1st disturbing find on P4
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The concept under discussion is obvious. The question is why you would be in a situation where it matters. The OP suggested a case where it doesn't matter, and then ran off when I questioned that. You didn't suggest anything at all other than you would be annoyed if it happened. Ianwood, in contrast, responded with a description of why he does record continuously, and hence why that could be a problem for him.
I'm sorely tempted to respond that you might be too dumb to hold an intelligent discussion on the topic, but I don't want to descend to your level, so I won't do that.
It looks like this issue has seen some discussion on the forums since last year, with at least one report, from October, that DJI was aware and planning to fix it with a firmware update. I guess that hasn't happened yet.
I already gave you 2 clear examples in my earlier posts, but please be clear, I am not here to make any enemies. I will respect everyone here no matter what their skill level or knowledge. Anyone that has an interest in these things can potentially provide us all with valuable information to a lesser or greater degree.
However and because I'm a nice and very patient guy [emoji12] I will provide you with some MORE examples of why 'some' users may wish to record long video clips.
1. COMPOSITING - last year we did a TV commercial for a well known fizzy drinks company. 2 stewardess's talking and drinking in a large (A380) cockpit, whilst behind them out of the Windows (green-screen) you see the ground moving underneath them. The director says in post, oh I would like this bit of dialogue to coincide with these buildings passing underneath them! Ok, I said, we have a 12m 42sec sequence of buildings and water we can scan through.. He had a big smile on his face and we tried several takes and scenery configurations to get the shot - (this was shot with aerial rig and an Arri Alexa mounted on the side of a helicopter).
2. A TITLE SEQUENCE - where the shot has been sped up for effect e.g following the course of a river. Your point of not noticing a single frame skip may be true (possibly!), but we are talking 3 possible 4 frames in my case. Moreover, in professional terms even 1 frame is not acceptable, certainly not at the studios/clients I've worked at/with.
3. ANALYSIS - even in the P4 launch video, contains an example of athletes recording their activity walking/running etc.. I personally know of people that have bought the P4 just for this reason!
4. Recording (to card) a LIVE STREAM, events etc. To be played back at a later date.
5. SURVEYING/Reconnaissance
6. BACKDROP VIDEO PLAYBACK - we have often been asked to film a continuous stream of video for playback on giant screens/backdrops for music events, The KLF live shows were a good example of what we did in the early 90's except we used 35mm film!
7. SOME USERS JUST WANT TO BE ABLE TO RECORD LONG VIDEO CLIPS - If a cheap GoPro can do it...
8. I could go on but my fingers hurt!
Workflow:
A filmmaker will appreciate that not all decisions are made in production, many can be/are made in post (depends on how pedantic your director is!) but usually for creative or budget/time reasons.. Often all! Either way (and my point is) an editor/director needs choice of content - as the industry saying goes, "Content is King!"
Just because you think 8m plus videos are unnecessary for your work, doesn't mean those that have spent the £1229 for the P4 have to think the same. Users should be able to use it for whatever purpose they see fit and without unnecessary technical limitations.
Anyway besides all the above, again you have totally missed the point.. Which is: IT SHOULDN'T DROP FRAMES - my £300 GoPro doesn't! SO WHY SHOULD THE P4?!!
I'm hoping DJI will address this in a future f/w update. Other than that, it's a great machine for the money and I wouldn't put off the casual user or even filmmaker buying one! Sorry this post was long, I was driven to it!
I wish you all happy, safe flying and great filmmaking.
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Thanks for taking the trouble to write that up - I certainly was not expecting you to go to those lengths. You clearly have some examples of situations that I have not encountered - we obviously do very different kinds of work - although only a few of those cases seem applicable to video shot from an aerial platform, and only a few seem to be cases where perfect continuity is important. But no matter - I take your point - there are cases where it is important.
As to why it happens, and whether it should - I don't disagree - there is no fundamental technical reason for it, as evidenced by the fact that other camera platforms do not exhibit it. Hopefully it is not a hardware problem, and they can fix it with a firmware update. The 4 GB file size limitation is getting old, anyway.
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I had a beautiful shot of the Hollywood sign at 15 feet away ruined because of the dropped frames between files. I learned from it and now I just self
Edit at the beginning of important shots and make sure there isn't any separation.
Sent from my iPhone using PhantomPilots mobile app
Edit at the beginning of important shots and make sure there isn't any separation.
Sent from my iPhone using PhantomPilots mobile app
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Seriously? You basically demanded it, trolling around the thread with facetious comments until someone actually went to the trouble to satisfy you. I stand by my earlier comment to you.
No - I didn't demand anything - I was simply trying to find out exactly why this was a significant problem for the OP, in the context that it isn't for the way I use video recording. Now - so far your contribution to this thread is a comment that you would be angy if this happened to you, and repeated attempts to insult. Do you actually have anything useful to say, or will it just be more of the same?
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People always leave out the UHS numbers.
Go get yourself a 32 gig or 64 gig Sandisk or Samsung but the very few and expensive ones that are UHS-3 because those have guaranteed read and write speeds of like a minimum of 80 rather than up to 80. Contrary to what a lot of people think around here, speed on those cards matter, a lot and they need higher speeds for quick writing to the card from the bird.
Somebody won't read this thread and will post the UHS-1 minimum requirement and to that person I say 28 minutes and 4 miles.
I already gave you 2 clear examples in my earlier posts, but please be clear, I am not here to make any enemies. I will respect everyone here no matter what their skill level or knowledge. Anyone that has an interest in these things can potentially provide us all with valuable information to a lesser or greater degree.
However and because I'm a nice and very patient guyI will provide you with some MORE examples of why 'some' users may wish to record long video clips.
1. COMPOSITING - last year we did a TV commercial for a well known fizzy drinks company. 2 stewardess's talking and drinking in a large (A380) cockpit, whilst behind them out of the Windows (green-screen) you see the ground moving underneath them. The director says in post, oh I would like this bit of dialogue to coincide with these buildings passing underneath them! Ok, I said, we have a 12m 42sec sequence of buildings and water we can scan through.. He had a big smile on his face and we tried several takes and scenery configurations to get the shot - (this was shot with aerial rig and an Arri Alexa mounted on the side of a helicopter).
2. A TITLE SEQUENCE - where the shot has been sped up for effect e.g following the course of a river. Your point of not noticing a single frame skip may be true (possibly!), but we are talking 3 possible 4 frames in my case. Moreover, in professional terms even 1 frame is not acceptable, certainly not at the studios/clients I've worked at/with.
3. ANALYSIS - even in the P4 launch video, contains an example of athletes recording their activity walking/running etc.. I personally know of people that have bought the P4 just for this reason!
4. Recording (to card) a LIVE STREAM, events etc. To be played back at a later date.
5. SURVEYING/Reconnaissance
6. BACKDROP VIDEO PLAYBACK - we have often been asked to film a continuous stream of video for playback on giant screens/backdrops for music events, The KLF live shows were a good example of what we did in the early 90's except we used 35mm film!
7. SOME USERS JUST WANT TO BE ABLE TO RECORD LONG VIDEO CLIPS - If a cheap GoPro can do it...
8. I could go on but my fingers hurt!
Workflow:
A filmmaker will appreciate that not all decisions are made in production, many can be/are made in post (depends on how pedantic your director is!) but usually for creative or budget/time reasons.. Often all! Either way (and my point is) an editor/director needs choice of content - as the industry saying goes, "Content is King!"
Just because you think 8m plus videos are unnecessary for your work, doesn't mean those that have spent the £1229 for the P4 have to think the same. Users should be able to use it for whatever purpose they see fit and without unnecessary technical limitations.
Anyway besides all the above, again you have totally missed the point.. Which is: IT SHOULDN'T DROP FRAMES - my £300 GoPro doesn't! SO WHY SHOULD THE P4?!!
I'm hoping DJI will address this in a future f/w update. Other than that, it's a great machine for the money and I wouldn't put off the casual user or even filmmaker buying one! Sorry this post was long, I was driven to it!
I wish you all happy, safe flying and great filmmaking.
Just for comparison - I checked some P3P split files, and those are also clearly missing around 10 frames at the split. I wonder why they haven't fixed it yet.
If the card is formatted as an NTFS card not Fat32 does that not increase the maximum file size.
If I am wrong please don't shout at me.
Graham
It increases the maximum permissible file size, but that may not, necessarily, prevent the camera from splitting the files if it is programmed to do that independent of the file system type.
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Both my P3Ps drop frames. This is with SanDisk Class 10 cards. For what I do, it doesn't really bother me. Much.
But I really wish it would not do that. GoPros don't misbehave this way (they misbehave in many other ways, though).
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Murphy's law states that the next-to-impossible sequence you have spent all day to achieve that will be slowed down by 30% for dramatic effect - will have the file split just as Sasquatch kisses Elvis.
Murphy was an optimist.
Hi Graham, I'm certainly not here to shout at people but instead learn from them and share my experiences. As we are currently experiencing some stormy weather here I've not touched my phantom this past couple of days.
Personally I don't believe this is a file allocation problem but a f/w issue in the Phantom. File systems are tried and tested, fat, fat32, ntfs and ExFat have been around a long while and proven themselves to work fine. However the issue is not so much the file size but the dropping of frames on segmented clips.
But, by all means please provide any information you can on your own findings.
I've reported my findings to DJI and as yet had no reply!
I film a lot of long shots, entire flights mostly. I guess I just enjoy viewing it on my 55", seeing all the details below. An added plus, I've preserved evidence of every screw-up since I started flying. 
That said, if I wanted to do a compilation, or use some of the footage in a later project, i would be severely pissed to find a chunk missing, or even a stutter in the section I needed.
That said, if I wanted to do a compilation, or use some of the footage in a later project, i would be severely pissed to find a chunk missing, or even a stutter in the section I needed.
Could be an over-taxed processor, perhaps. A lot going on in the Phantom 4. i don't have mine yet, but I'd be curious to see if lowering the frame rate or resolution resolved the issue, maybe even turning off some non-essentials (GPS, CO). I wouldn't accept either as a solution, but it might give you some insight.
Same finding, split clips when joined together loses/skips frames, and looks really ugly and unprofessional. My Canon 6D and my Nikon D750 doesn't do that, when 2 videos joined together, it's smooth as if it's one file. Really annoying especially if it splits during a important take...
ianwood
Taco Wrangler
The P3, P4 X3 and X5 all use pretty much the same system and processor as the GoPro Hero 4 which can switch files without dropping frames. So there is evidence it can be done.
i'm almost glad to hear that, it seems to point more towards a firmware issue. I'm sure it will be addressed, sooner than later, I would hope.
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