas that get the most direct sunlight in the morning, areas where water collects after rainfall, movement of wildlife, the overall health of the foliage of the area, etc.

My question is, does anyone have any recommendations on which software to start looking at first? It seems like my commitment to using the Smart Controller eliminates some options such as Pix4dCapture. I have the impression from other threads that I can use DJI Pilot on the Smart Controller and potentially Open Drone map to achieve my goal.

Anyways, thank you so much for your consideration of this potentially quite simple situation. I am just a bit overwhelmed by the possibilities and am hoping someone will shed some more light on different solutions. In hindsight, I am wondering if cost was no issue if I should have considered an Enterprise UAV.

Happy holidays to everyone-
b

 

[Meta4]

In hindsight, I am wondering if cost was no issue if I should have considered an Enterprise UAV.

The Mavic 2 and Phantom 4 pro are excellent mapping drones that are used by many professionals for mapping.
Paying extra for one of DJI's enterprise drones wouldn't do anything more or better.

There are some excellent mapping apps that will make your task easy.
Soon I'll be flying a revegetation site that I've been monitoring for four years using DroneDeploy.
The flight plan is saved and can be repeated as often as desired.
Here's DD showing the mission in progress.

And some of the results:

 

[Deleted member 140880]

The Mavic 2 and Phantom 4 pro are excellent mapping drones that are used by many professionals for mapping.
Paying extra for one of DJI's enterprise drones wouldn't do anything more or better.

There are some excellent mapping apps that will make your task easy.

Thank you for sharing these beautiful images--quite capable of the quality I am looking for indeed. I did a bit of searching, and it seems that the Smart Controller cannot accommodate DD in particular.

Here's to hoping there is a user who may have a SC compatible workflow or recommendation.

Best to you @Meta4 on your holiday eve!

 

[Deleted member 114292]

For your situation you should try Dronelink.
They have a version for smart controller.
Much more reliable Than drone deploys app
They have a mapping plan that is $20 lifetime.

 

[Meta4]

For your situation you should try Dronelink.
They have a version for smart controller.

If it works on the smart controller, that would be a help for the OP

Much more reliable Than drone deploys app

Much would be more reliable than DD??
I've used it for a few years and haven't noticed any reliability issues.

 

[Deleted member 140880]

Except do not install it from the Google play store on - the Dronelink site has a download page because there’s a special version for smart controller. Due to the fact that it is an old build and not licensed with Google they are special considerations for apps.

There’s also links there to install the Google play service and the play store but the play store won’t actually run.
So please do this find their download page and install it from their Google play store may or may not ever run on smart controller.

This is because DJI has a custom build for android and has not paid the licensing fees therefore generally speaking good google play store will not run out of the box

There is a procedure to get it to run just for you but I didn’t have any luck with this and I just download the apps I need APK file from the Pure APK app.

Drone link Tech Support will guide you through this if you have problems. You will also have to get a license from the website to use it

Good morning @Done , thank you for mentioning Dronelink. After searching the forum I found this thread, would you mind sharing a bit more about your installation process? In my understanding, it seems that you had to modify the developers installation procedure to successfully install the software on the Smart Controller.