Autonomous flying should be default mode

[aseidman]

The fact that we are still fly our drones manually is crazy. Flying / navigating a helicopter when you are sitting inside of it is really hard. Flying it while its 900m away from you and 75m up is borderline stupid.

These machines are meant to be flown autonomously. Once the default mode becomes autonomous flights we will rarely see people losing their drones, crashing them, or generally doing idiotic things with them.



I'm looking forward to that day.

 

[job2310]

The fact that we are still fly our drones manually is crazy. Flying / navigating a helicopter when you are sitting inside of it is really hard. Flying it while its 900m away from you and 75m up is borderline stupid.

These machines are meant to be flown autonomously. Once the default mode becomes autonomous flights we will rarely see people losing their drones, crashing them, or generally doing idiotic things with them.

I'm looking forward to that day.

So by that logic if I only fly waypoint flights I will never lose my bird? You might want to read more on this forum and check out a site called YouTube.

 

[fixedwing]

Just in case enough of the videos didn't all look the same already, lets remove all creativity and personality from the filming.

What do you use your drone for? Scaring people away from the troll bridge you hide under?

 

[N017RW]

Despite the Phantoms being, as they say, catered towards the entertainment industry, many, many r/c hobbyists jumped on board too.

While I respect that to many that the quad is seen as a tool, to me it is another type of r/c aircraft I have owned and enjoy FLYING. Challenging in it's own way because of and despite it's flight control system(s).

It's a big sky out there and there's room for all of us.

 

[kitari]

I'm with N017RW on this one, I went to the phantom from rc helicopters after watching someone else fly one at my school. I was pulled in because it's something different, has sharp fast turning, fast and stable flying, and the camera was just a nice extra bonus. yes, some of those helicopters can do some gravity defying moves, but I just don't think I'm ready for 3d flying just yet. (I'd love a trex 700 though)

 

[GoodnNuff]

The fact that we are still fly our drones manually is crazy. Flying / navigating a helicopter when you are sitting inside of it is really hard. Flying it while its 900m away from you and 75m up is borderline stupid.

These machines are meant to be flown autonomously. Once the default mode becomes autonomous flights we will rarely see people losing their drones, crashing them, or generally doing idiotic things with them.



I'm looking forward to that day.

I wish you luck with your Hive Ports and your autonomous flying.
But truly, I wish you the joy of flying. I hope you discover it at some point.

 

[derrickduff]

Might as well just ground the entire industry. If you don't think there will be some spectacular crashes once autonomous flight ramps up you're living in a dream world.

Typically we learn from mistakes. It took many years and many designs to achieve flight and they were basically guessing at what might work back then. It's a brand new industry, there will be some speed bumps along the way. That's a good thing, it will only improve the future designs.

 

[750r]

With that logic why even get a RC ? I enjoy flying makes no sense to sit their with your thumb up your butt watching something doing it's own thing wooohoooo that's fun . I think this maybe the wrong hobby for you just sell everything and sit in your house and watch life pass you by :roll:

 

[aseidman]

Just in case enough of the videos didn't all look the same already, lets remove all creativity and personality from the filming.

What do you use your drone for? Scaring people away from the troll bridge you hide under?

Why does automation have to remove the creativity? Cirque du Soleil did some incredibly creative things using automated drones https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6C8OJsHfmpI

Flight Automation can actually enhance our collective creativity. I could design a flight pattern, share it with this community, others could enhance it / suggest modifications, and then we could execute the flight. It's like making music together!

 

[aseidman]

Despite the Phantoms being, as they say, catered towards the entertainment industry, many, many r/c hobbyists jumped on board too.

While I respect that to many that the quad is seen as a tool, to me it is another type of r/c aircraft I have owned and enjoy FLYING. Challenging in it's own way because of and despite it's flight control system(s).

It's a big sky out there and there's room for all of us.

Fair point. It's like a car. I love driving my car up and down the coast of California, but most of the time it's a tool that takes me from A to B, and in some cases I would prefer if the car were driving itself. I think quadcopters are the same way.

 

[aseidman]

I wish you luck with your Hive Ports and your autonomous flying.
But truly, I wish you the joy of flying. I hope you discover it at some point.

I think of it like driving -- I love cars and love driving up and down the coast where you can really feel the road. But most of the time my car is a tool to get me from A to B, and in those situations I want the car to drive itself.

From a broader perspective here is how I think about drones / quadcopter. Quadcopters are great fun -- that's why were are all here having a blast! But they are also incredibly important for society -- a new form of transportation. They have the potential to replace billions of trips via cars and trucks, etc. and that means we'll have fewer roads, less congestion, and ultimately less toxic fumes. It will take us awhile to get there. Getting there requires us put more energy weight into autonomous flights. Today, we are putting a lot of effort into data collection tools e.g. video, camera, data processing software etc. and data collection is fantastic (e.g. learning about how killer whales behave in the wild). However, to take us to the next stage we need more focus and energy on autonomous flying.

 

[aseidman]

With that logic why even get a RC ? I enjoy flying makes no sense to sit their with your thumb up your butt watching something doing it's own thing wooohoooo that's fun . I think this maybe the wrong hobby for you just sell everything and sit in your house and watch life pass you by :roll:

You can still do both. I love cars and sometimes I want to drive my car and feel the road, but other times I just want to get somewhere and would rather be doing something else while the car drives itself. The same is true for drones -- sometimes I enjoy doing going out with my 4 yr old to a big park and flying, and other times I want to get something done with the drone and for that we need better autonomous flying capabilities.

 

[aseidman]

Just in case enough of the videos didn't all look the same already, lets remove all creativity and personality from the filming.

What do you use your drone for? Scaring people away from the troll bridge you hide under?

Why does automation have to remove the creativity? One of the most creative things done with drones so far was 100% automated....see this video by Cirque du Soleil https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6C8OJsHfmpI

Ultimately, flight Automation can actually enhance our collective creativity. People create music together so we could create interesting flight patterns together. That would be lots of fun.

 

[chapsrlz]

The fact that we are still fly our drones manually is crazy. Flying / navigating a helicopter when you are sitting inside of it is really hard. Flying it while its 900m away from you and 75m up is borderline stupid.

These machines are meant to be flown autonomously. Once the default mode becomes autonomous flights we will rarely see people losing their drones, crashing them, or generally doing idiotic things with them.



I'm looking forward to that day.

agreed, there are some jobs that require autonous flying, but then where's the fun/challenge of flying a quad?

 

[derrickduff]

Your OP insinuated there should be no manual mode. That it is actually "crazy" that we fly quads manually. Why? Because it's very hard to fly a helicopter and therefore, since a quad does indeed fly it is also difficult. Also, apparently people are too dumb and do "idiotic" things with them.

You've brought up driving. About 1.3 million people die every year in car accidents. If this is all about the "greater good" we should all be focused on autonomous driving to reduce traffic deaths.

The Cirque du Soleil was awesome, but it was automated drones as the subject. The vast majority of consumer drones are flying cameras. The subject is not the drone but what the drone is pointed at. There's a huge difference. And sure, you can create a fully automated flight to film a subject. Take the time to map out a flight path, program the coordinates and let your drone do it's thing. You'll probably get some decent shots too. But the guy next to you who flew manually got exactly the shots he wanted, at the perfect angle and lighting and took half the time.

No doubt there's some exciting developments with autonomous flights. They aren't the end all be all though. Too many applications need a human eye to get right.

 

[SteveMann]

Might as well just ground the entire industry. If you don't think there will be some spectacular crashes once autonomous flight ramps up you're living in a dream world.

Define "Spectacular".

I am aware of two light drone related deaths in the past few years, were they spectacular enough?

 

[aseidman]

Your OP insinuated there should be no manual mode. That it is actually "crazy" that we fly quads manually. Why? Because it's very hard to fly a helicopter and therefore, since a quad does indeed fly it is also difficult. Also, apparently people are too dumb and do "idiotic" things with them.

You've brought up driving. About 1.3 million people die every year in car accidents. If this is all about the "greater good" we should all be focused on autonomous driving to reduce traffic deaths.

The Cirque du Soleil was awesome, but it was automated drones as the subject. The vast majority of consumer drones are flying cameras. The subject is not the drone but what the drone is pointed at. There's a huge difference. And sure, you can create a fully automated flight to film a subject. Take the time to map out a flight path, program the coordinates and let your drone do it's thing. You'll probably get some decent shots too. But the guy next to you who flew manually got exactly the shots he wanted, at the perfect angle and lighting and took half the time.

No doubt there's some exciting developments with autonomous flights. They aren't the end all be all though. Too many applications need a human eye to get right.

The tools to plan autonomous flight today are crude so agreed its pretty clunky versus just flying manually. Once the flight automation tools get better than in most cases autonomous flights will be easier, more accurate, and far safer. For example, If you've done a great flight path then I would love to use that, tweak it a bit, and simply load it into my drone and hit Go!


Most airplanes fly in auto-pilot for vast parts of the flight and pilot error have been the cause of major accidents (Air France 447 and more recently Asiana Air at SFO)

People think autonomous flight = boring and kills creativity. I think once the auto-flight tools get better it will actually provide far more creativity and flexibility to do things that were once impossible.

 

[phantomi]

Bottom line! Autonomous flying is another of the great assets of this hobby. Photography, filming, flying, fpv, modding as well as autonomous capability all define the beauty and joy of this.

 

[Meta4]

People think autonomous flight = boring and kills creativity. I think once the auto-flight tools get better it will actually provide far more creativity and flexibility to do things that were once impossible.

Programmed flight might be interesting to play around with and could be very useful for something like photogrammetric survey but its useless for straight aerial photography where it's all about lining up the right camera position.
I can't see how it would be at all helpful getting shots like these. I'm happy to keep piloting my flying camera myself.

 

[gunslinger]

I love this type of discussion... It reminds me that we have so many people approaching quad ownership for so many different reasons and from so many different disciplines.

1) Professional/amateur photographers looking for a new and interesting platform. They bring a wealth of knowledge regarding photography, post production, camera settings, etc.

2) Experienced RC jockeys. Some of these guys can fly nearly anything and bring us their years of expertise on methods and training.

3) Technology geeks. They're always finding ways to push the envelope. Get more distance, get more speed, carry a bigger payload, get more flight time, build your own gimbal. Some pretty amazing stuff has come from this quarter

4) Curious neophytes. We don't have much to offer, but we're generally good for a certain amount of comic relief.

-slinger