About to throw in the Towel on my Inspire 1 Pro Blacks!

[Tommy Bayshore]

Ok, im sure there are 5,000 articles floating around that "discuss" these same issues but i'm not out of my mind, and "The Editor" please allow this post as i know you typically don't like redundant posts but i'm really at witts end.

I have a Inspire 1 Pro Black (latest firmware on craft, RV and cam) and a P4 (also latest firmware). The P4 flies like a dream, never really have had any problems with it. I got the Black so i could give our company a bit more of a professional look when showing up for shoots and also for the advanced camera settings and ability to change lenses. On the camera settings side having the Black works like a dream, i understand those settings and love using them!

Here is my problem. The Black used to give me image transmission problems horribly, to the point i couldn't fly it (tried android, ipad mini 2, ipad mini 4 etc.. turned off cached video etc..) , i sent it back and got a new one, had the same issues, this time i switched it to channel 20 and took it off auto and the video problems are fixed/gone, no more transmission issues. I returned it at the advice of DJI tech who never once told me to set it to a custom channel, i found out about setting to a custom channel on this forum after i received the replacement and had the same issues. I flew this craft all over Florida so it wasn't the area i was in, it had the same behaviour anywhere, regardless, image transmission issues fixed.

In my opinion the Black is EXTREMELY touchy and EXTREMELY fast, now that's not a bad thing i suppose but i barely put any pressure at all on my sticks and the thing takes off like a bat out of hell to the left/right/up/down. If i try to pan around slow it's almost impossible and NOTHING like the P4 smoothness. I realize these are two different machines and please don't tell me "maybe the Inspire isn't for you", i'm not a dumb guy and i have all the patience in the world and i've spent a lot of money on this whole rig, from cases, batteries, lenses etc.. which is why i'm so frustrated, i stand to lose a lot of money by getting rid of this.

So what i did was go into my GAIN and turn those settings down about 20% for each item, that seemed to make the craft a bit more smooth/stable/slower which made me very happy, now i have something i can feel a bit confident about controlling! I also did some searching and found a fellow named Lynh Phan who recommended some settings to help people film "smoother". I took all his advice and set the settings which included attitude and braking. I tested the settings at home for about 5 minutes and all seemed fine.

Yesterday i went on a shoot in Tampa, the winds were about 16 MPH which no doubt was "breezy", technically this craft should hold it's own in that wind but instead soon as i launched it, it started drifting with the wind, i took my hands off the sticks and the craft held its altitude fine but just went right along with the wind, almost like a balloon getting pushed by the wind through the air. Soon as grabbed the sticks i was easily able to bring it back to me but i couldn't even take a picture because it wouldn't stay still at all!

Ok so maybe it's the wind, or some high magnetic interference or just too much nice weather, whatever the case is i packed up and drove back home to Orlando. This AM i had another shoot for a buddy of mine and took the Inspire and the P4 with me. Today the wind was dead calm, maybe 2 MPH, i launched my Inspire, went up to about 200ft (using my new 45mm Olympus lens) and tried to snap some pics. Low and behold my Inspire just started drifting in the sky (holding altitude fine) to the left, i was watching this on the iPad and now this is almost comical. I mean, WTF is going on. Maybe i have a setting wrong, maybe i just am doomed to fly a Inspire 1? Anyways, sorry to rant but i'm just really beyond frustrated that this thing does not work right. I have attached 4 screenshots of my current settings. Keep in mind the "attitude" setting was set at 70 (Lynh Phan tips and tricks/advice) and someone on here said lowering that to 70 could cause bad drift and they advised move it back to 100, so that is what it is set at now but now it's dark and i haven't had time to test.

I just want to fly my Inspire, snap some nice pictures and occasionally do some video without the thing flying away on it's own or moving around so much it's impossible to snap a pic or record video in focus. Again i ended up landing the Inspire today, packing it up and using my wife's P4 which did a perfect job but i couldn't get the detailed still shots i wanted because i wasn't using my new lens.

And no offense to Lynh Phan, i'm sure he is an incredible source of good reliable info, but not sure if his recommended settings were right for my craft?

Please don't bash me, i'm really trying to learn and my eyes are almost bleeding from endless forum posts which i truly read and try to apply to the best of my ability. There is almost no comparison to me between the P4 and the Inspire as far as handling goes, my Inspire will NOT hover in place low or high, my P4 hovers perfect no matter where it is. What is the issue? If i don't figure out soon i'm going to just sell it which greatly bothers me because i am not one to give up on something but i just don't know what to do.

I guess the icing on the cake was the owner of the facility i was shooting walked over and said "what the hell is wrong with that thing (the Inspire at about 40 ft up drifting by itself with no wind), how much did you spend on that?". I told him about 4K and he said "they (DJI) took you to the bank didn't they", he laughed a bit and walked away.

- Frustrated

 

[Mad_angler1]

Set As follows should get you the best rough settings, if this does not suit I'm not sure what else can be done as this is simply not an issue people have as the Inspire fly very well generally .

Basic Gains 80 across the board
RC Expo set to 0.20 across the board
Altitude, brake and Yaw Endpoint set to 100

This should be it tbh, it's a bigger bird but I had absolutely no issues compared to the P4.

 

[Pescatoral Pursuit]

If I read this correctly, you have the RC in "attitude" mode. This mode only automatically maintains altitude and nothing else, by design.

It is recommended for smoother filming because the vehicle is not subject to sudden stops associated with P or F mode, thus making filming smoother. The by-product is that you have to manually compensate for even slight breezes and it will drift with 0 wind also just because of surrounding air turbulence from the propellers.

If this is the case, then you can either get used to it by putting in stick time in Atti mode or dial down the curve of the controller input sensitivity.

 

[The Editor]

In addition to the advice above.....
What you are describing with drift of the aircraft with the wind is exactly what happens if the Inspire drops into P-Atti mode due to poor GPS reception.
Are you getting any warnings on screen about poor GPS or flying with caution because the mode has switched to P-Atti?
One final thing (and it is an obvious one) but thought I should mention/check...... your flight mode switch on top of the remote isn't in the middle position is it?

 

[Tommy Bayshore]

In addition to the advice above.....
What you are describing with drift of the aircraft with the wind is exactly what happens if the Inspire drops into P-Atti mode due to poor GPS reception.
Are you getting any warnings on screen about poor GPS or flying with caution because the mode has switched to P-Atti?
One final thing (and it is an obvious one) but thought I should mention/check...... your flight mode switch on top of the remote isn't in the middle position is it?

Nope, it has perfect GPS, usually and in this instance 18 satellites, all is green, the flight mode is the small silver stick on the RC i believe, it's set to far right which is P i believe. I'll see if i can get someone to take a video later today and ill post. It's just really weird as i know this thing is supposed to handle as well as if not better than a P4. I wish i had someone local that i could let fly it and see what they think. The only place local i know of that said they could look at it is Drone Nerds out of Miami which is about a 3 hour drive which I may do, but no errors on the app of any sort.

 

[Tommy Bayshore]

If I read this correctly, you have the RC in "attitude" mode. This mode only automatically maintains altitude and nothing else, by design.

It is recommended for smoother filming because the vehicle is not subject to sudden stops associated with P or F mode, thus making filming smoother. The by-product is that you have to manually compensate for even slight breezes and it will drift with 0 wind also just because of surrounding air turbulence from the propellers.

If this is the case, then you can either get used to it by putting in stick time in Atti mode or dial down the curve of the controller input sensitivity.

I have the mode on the RC set to P, its slid to the far right, is there another setting other than the remote control that i could check or is it just the silver "stick/switch" on the RC?

 

[Tommy Bayshore]

Set As follows should get you the best rough settings, if this does not suit I'm not sure what else can be done as this is simply not an issue people have as the Inspire fly very well generally .

Basic Gains 80 across the board
RC Expo set to 0.20 across the board
Altitude, brake and Yaw Endpoint set to 100

This should be it tbh, it's a bigger bird but I had absolutely no issues compared to the P4.

I will try these settings today and let ya know. Thanks.

 

[Pescatoral Pursuit]

I have the mode on the RC set to P, its slid to the far right, is there another setting other than the remote control that i could check or is it just the silver "stick/switch" on the RC?

Only one I'm aware of. If you want to do an apples to apples comparison this week, PM me. I have a V1 and live in Apopka.

 

[eldorado]

Basic Gains 80 across the board
RC Expo set to 0.20 across the board
Altitude, brake and Yaw Endpoint set to 100

Expos set to .20 are really nice for smooth filming in light winds. If the wind is gusty you may have trouble with sudden moves as the sticks are slow to respond. Perhaps adjusts up towards .35 / .40 as the wind speed increases. Flying in ATTI is really the smoothest but you loose the brake and auto hover so practice, practice, practice before trying it in a tricky shot.

 

[IrishSights]

Braking is way to low at 70 for flying in wind. Increase the value and test it, if it still drifts knock it up a bit more. Almost certainly its you braking level that's causing it to drift with the wind. I found out all this during my flight test last year!


UK PFAW holder
BNUC-S qualified

 

[Tommy Bayshore]

Here are the latest settings and the bird was still drifting all over the place, i have a video that i took that i will upload later today but if anyone can tell me if there are anything wrong with the settings i have set please let me know... thanks

 

[Tommy Bayshore]

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Here is the video of the Inspire 1 all over the place yesterday...


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[IrishSights]

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Here is the video of the Inspire 1 all over the place yesterday...


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The compass value looks a little on the low side of normal. I think it should be between 1400 and 1600

PFAW Holder
BNUC-S Qualified

 

[Tommy Bayshore]

But you get the picture though after seeing the video right, how can anyone film or take pictures of anything with the craft behaving like this? I take out the P4, exact same conditions and it hovers perfect, almost no movement, meanwhile my Inspire is about to fly into a palm tree on it's own. I can't believe others don't have these issues. I mean i really am just standing there doing nothing, i believe almost all values that can be set are set correctly and it does this anywhere, my house in Orlando, Tampa, Miami, North Carolina etc... i always calibrate the compass when i'm in a new location and even have calibrated the IMU cold quite a few times. No errors on the app ever.

 

[Blacksails]

In that video, other than touching the throttle when it climbs by itself, are you touching the sticks to keep it in place, or is the aircraft holding that position by itself?

It is very windy in that video, as evident by the palm tree. If that is the inspire holding position by itself in those winds, I'd say it's doing quite for a machine with a brake setting of 70, which is quite low.
With the brake set lower, it will certainly drift more.

Brake is how quickly/aggressively the machine will correct to hold its position when being affected/pushed by outside forces such as wind. It also determines how quickly/aggressively the machine will stop when you let go of the sticks if flying in GPS mode. That is the reason some people like to turn it down for filming in GPS mode. It makes corrections a lot slower/less aggressive meaning there aren't weird movements translated over to the footage. It will however make the bird prone to drift, as it is no longer correcting as aggressively as it would normally, and so does not hold position so well. I hope this makes sense?

Personally, I do not like reducing brake. I would much rather leave the brake settings stock and if I need smooth flight for filming I will use Atti mode. That is the purpose of Atti mode, to fly without GPS corrections messing up your smooth flow. If I get into trouble and need to stop and hold position, it's simply a case of switching to GPS mode, and with stock settings this will hold position very, very well. I find GPS on stock settings good for stills, but for video, Atti is the way to go... and it makes you a better pilot. I believe, personally, that all pilots using these commercially should be confident and skilled in flying without the aid of GPS, as when GPS inevitably drops out at some point you are dumped in to Atti mode whether you like it or not.

I would suggest setting brake back to stock settings, but keep all of your expo and stick settings. I expect this will sort your problem [emoji846]


Sent from my iPad using InspirePilots

 

[Tommy Bayshore]

In that video, other than touching the throttle when it climbs by itself, are you touching the sticks to keep it in place, or is the aircraft holding that position by itself?

It is very windy in that video, as evident by the palm tree. If that is the inspire holding position by itself in those winds, I'd say it's doing quite for a machine with a brake setting of 70, which is quite low.
With the brake set lower, it will certainly drift more.

Brake is how quickly/aggressively the machine will correct to hold its position when being affected/pushed by outside forces such as wind. It also determines how quickly/aggressively the machine will stop when you let go of the sticks if flying in GPS mode. That is the reason some people like to turn it down for filming in GPS mode. It makes corrections a lot slower/less aggressive meaning there aren't weird movements translated over to the footage. It will however make the bird prone to drift, as it is no longer correcting as aggressively as it would normally, and so does not hold position so well. I hope this makes sense?

Personally, I do not like reducing brake. I would much rather leave the attitude, brake etc settings stock and if I need smooth flight for filming I will use Atti mode. That is the purpose of Atti mode, to fly without GPS corrections messing up your smooth flow. If I get into trouble and need to stop and hold position, it's simply a case of switching to GPS mode, and with stock settings this will hold position very, very well. I find GPS on stock settings good for stills, but for video, Atti is the way to go... and it makes you a better pilot. I believe, personally, that all pilots using these commercially should be confident and skilled in flying without the aid of GPS, as when GPS inevitably drops out at some point you are dumped in to Atti mode whether you like it or not.

I would suggest setting brake, attitude etc back to stock settings, but keep all of your expo and stick settings. I expect this will sort your problem [emoji846]


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Hi Blacksails,

Thank you for all the info, very good info for sure. What is the difference between attit and brake setting, are they the same? I did move the atti setting back to 100 before filiming the video. I had a wind meter while filming and we were at about 8 MPH (palms give off a very dramatic windy effect even when its not that windy outside), i wasnt touching the sticks at all though, other than once to bring it down when it started going straight up. I guess my biggest frustration is how do people take nice "stills", you can see how much this craft is all over the place and every still i take is blurry because the thing is always all over the place. Do still have to be taken in 0 MPH wind? Im just not sure i guess, but i cant get any decent still shots although the higher i get 150-200ft it seems to be more stable.

 

[SanCap]

Hi Blacksails,

Thank you for all the info, very good info for sure. What is the difference between attit and brake setting, are they the same? I did move the atti setting back to 100 before filiming the video. I had a wind meter while filming and we were at about 8 MPH (palms give off a very dramatic windy effect even when its not that windy outside), i wasnt touching the sticks at all though, other than once to bring it down when it started going straight up. I guess my biggest frustration is how do people take nice "stills", you can see how much this craft is all over the place and every still i take is blurry because the thing is always all over the place. Do still have to be taken in 0 MPH wind? Im just not sure i guess, but i cant get any decent still shots although the higher i get 150-200ft it seems to be more stable.

I can't help you with you current issue but regarding the stills question I can. It is all about shutter speed. If you have a slow shutter speed your images will be soft if the copter is moving. Get your shutter speed above 1/500th and you will most likely have sharp photos if focused properly even if the copter is moving.

 

[Tommy Bayshore]

I can't help you with you current issue but regarding the stills question I can. It is all about shutter speed. If you have a slow shutter speed your images will be soft if the copter is moving. Get your shutter speed above 1/500th and you will most likely have sharp photos if focused properly even if the copter is moving.

I will check those settings out, im starting to think maybe its a bug in the Black Edition, i havent really seen anyone on here with the Black Edition ever comment so maybe its something with it. On the ligher side just ordered 2 Mavics a few minutes ago.

 

[Blacksails]

Hi Blacksails,

Thank you for all the info, very good info for sure. What is the difference between attit and brake setting, are they the same? I did move the atti setting back to 100 before filiming the video. I had a wind meter while filming and we were at about 8 MPH (palms give off a very dramatic windy effect even when its not that windy outside), i wasnt touching the sticks at all though, other than once to bring it down when it started going straight up. I guess my biggest frustration is how do people take nice "stills", you can see how much this craft is all over the place and every still i take is blurry because the thing is always all over the place. Do still have to be taken in 0 MPH wind? Im just not sure i guess, but i cant get any decent still shots although the higher i get 150-200ft it seems to be more stable.

I would say your drift problem is definitely down to your brake settings then, if you were not touching the sticks during that video.
I would definitely suggest you put you sensitivity settings back to standard and I believe your stability/drift problems will be sorted.

Imagine your car is on a hill with no handbrake. The car will start to roll (like the wind pushing your inspire). If you apply the brakes very gently (a low setting in the DJI go app) the car will stop slowly, travelling further (drift). If you apply them very hard (high setting) the car will stop very aggressively and almost immediately.

In regards to your stills being blurry, I agree that this may be a shutter speed problem. Your images will be a lot clearer the further you are from your subject as movement isn't magnified and the gimbal works extremely well. If the subject is up close movement is much more apparent in the frame and if taking photos with longer shutter speeds, this will cause blur.
Are you shooting manual?
I still think the sensitivity settings will help with this though. You're not going to have as much drift, therefore less movement of your framing...

 

[Tommy Bayshore]

I would say your drift problem is definitely down to your sensitivity settings then, if you were not touching the sticks during that video.
I would definitely suggest you put you sensitivity settings back to standard and I believe your stability/drift problems will be sorted.

I may have oversimplified a bit and tied attitude and brake together in my explanation of how they work. They do both work together to achieve stability, but Attitude gain determines how hard the aircraft will fight to remain stable and in its current position. Brake determines how quickly that correction is applied. If it is applied slowly (low setting) a gust of wind will hit the bird and it will apply the correction slower (therefore it will drift more) than if the brake setting is higher. But basically, see brake as the brakes on your car. Imagine your car is on a hill with no handbrake. The car will start to roll (like the wind pushing your inspire). If you apply the brakes very gently (a low setting in the DJI go app) the car will stop slowly, travelling further (drift). If you apply them very hard (high setting) the car will stop very aggressively and almost immediately. So I guess you could see the Attitude setting as being how good the actual brakes on your car are (new pads vs worn pads) and the brake setting as being how quickly and aggressively you apply the brake with your foot.

In regards to your stills being blurry, I agree that this may be a shutter speed problem. Your images will be a lot clearer the further you are from your subject as movement isn't magnified and the gimbal works extremely well. If the subject is up close movement is much more apparent in the frame and if taking photos with longer shutter speeds, this will cause blur.
Are you shooting manual?
I still think the sensitivity settings will help with this though. You're not going to have as much drift, therefore less movement of your framing...

I shoot Manual most of the time, but remember, the reason i changed the sensitivity settings in the beginning was because it was so fast, i would barley touch the sticks and the craft would jerk to the left or right in a heartbeat, almost impossible to film smoothly and try to turn, so i wanted the sensitivity turned down. I took the craft out about 5 days ago and the winds were about 15 MPH and prior to that someone had mentioned to turn the attitude down to 70 and the thing drifted like mad, so the attitude is back at 100 and brake is at 100. Ill test some more today but its really almost impossible to fly it around and take nice video without it jerking at the slightest touch of the sticks :/