Black maps when zoomed in

Summary of Issue:
When i zoom in the map turns black and i cant see anything but street lines. Ive tried the offline thing, reinstalling, etc etc. Need satellite view or at least map view to work. Cant work out flight path when its all black. Plz help
Date Issue Began:
1st November 2017
Drone Model:
Phantom 3 standard
Mobile Device Model and OS version:
Ipad pro OS 11.1

Hi @Darren_Bartz,

As per our Supported Drones doc:

Discontinuing Support of Phantom 3S and Phantom 3 4K

Due to limited support for the Phantom 3S and Phantom 3 4K drones within the DJI SDK, we have decided to stop continuing development for these models. Although the DroneDeploy app may work with these drones, our support team will not be troubleshooting issues related to them. We strongly recommend that any users currently flying either the Phantom 3S or the Phantom 3 4K with DroneDeploy upgrade to one of the drones best supported by both DroneDeploy and the DJI SDK for a better mapping experience.

Please let us know if you experience similar issues on a supported drone and mobile device/tablet.

Cheers,
Christina

You might try this approach.

the blacking out of maps occurs with all latest app and firmware on my P4 pro

this has been reported numerous times on this forum previously ā€¦

Yes, I understand, but what are the names of the maps that you are having this issue with?

every map - every time i use the mobile device (iPad pro 2016 256 gb) when I zoom in to edit the flight plan it blacks out.
on the office PC it doesnā€™t but on site it blacks out.

When reported previously Chase dismissed this citing various non plausible reasons ā€¦

Hi @Daniel777,

As stated to you both publicly and privately, we are in this community to help each other out. If you found Chaseā€™s response unhelpful, what about it was unclear or not of use?

Please keep in mind that youā€™ve had several warnings already and we will no longer be able to assist you if this persists.

Cheers,
Christina

The blacking out as you zoom in indicates there are no tiles available for that region. Itā€™s likely youā€™ve clicked ā€˜make available offlineā€™ for a plan in that area and the tiles from Mapbox are still stored on your device. I recently helped a user at our DroneDeploy Day conference with the same issue. They had to make sure that they had disabled all ā€˜make available offlineā€™ toggles for their plans and then uninstall and reinstall to resolve it.

Chase, not clear as to what you are sayingā€¦

Just so you understand what I and others are experiencing, Iā€™ll clearly repeat it all againā€¦

  1. In the office on the PC The google or whatever imagery is able to be viewed even when zoomed right in up to its limit.

  2. Obviously , for flight purposes, in the field the imagery and DD functionality needs to be made offline (no internet out in the field).

  3. In the field with DD if I try to zoom in then the imagery goes black.

I have to say that I am still having this problem with black maps, even though I have been on the forum before to find a fix. I have resorted to flying my maps manually or using DJI GS Pro.

The fix previously suggested to unload and reload DD and clear the map cache works for one instance only - the map is available offline for one viewing; the next time I open the view I can see only black, BUT when I zoom in or out I get a momentary glimpse of the underlying map before it goes black again. Please watch the video. The map must be present on my device, but is visible only when zooming. I am using an iPad 2017 with 32Gb with IOS 11.0.3. There is 20Gb of memory space available. I get the black maps every time I use the offline function anywhere in Tasmania. I have saved Google Maps imagery for the relevant areas, but this doesnā€™t fix the problem with DD (but GS Pro is able to see and operate with the maps offline).

This is the issue I mentioned above. You have enabled at least 1 map to be ā€œavailable offlineā€ which has downloaded image tiles from Mapbox. You need to disable the ā€œavailable offlineā€ toggle, then uninstall and reinstall. This will then most likely use your google map cached imagery that you are seeing in gs pro. You donā€™t need to toggle the ā€œavailable offlineā€ toggle if you are caching your google map imagery using the google maps app.

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Guys, I think you need to cache your maps before you leave home. Donā€™t be trying to zoom in when you get onsite, do that at home while you have Wifi/data connection and the zoomed in version of the map will be saved in your cache and available on site when you have no internet connection.

OK, thanks @chasemgray once I reloaded DD and disabled all the offline maps for all missions, it does indeed use the cached Google Maps in the background. Back in business.

The video I made above was back in my office with full wifi - yet the affected maps remain black; it appears that once you hit the ā€œofflineā€ button, the mission always refers to the offline maps, even when reconnected back to wifi?

The difficulty I have with caching maps is that often the mining/forestry company canā€™t give me exact coordinates of the job(s) until I get on site, so I either have to plan a dummy flight over a larger area and try to cache the whole thing or I fly it manually without a map. It would be really handy if I could get airborne to 400ft, take a few photos and use them as my base map, even as un-stitched or overlapping tiles. Asking too muchā€¦?

One option is an app within the app market on DroneDeploy which lets you fly over your pre-existing data. Youā€™d have to make a map of the area first, though.