Walking a site, shooting points, establishing ground control—these things took days, sometimes weeks depending on the acreage. 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.
Sport Mode boosts the drone’s speed to 45 mph and substantially raises its agility. Position Mode activates TapFly, Active Track, obstacle-sensing, and positioning features for intelligent navigation. Altitude Mode disables satellite stabilization and holds the drone steady, making it perfect for experienced pilots who want to capture smoother footage.
Aircraft weighing over .55 lbs must have a compliant label for identification and carry a Certificate of Registration . We will assist you with your FAA registration filing, make compliant labels and Fight ID card. When you fly a drone in the United States, it is your responsibility to understand and abide by the rules. The MARS Parachutes Phantom P4 Lite is the ultimate low cost, light weight parachute recovery system that is tried, tested and most important of all, proven. A DJI Phantom 4 accessory that will save your drone if hits something or falls.
The major functional difference between these two data collection devices is their GPS capabilities. Flying drones indoors can be challenging if you don’t have the requisite ability to do it safely. And since both the Phantom 4 and Phantom 4 Pro are such big drones, flying them inside is a really, really bad idea.
But I generally prefer proprietary software provided by the drone company since it has likely been the most tested and vetted for their own platform. I look for the universal basics – the offline ability to set flight line overlap, design polygon missions , set AGL, gimbal tilt, etc. Then I look for the camera settings crucial for successful photogrammetry missions. This is where I often see alternatives to GSPro come up short. The bad news is there’s yet another new style of battery (so if you already have a Phantom, your collection of cells won’t work). The good news is that the Phantom 4 can fly for up to 28 minutes on one charge.
It was a quantum leap in combined drone and camera technology that, even today, remains the most sought-after drone for commercial aerial photogrammetric mapping. A 1-inch sensor with variable aperture on a sub $2000 drone with a 4.3 mile range and obstacle avoidance that could also shoot 4K video at 60 frames per second!?!? The Phantom 4 Pro quickly became the gold standard for anyone looking to use an affordable consumer-level UAV to jump into the drone industry to make a buck. An ultra-bright 5.5-inch screen makes vivid colors easily visible even in direct sunlight.
The 1-inch sensor is about four times the size of the more typical 1/2.3-inch class used by most drones , flagship smartphones, and point-and-shoot cameras. The Phantom 4 Pro manages a top speed of about 30mph in its GPS-assisted flight mode, with forward and rear obstacle avoidance in full effect. When flying in this mode, you won’t see the rotors in your video, even if the camera is pointed straight forward. The drone has automated and semi-automated flight modes as well, controlled via the app, but you should be comfortable with manual control before using them. Even with all of its sensors and safety features, you never know when you’ll need to take control of the drone in order to avoid an accident.
The colored bands are gone from the arms, which now end in shiny metal on the exposed motors. It’s belly is grey plastic, which is a nice break from the all dji mini 2 fly more combo white design. From a distance it’s impossible to tell apart from previous editions, but from up close it’s a slightly more aggressive and attractive design.
The Phantom 4 Pro V2.0’s vision and infrared sensing systems are both activated in all three modes to give you a safer flight. Released in October 2013, it was the first of the Phantom 2 series to be released, and featured significant upgrades over the original Phantom. Upgrades over the original Phantom include auto-return, increased flight speed, increased flight time and controllable range, increased battery capacity, and smart phone or tablet connection capability. It later became compatible with a ground station and iOS or Android devices. It was the first DJI aircraft to be released with the “Intelligent Li-Po battery” which enabled flight times of almost 20 minutes. It also featured a “Range Extender” device on the controller which worked as a relay/amplifier for the wifi FPV signal between the aircraft and the controller, thereby increasing signal strength and range.
Just look at GoPro – the company once sold six different cameras at once – and all of them essentially did the same thing. This led to confusion which probably hurt GoPro’s sales numbers in the long run. Essentially this new model makes it even more difficult to decide what to buy. The Advanced will take the place of the regular old Phantom 4, which will be discontinued on April 30th when the new version launches.