Thoughts on GoPro Karma?

Sorry but gopro is too late... hero5 is also a letdown. I wanted a better quality camera but thyve only added features that sounds attractive .. reminded me of samsungs phones gimmicks that didnt work and not needed. Eg eye scrolling .. ha!


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I'm ordering one. I am not a distance flyer, and plan on using it for real estate work, etc. I like the gimbal stick because when I am done with aerial shots, I can move right to interior/ground shots. I can also take the tiny 4K cam on trips or whatever. Has stereo mics also. The dedicated controller is supposed to be very bright for outdoor use, we will see. Portability looks good. Not giving up my Phantoms, just see this as an extension to the photography aspect, which looks to be a pretty nice camera for the $$. Getting the 5 Black for sure.


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Yeah, oddly enough the $1,100 package seems like the best value

$400 Gopro Hero 5 Black
$200 Handheld gimbal/steadycam
$100 Backpack

That makes the drone $400. IF I were to do it, I would go with that package, due to the fact I would love to have a Gopro Hero 5 Black, the new features sound like they will be amazing. I have the Gopro Hero 4 Silver, and it's awesome, love it, but the Hero 5 Black sounds amazing. So IF I were going to buy one, I'd go that route. But I'm saving up for the P4, would rather spend my $1100+ on that.

The overall package of the Karma, w/Gopro Hero 5 Black, Handheld gimble/steadycam and backpack is pretty enticing though. It really is an all around photo/video solution.
 
I can't wait til Autel comes out with a Inspire Equivalent Drone as well as the hand-held stabilizer.
 
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I can't wait til Autel comes out with a Inspire Equivalent Drone as well as the hand-held stabilizer.
you got my vote
 
Waiting for dji mavic
With obstacles avoidance system

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Karma uses Wi-Fi, like Phantom Standard 4K ($650 with camera). Is that acceptable for a new drone from our point of view?

Just buy the Osmo Mobile and the Phantom Std 4K. It costs less and it will work better (no fisheye). True, it's not as small, but both are easily backpacked. How important is being foldable?
 
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Videos from GoPro have fisheye. You'll have to correct that every time you shoot, such a hassle.

Yes.. I much prefer the P4 lens.

I have a hexacopter with a GoPro mounted on it. When tilted up or down, the horizon gets curved. With the Phantom's narrower filed of view, the horizon is always straight.
 
Just sold my 2 month old Phantom 4. Waiting to see the Mavic pricing vs feature list.


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I am interested in the Karma, but only if it's rugged. I've got several GoPro cameras and I'm just not really nice to them. They get wet, scratched, dropped etc. They also keep working. If the Karma is ANYTHING like that, I'll get one.

Maybe I'm reading too much into it, but I notice a lack of gimbal lock in the package for the Karma. If I can throw this compact bird into a backpack, without gimbal lock, hike for a few hours put the gimbal on my pack, hike some more, switch to the bird, grab some picks, and hike back, it's worth my $.

The phantom is awesome. It's fun and functional and a great product. I treat it very delicately and it's bulky to take along with me. Sometimes it's a hassle to take, so I don't.

If the Karma or Mavic is truly rugged, or at least easy to fix, I've got to consider one.


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This kid made a quite valid point

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Withoutthe ability to hand catch u will be breaking props pretty regularly
 
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This kid made a quite valid point

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Withoutthe ability to hand catch u will be breaking props pretty regularly
nice x star premium
 
One thing we do know for sure about the Mavic--it will be a new product that comes with dji's legendary (infamous) comittment to customer service. I don't own a GoPro so I have no idea what their customer service is like. Hopefully an improvement on dji.
 
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Karma is a perfect product for the family outing and provide upgrade to standard hand held camcorder, now they will have state of the art video capabilities. Everything is available in one pack, it's a great idea and if I had the money I would get one just for that purpose but never to replace my P3P, not that I have a kids but portability covers all needs if you are a GOPRO fan, I have 2. I love the fact you can remove the gimbal and sooo interested if you can connect thermal device to their gimbal. This is the problem I have with DJI P3P, can't remove the camera and add thermal.
 
Karma is a perfect product for the family outing and provide upgrade to standard hand held camcorder, now they will have state of the art video capabilities.

State of the art? Not exactly. There's more post editing needed with GoPro, such as fisheye correction and saturation required. If you use M format for mitigate fisheye, you lose resolution.

There are lots of things to wait and see for a rational decision. I think Mavic will have more of these things below resolved or offered, more than Karma.
1. How is the compass calibrated? Have you ever calibrated a Yuneec drone? Oh my.
2. How long does it take to prepare and wait for the craft to be launch ready? Yuneec TH is like 3 to 4 min.
3. Can you set the RTH height? Yuneec didn't have this option for almost 2yrs, it was stuck at 60'.
4. Are expo settings supported to adjust linearity of the stick controls, smoothing out control of the craft (nobody else but DJI has this so far)
5. Hand launch and catch, is this even possible with the small landing gear of Karma?
6. Will the camera need charged separately, or does the drone battery charge it? IE, will an H4 work without a battery installed in the camera?
7. How bright is the built in display. It doesn't appear you can install a sunshade very easy. Yuneec's built-in display is mediocre, no options.
8. How much control over the camera settings will it have, using the remote? How intuitive and quick will the interface be?
9. Will it have redundant IMU and Compass sensors? This really helped the P4 minimize compass anomalies.
10. What's the range in the real world. It likely uses WiFi, like everyone else. I think 1000 meters is optimistic for Wifi in town, but in the wild or over water I think it's a reasonable estimate. However I expect Mavic to be WiFi also, so that's likely going to be similar range unless they have an antenna on the RC that can be mirrored with a windsurfer (IE, Phantom Std).
11. Will folks be OK with medium format resolution to mitigate fish-eye?
12. Can you only get the Hero 5 in the Karma bundle? Some folks won't like the NON-REPLACEABLE battery in the Hero 5, and want the Hero 4.
13. Is the gimbal pitch speed adjustable? Yuneec's was not on Q500. Is there "smoothing" supported on gimbal pitch control, so stopping a pitch movement isn't so sudden?
14. How stable is the craft hover to shoot a 2 second exposure night photo?
15. Now that I've gotten use to red lights in the front (unconventional) on my Phantoms, will I get confused with red lights in the back (more conventional) with Karma? Probably not an issue, but owning both setups in one fleet could pose some confusion at times.
16. How easy is it to replace a folding prop, and how expensive are they? Folding props cannot be balanced, will this be an issue? Unlikely.
17. With such short landing gear, is there more prop risk when landing, since it looks too risky to hand catch? Probably only in rocky areas.

I could go on, but these are "my thoughts".

You may think some of these issues above are minor nits, and for some people they are just nits, especially GoPro fans that will quickly look the other way. But I've grown to appreciate these niceties in the DJI software and hardware. The more the Go app features are used in the Mavic, the better, IMO. It's going to be an interesting comparison. I fly all time during my travels, vacation and business trips. I try to have all my sales calls done in time for the golden hour, with pre-planned locations to shoot. So having a more portable craft like the Karma or Mavic is an interesting option. Although I'm pretty happy with the portability of my P3P and P4, a Mavic may have a place in my fleet, but I'm not sure I can get along with Wifi communications. I had that in my Q500+ and wasn't happy.
 
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