This field of view isn’t quite as wide as a GoPro, but provides a good balance between an immersive perspective with little distortion. The gimble is motorized, allowing full wireless control via the controller. This allows the camera to dji fly be moved 90 degrees (i.e. a full range from directly in front to directly below). The iPad shows highlight clipping via zebra lines which I found very useful, especially when the iPad screen was hard to see properly in bright sunlight.
Chromatic aberration has been reduced by 56% and lens distortion had been reduced by 36% compared to Phantom 3 Professional. The Phantom 4 Pro+ has all the technology of the Pro with the addition of the upgraded Lightbridge HD remote controller featuring a HD screen. 2.4Ghz and 5.8Ghz transmissions are available allowing pilots to cut through interference and remove lag. Video transmission of up to 4.3 miles is not available helping pilots go even further.
The general rule is that when shooting video is that the shutter speed should always remain at 2 times the frame rate. So if you’re shooting at 30fps at 4k on the Phantom 4 your shutter speed should remain as close to 60 as possible. The ND filters allow you to fix the shutter speed at 60, allow for buttery smooth cinematic footage.
Flying a drone indoors is a nerve-racking experience, even with the relatively stable Phantom 3. The phantom 4, however, maintained its increased stability even inside when I flew it around an unused ice hockey rink. It was actually enjoyable to fly inside, though the lack of prop guards made me reluctant to get it too close to the walls. DJI’s Phantom 4 is in fact a pretty amazing piece of technology and — for the moment — has supplanted the Phantom 3 Professional as the consumer camera drone to get if you’ve got the money. That said, the out-of-the-box flight experience isn’t all that different from the Phantom 3 — any of them. To be sure, the Phantom 4 does more, but if you are a beginner, there are less expensive options for learning to fly and capturing nice video and photos while you do it.
Marine Phantoms from VMFA-531 “Grey Ghosts” were assigned to Da Nang airbase on South Vietnam’s northeast coast on 10 May 1965 and were initially assigned to provide air defense for the USMC. They soon began close air support missions and VMFA-314 ‘Black Knights’, VMFA-232 ‘Red Devils, VMFA-323 ‘Death Rattlers’, and VMFA-542 ‘Bengals’ soon arrived at the primitive airfield. Marine F-4 pilots claimed three enemy MiGs at the cost of 75 aircraft lost in combat, mostly to ground fire, and four in accidents. On 10 May 1972, Lieutenant Randy “Duke” Cunningham and Lieutenant William P. Driscoll flying an F-4J, call sign “Showtime 100”, shot down three MiG-17s to become the first American flying aces of the war. Their fifth victory was believed at the time to be over a mysterious North Vietnamese ace, Colonel Nguyen Toon, now considered mythical.
In 2013, DJI introduced the world to the Phantom, a durable quadcopter that brought an air of professionalism to a largely recreational market. Around this time, individuals outside of the aerial photography community began exploring use cases for the objectivity and visibility a bird’s-eye view presents. Sometimes when I asked it to navigate through a stand of trees with a few feet of clearance on either side, it refused. TapFly also declined to work when you were too low, for example right after an automatic takeoff. That meant I had to touch the sticks a little before switching over to rely totally on the screen of my mobile device.
As of December 2013, QF-4 and QRF-4 aircraft had flown over 16,000 manned and 600 unmanned training sorties, with 250 unmanned aircraft being shot down in firing exercises. The remaining QF-4s and QRF-4s held their training role until the first of 126 QF-16s were delivered by Boeing. The base continued using them to fly manned test and unmanned live fire test support and Foreign Military Sales testing, with dji drones the final unmanned flight taking place in August 2016. The type was officially retired from US military service with a four–ship flight at Holloman during an event on 21 December 2016. The remaining QF-4s were to be demilitarized after 1 January 2017. It can carry more than 18,000 pounds of weapons on nine external hardpoints, including air-to-air missiles, air-to-ground missiles, and various bombs.
Short battery life has been an issue with previous Phantoms, and DJI has moved to address this in the Phantom 4 with a battery that extends flight times by a quoted 25%. All this makes the Phantom 4 an appealing option for jobbing photographers who need a solid, easy to use drone that will enable them to capture great aerial shots . DJI claims the Phantom 4 is five times more stable than previous models, and while I have not empirical way to test this, it sounds correct based on my time with it. When watching footage where the Phantom 4 was just hovering, I frequently found myself thinking I had accidentally paused playback because the video shot did not change or shake at all. Even in moderate wind, the Phantom 4 managed to hold its position with hardly a waver.