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Spark - first impressions

dropro

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Jun 12, 2017
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18
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53
Hello All,
Got my Spark today and immediately set to test the gestures control.
Pretty cool, but it was not taking pictures... that is until I realized it did not come with an SD card. Strange - all my previous phantoms had an SD card...
Now, that gesture control is pretty nifty. Easy to get used to - but does not always work.

Had one incident when beckon would not work, and that is a hard to mess gesture. It was just waiting there until the battery drained and it then zoomed up and returned home. I later found what I believe was the reason- on the app it wanted me to select a green tracking region - but I was not looking at the app, I was using hand gestures. Also the follow me is the same gesture as beckon, so I don't understand why it was waiting for the app. This has to be fixed in a future release...

I read somewhere that follow me works best if GPS is enabled on your phone and you have it with you. Where am I supposed to put the phone? in my pocket? what happens if the application closes or the screen locks?
Need some more testing on this. So far I used the follow me without the phone. It was a little slow and when I reached a corner around the house - it stopped following. I returned but it had lost me by that time. That is when I tried the beckon (mentioned above) - and it just ignored me.


Landing on the hand is piece of cake and worked all the time. Launching off was not. At one time it said ready to take off but as I was lowering my hand it seemed to drop with it. I finally removed my hand completely - it dove down but caught itself and then went back to eye level.

Did not figure out on the app how to aim the camera down/up. With the phantom it is just a swipe down. Here the swipes are used for the sticks. Maybe have to swipe exactly on center of screen?

Using the drone without a controller/phone for nearby selfies is just great. But they need to allow issuing start and stop video as well, and need to allow positioning drone for selfie. I will elaborate on last point: You can position the drone but only when it is 2 to 3 foot from you - but in this mode you cannot gesture it to take a photo. You have to first send it away and wait for it to enter "follow me" mode for it to be able to accept snapshot gestures. Here is the rub: in follow me mode, you cannot position it.

12 minute battery is not enough for experimenting. Had to charge it 3 times to do the above. first charge was almost half way empty just doing the firmware update, registration, calibration, NFZ map updates, etc...

Feel free to add your own experiences. Overall it is a nice toy. Pretty good for first generation gesture controlled device, but as always - we need to push the envelope!
 
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I received my Fly Less 2 day ago, but wasn't able to post because of DJI rules. I'll "piggyback" off of @dropro post:
  • First & foremost- Flying with the Virtual Joysticks sucks! I was using an iPad.
  • Gesture mode if pretty cool, but gets old quickly and I recommend carrying a "cheat sheet" for all the commands
  • Palm launch can be dangerous and I foresee a lot of cut fingers, especially for those of you with large hands.
Overall its a nice unit, but I feel that the Fly Less @ $499 should have included a remote. I do have a Fly More arriving on Monday.
 
I received my Fly Less 2 day ago, but wasn't able to post because of DJI rules. I'll "piggyback" off of @dropro post:
  • First & foremost- Flying with the Virtual Joysticks sucks! I was using an iPad.
  • Gesture mode if pretty cool, but gets old quickly and I recommend carrying a "cheat sheet" for all the commands
  • Palm launch can be dangerous and I foresee a lot of cut fingers, especially for those of you with large hands.
Overall its a nice unit, but I feel that the Fly Less @ $499 should have included a remote. I do have a Fly More arriving on Monday.

I thought I would need a cheat sheet too - but there are so few gestures, and they are so easy to remember that no cheat sheet is needed.

As to the controller, I also have a fly-more unit coming in. Not sure I will keep it. I like the fact that this unit is ultra-portable. It will be great for selfies and hopefully dji adds video gestures in a not-too-distant time. I see this unit serving a completely different purpose.

For some odd reason, I'm not worried about palm-launch. This device, while small, looks very well made and exudes reliability. I think that if people will have issues with palm launch, it will be because they will instinctively try to grab it, if they think the unit is going to fall instead of launch.
 

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