Connecting My Drone to The App

I have set up my mapping plan. I am using Mavic 2Pro with a Smart controller. How do I connect my drone to the app either using my phone or my smart controller

As far as I know DroneDeploy still doesn’t work on the Smart Controller. It can apparently be installed, but I haven’t seen any reports of it actually connecting and flying. You’re best bet is to get a standard RC1A controller and use a mobile device. Or just use another program for flight.

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Thanks Michael, That’s a little frustrating when you pay so much for a ‘Smart Controller’. In your opinion is it worth persevering with Drone Deploy. I have run out of my free trial. Software looks good but with poor weather and no connectivity I have run out of the trial period and not been able to experience it. It is a shame that Drone Deploy do not do a Student package for when you are training. The monthly fee is quite high if you are training but working in a different industry

I think you can sideload Pix4D now. Go to APKPure and download these. Put them on a mSD card and install them through the File Manager. Open CTRL, connect the drone and then open Pix4D. I don’t have one myself, but I have seen several mentions of this so you can be the guinea pig… :wink:

As for processing for now it sounds like you are doing more testing and training so I would look at Carlson PhotoCapture or maybe Maps Made Easy. The both offer pay-as-you-go so you only have to shell out when you want to upload and process a map.

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Or you could use a trial version of Metashape to process your mission photos yourself.

Regards,
Terry.

I forget what can you export with the free version once the trial has run out?

@Shippers, here’s a couple standard controllers well priced.

On the page at the link I provided it says:

You can try Agisoft Metashape software either in demo mode (export and save functions are blocked) or test it in full function mode with 30-day trial license for free.

So full functionality should be available.

Good idea and for 30 days that’s great, but what happens when that’s over and you need to buy a $3,500 piece of software and at least a $2,000 computer? It also needs to be pointed out that it is local processing only and a node-locked license. I have it myself, but my company affords it for me. It’s an okay product, but in my opinion nothing special and a little more cumbersome then other options out there.

It comes in 2 tiers. The lower one is less than $200. @Shippers should investigate if it can be useful. It works much better than DD at processing orchards to create a 3D model from which yields can be estimated. It has a one time cost which quickly outruns a subscription model within a year or so. Just saying…

I guess it really depends on the need of the user. The standard edition is hardly even worth mentioning if you need correctly scaled and georeferenced orthomosaics, ground control points, analytics or custom python scripting which I believed you used a fair amount of getting the results you desired from your orchard data?

Thanks for all the research and advice I think I’ll go for the pay as you go option. The financial outlay at my stage is hefty. Mixed with bad weather & limited time to practice i am sad DroneDeploy don’t offer other options. I would have thought they would have picked up more business long term by ‘students’ using the software through an academy package then students would quite likely stay with DroneDeploy long term.
Thanks once again Michael

No problem and keep in mind that you can pay for DroneDeploy monthly and retain your data for up to 3 months so if you need to take a month or two off you don’t have to worry about your data getting lost. If you need to take longer off just make sure you download what you need beforehand.

No Python scripting is needed inside Metashape in order to create a very detailed 3D model. Many agriculture applications do not need geo referenced orthomosaics or GCP’s to achieve valuable results. The analysis of the 3D model can require specialized code which is unavailable in DD. So like you said, it depends upon the needs of the user.

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So the Python is coming in on the data after the fact in Rhino? I see other people seem to be getting around some of the weaknesses of the Standard edition with Blender or Meshlabs?