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Unusual Tracing Problem in Camera View

Pilot56

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Premium Pilot
Joined
Sep 11, 2020
Messages
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Location
Louisburg, NC
I have recently purchased the Mavic 2 Zoom, which I find to be a very nice drone. The only issue to date is a strange tracing problem while viewing a recently harvested farm field with the gimble in a downward position. The tracing moves across the screen "smart controller" from left to right starting in the top left corner. There are several traces moving down until it finishes in the bottom right. It then begins at the top left and repeats.

This can be seen in playback, but not apparent while viewing in an external program. The camera has been reset and the gimble recalibrated without positive results.
 
For clarity, you see this as you are flying and if you play back the footage on the smart controller. You do not see this if you play the footage on a PC, Mac, Ipad, etc. Is this correct?
 
Playback is from low res proxies, and are only approximations for what is on the SD card. I never use them except to check out a particular flight path I might try. All serious work is done on the off loaded SD card files.
 
What SD card are you using?
 
A photo would help. But, if your seeing a white line across in your playback on different monitors, then I would say it’s your camera. Prob the cable. I guess is common. Idk tho. Don’t send it to DJI unless you have care refresh. Lol. Tried a second card as well? You can do a calibration of the gimbal, but that’s more movement. Try firmware refresh.. after that, camera/hardware. Sorry
 
OK, I was able to come up with a pic. Hopefully you can see what is going on. There is an obvious blurring partial way down. For those of you that have used Photoshop, it reminds me of the blurring tool. I haven't counted the number of "blurred tracts" coming down from the top. I hope this makes since to someone.

Thanks for the help..Camera-Blurred.jpg
 
Ok, so based on what you know, it would seem that the camera itself and the signal path from the camera to the sd card is fine. I'm assuming you got that screen shot by transferring the the file from the controller to a pc (or whatever) for analysis. This, along with clarity of the screen on the controller with no video feed present indicates the screen itself is fine. That leaves the transmission path between the drone and the controller. Vagally, the encoding at the drone, the rf modulation from the drone, the demodulation at the controller and the decoding in the controller. To isolate further you would need a known good drone or controller to eliminate one of them. To further isolate gets complex. I was hoping for your sake that you had just experienced a one time RF interference that would be of no effect on subsequent flights. In other words, the signal in the air from the drone being mixed with another RF signal causing the distortion of the signal.
 
I understand. I will setup another controller with the Mavic 2 Zoom. The Mavic Air 2 does not have this problem using the same smart controller. Ouch! Doesn't look promising at this time.
The two drones should use the same protocol for signal transmission. Given the Air 2 does not have the problem, it would seem that it is the drone that is suspect. I have absolutely no idea now those circuits in the drone are broken out. I don't know if different functions are on different boards or no. I'm out at this point as per further analysis.

Good luck getting it fixed!!!!
 
Oh, just to add a little more info. The image was cached to the smart controller's internal memory and uploaded to AirData. I downloaded it from their server.
Got ya. No change in theory. Still a file transfer.
 
Got ya. No change in theory. Still a file transfer.
Just an update. I think the root cause of the static line issues boils down to poor reception. I live in area with a lot of metal roofs, ham radio antennas and strong WIFI. If I walk out into a field away from the potential interferences, the problem seems to go away. As a comparison to the Mavic Air 2, I find the Air 2 has better reception. The problem has never been visible while using the Air 2.
 
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Gla
Just an update. I think the root cause of the static line issues boils down to poor reception. I live in area with a lot of metal roofs, ham radio antennas and strong WIFI. If I walk out into a field away from the potential interferences, the problem seems to go away. As a comparison to the Mavic Air 2, I find the Air 2 has better reception. The problem has never been visible while using the Air 2.
Glad your finding resolve! Thanks for the update.
 
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