What's all this here then?

Chrisbarbers · Apr 1, 2018

I love my MA, I also have a Karma and previously had a Spark and before that a Yuneec Q500. Kept the Karma because of the Grip but don’t think it will actally get much flight time. I have never experienced a fly away and I consider myself an accomplished pilot so not phased by flying it myself. That doesn’t mean my knees didn’t tremble when flying the Yuneec or Karma over water

honestly I stayed away from DJI because of the fly away stories I kept seeing related with the Phantoms but even the Spark had me thinking I had made a mistake and the Karma should have been a Mavic Pro.... just have a good set of preflight procedures you follow, don’t ignore the warnings from the drone and fly safe, always.

Kilrymont · Apr 1, 2018

Hi Chris, actually I don't know what a Karma is so I'll google it when I've sent this off. I've seen a fair bit of footage from Yuneec birds and thus far it all looked like high quality stuff. In particular there's a YouTuber goes by the tag of Tigger who lives in the Scottish Highlands and his videos are real eye candy - scenery is off the chart beautiful and he's clearly an accomplished flier, plus he obviously has a good command of how to make footage look its best. Pretty sure he's got a Q500 and a Typhoon, the hexcopter device. Well worth a looksee.

Frankly, I'm a bag of nerves whenever a non-toy grade quad is at the opposite end of my controller... so far no crashes, but maybe that's a dangerous claim to make - so consider it withdrawn!

And roger on the procedures. Losing one of these things isn't something I want to contemplate, it's more than the £££ that I'd have burnt, it's tied in with pride and general desire to avoid disasters...

Chrisbarbers said:
I love my MA, I also have a Karma and previously had a Spark and before that a Yuneec Q500. Kept the Karma because of the Grip but don’t think it will actally get much flight time. I have never experienced a fly away and I consider myself an accomplished pilot so not phased by flying it myself. That doesn’t mean my knees didn’t tremble when flying the Yuneec or Karma over water honestly I stayed away from DJI because of the fly away stories I kept seeing related with the Phantoms but even the Spark had me thinking I had made a mistake and the Karma should have been a Mavic Pro.... just have a good set of preflight procedures you follow, don’t ignore the warnings from the drone and fly safe, always.

Chrisbarbers · Apr 1, 2018

Kilrymont, the Karma is the GoPro Drone that they are still selling but have announced they are out of the Drone Market, so when all stock is gone they are done with drones, that means no Karma 2 or any updates for the Karma of late, which is a shame as the numbers and claims I saw said the Karma was no. 2 best seller after DJI, that said their drone is way behind even the Yuneec for capability, I like the Typhoon H but I originally went for the Karma as it's footprint was hands down better for pack and Go, I used to have a massive wheely case for the Yuneec

Now the MA is just so portable and unobtrusive and unless it's a few feet away it's pretty quiet too, although I saw a Mavic Pro Platinum at the Photography Show last month and was amazed how quiet that was, my reason for getting the Spark and then the MA was the fact they can do 360 Panos, which I love as an art form, I also have the Ricoh Theta V for land based 360 photospheres and 360 4K Video.

I am just waiting for the crappy UK weather to improve so I can get out with the drone, I will have to start building some story boards of footage I want to do, but I live in Peterborough (the Fens) and stunning features for great footage is pretty limited... I need to plan some trips, I'd like to do some more waterfalls.

Kilrymont · Apr 1, 2018

Waterfalls are very attractive, but if you can find a bit of river with some rapids (in the fens I can guess such will be - non-existent?) since there's length and/or area to use involving some horizontal movement to increase the shot's interest. The idea of storyboards is one I'd never considered - I'm a lifetime photographer, but very wet behind ears with cine/video, amazing how little my experience is of value for so closely related a subject. Story boards - nice idea, must give this some thought.

Should you find yourself up in the NW area of Scotland, two falls you might consider are - the Falls of Glomach, I've an idea that's the highest fall in the UK - and the other one's very extreme indeed; the Falls of Lora. The latter, rather than a true waterfall, is a tide race to end all tide races. A massive sea loch called Loch Etive gets filled and lowered twice daily with tidal action, and all the water to do so funnels through a relatively shallow narrows. It's famous for play-boat canoeist heroes playing among monstrous standing-stacks of white water like transit vans-and larger. And if you can see this, time it for half-tide on a Spring tide - which are the highest ones in the lunar month. Very, very spectacular. Lora is so savage at its height that you have to holler at someone stood beside you to be heard. If you catch it halfway through a big tide as described, it's quite terrifying - you can easily grasp how folks might have thought of supernatural forces at work in bygone ages. Here's a random clip...

And one of Glomach

If interested, try some searches on Flickr for these locations. They're really worth the look. I'm too old & knackered now to get anywhere near Glomach, but I'll be up around Etive some time this coming spring.

Kilrymont · Jul 14, 2018

Replying to myself here, just as well I'm not *talking* to me as well?

Latest - the reduced prices on Amazon for the bare MavPro was tempting beyond endurance, so I got fed up resisting and bought the bloody thing. A bare-bones package with only two spare props as extras over the usual battery and charger set. Since then I've got a refurb battery and a Powerextra new one so I'm nearly up to speed on the same level of equipment as the Fly More as far as needed stuff goes. Extra props excepted. I don't really need the multi battery charge facility.

I made a video up of half the Air's footage and half the Pro and nobody can see "the join". I set the pro to focus on the frame centre, so all's sharp. Just general flying around a loch, no selective focus needed really. Still, nice to find it handled so well. Got a couple of individual zipped hardshell pods to hold the drone and the controller with a splint for the sticks. A small padded camera bag serves for the two extra batteries, and all fits nicely into a satchel I've had for about 25 years and doesn't shout "DRONE BAG" to any prying eyes.

First time out - well now, if I'd flown one of these before I'd never have bought the Air... Straight away, impressive. Solid, no nonsense and very, very steady. I like it LOTS. That's with one flight only, mind you. (I don't get out much!)

And the P4 has started with the squint horizon business now, that's a real killer as I like to shoot at the shore and those sea horizons - if not horizontal - really take your eye. Videos don't straighten up as easy as trimming a still in Photoshop.
So far I've not been too traumatised at this with the two new toys to play with, but it'll need sorted at some point.

Could be it'll need to find itself a new owner, we'll see.

K

Underdog1964 · Jul 15, 2018

I don't have a drone as yet so forgive a potentially foolish question.

Could the flyaway issue be that some may be disabling the RTH function while flying past the range of the device?

I’ve seen two distance tests on YT where the MA went 4 kilometers and back over a lake. The other was 2.5 kilometers over land.
Seems pretty solid to me.
I will say though that the 2.4 ghz setting seemed to offer the best connection.

Still, would you really need to go out that far?

Thwyllo · Jul 15, 2018

Underdog1964 said:
I don't have a drone as yet so forgive a potentially foolish question.

Could the flyaway issue be that some may be disabling the RTH function while flying past the range of the device?

I’ve seen two distance tests on YT where the MA went 4 kilometers and back over a lake. The other was 2.5 kilometers over land.
Seems pretty solid to me.
I will say though that the 2.4 ghz setting seemed to offer the best connection.

Still, would you really need to go out that far?

Your last question is the key and the simple answer is frankly no. People do it because they can. They'll all come piling in with various justifications but the way it works with any other camera is that if your subject is too far away for your lens you walk, drive or crawl closer to it.

I'll let you draw your own conclusions from whatever follows

Underdog1964 · Jul 15, 2018

Understood.
I view the max range as an indication of connection strength, not actual recommended flight range.
We are required to fly VLOS in the U.S.
I can't ever see the need to fly that far out.
Thanks for your input. The MA is now something I’m considering again.

Thwyllo · Jul 15, 2018

You could do a lot worse. I own one and the performance and photo/video quality are first class. And if you're content - like me - to stay inside the envelope it does everything you need it to.

Underdog1964 · Jul 15, 2018

Thwyllo said:
You could do a lot worse. I own one and the performance and photo/video quality are first class. And if you're content - like me - to stay inside the envelope it does everything you need it to.

I think it will be a good fit for me as well

Kilrymont · Jul 16, 2018

I think I can confidently say that no drone flown by me will ever approach those distances.
Especially since in countries where the CE standard applies the transmission wattage (milliwattage?) is considerably reduced from what the US FCC permits. Not every info source in the UK/Europe is keen to publicise that we get less range than Transatlantic cousins.

The flyaway issue as you mention is addressed well enough in earlier posts and I think was more or less put to bed as a non-event provided that the quad's flown with sense and care as regards compass calibration.

Having used mine for several flights in various light conditions, I'm happy that its footage is more than acceptable quality for my needs. It's easily a better drone than I am a pilot and I wonder if that's the reality for many owners who don't get to fly as often as they'd like because of other pressures?

A You-Tuber using the name "Ian In London" posted a couple of test flights with his MavAir over open English countryside beginning in his garden. The difference between the two Wifi bands was less than expected - considerably less than I'd expected. Without rewatching those clips I'm pretty sure he achieved a good Kilometre or more before signal loss became worthy of note and he returned home. Mine won't ever be as far out as that from me. Very, very difficult to maintain any sort of eye contact outside maybe a hundred yards or so, as you find when you look down at the screen - reacquiring it in the air is very difficult indeed, unless it's above the horizon. Even then, outside 150m or so that becomes one very tiny flake of plastic in the sky.

But people do seem to like to stretch things to "see what it'll do" - like the need to see how fast a motorcycle is compared to the magazine tester's findings, etc etc. The really dangerous guys are the ones who persist in sending them way too high up because they think they're far enough from air lanes for that to be acceptably risk free. Sooner or later one of those fools will cause a nasty incident.

Underdog1964 said:
I don't have a drone as yet so forgive a potentially foolish question.

Could the flyaway issue be that some may be disabling the RTH function while flying past the range of the device?

I’ve seen two distance tests on YT where the MA went 4 kilometers and back over a lake. The other was 2.5 kilometers over land.
Seems pretty solid to me.
I will say though that the 2.4 ghz setting seemed to offer the best connection.

Still, would you really need to go out that far?

Underdog1964 · Jul 16, 2018

Thanks Kilrymont.
What you say makes perfect sense.
I don't plan on flying it that far away from me either.
Have a great day!
(waiting for Amazon Prime Day. To kick in at 3pm EST)

msinger · Jul 16, 2018

Underdog1964 said:
waiting for Amazon Prime Day. To kick in at 3pm EST

DJI's deals are available right now in the DJI Store or in the DJI Amazon Store.

Underdog1964 · Jul 16, 2018

msinger said:
DJI's deals are available right now in the DJI Store or in the DJI Amazon Store.

I ordered the Onyx Black Mavic Air Fly More Combo with Refresh.
Can I tell my wife it's your fault?

msinger · Jul 16, 2018

Underdog1964 said:
Can I tell my wife it's your fault?

Of course! I'm the designated scapegoat when wives disapprove

Underdog1964 · Jul 16, 2018

Kidding aside, she's been really supportive on it.
I hope I can get some nice pics for her as a payoff.

msinger · Jul 16, 2018

I'm sure you will. When I bought my first drone, even taking simple pics over top of my house was pretty amazing to see. It's an angle that many people never get to experience.

MavicFlyer · Aug 9, 2018

msinger said:
The remote controller was only designed to hold a mobile phone. And that works quite well and it's comfortable to hold the remote controller with a phone inserted between the arms.

Early on, people have figured out that it's also possible to wedge some tablets between the remote controller arms. As you probably noticed if you've seen any photos, the arms don't really sit at a comfortable angle (IMO) when using something like an iPad Mini.

So, try it and see how you like it. If it's not comfortable, then try one of these commonly used Mavic Air tablet mounts:

FStop Labs

Hooshion or SKYREAT Extended (see it in action here)

MavMount (see it in action here)

PGYTECH (see it in action here)

Thanks for posting these links...would have taken a lot of searching to find them...these are the very best reviews I’ve seen of these holders.

I looked around a lot, and ended up with
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B076HHSHFH/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o04_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1, which is similar to the first one.

I think any of these will work with a phone, but the full size iPad may have some issues. My holder was fine with my iPhone, but it flexed a bit with the heavier iPad.

One critical aspect of any holder is that it must all stay together when you let go of it, and let it hang down on the neck strap. I had one holder that did NOT! It was one of those that used a plastic bracket between the remote and the phone wedged between the foldout arms, and the neck strap attached to that bracket. The phone slipped out from between the brackets, and everything fell on my driveway, except for the plastic bracket hanging from my neck. Fortunately, it wasn’t a very long fall, and resulted in only some scuffing.

After that incident, I decided that my holder would NOT rely on anything held by the RC arms, which explains why I’d prefer only the first item on this list.

Note that these reviews also cover sunshades, which are nice to have. One piece of advice would be to make sure you have access to the touchscreen and the physical buttons, like Home on the Apple products. Some shades block the Home button...not good.