Audio

[N017RW]

It's been answered. The ambient SPL of the drone combined with distance makes it impractical to selectively discern and capture sounds at a distance. I say impractical as opposed to impossible because of the size constraints.

Ever see the sound techs on the side of a football game, holding the translucent parabolic reflector?


That's the most cost effective solution.

"Ya can't change the laws of physics."
(Montgomery Scott)

 

[chrismartin3391]

By the way, welcome to flying drones! I started 6 months ago and it has not gotten old one tiny bit. I am 60 and very little makes me excited like a little kid again - except flying my Phantom.
Every day I get and think where can I fly this thing today?
Of course, I am retired so I have a big advantage over most guys who have to go to work every day.
Hopefully you will enjoy it as much!

Thank you.. I am very blessed. Although I do work a lot I also get to travel more than some. But I understand the feeling. Always looking for new places to fly. New ways to shoot.

 

[Uncle Stumpy]

Thank you.. I am very blessed. Although I do work a lot I also get to travel more than some. But I understand the feeling. Always looking for new places to fly. New ways to shoot.

That is my problem. When I was younger and also traveled alot, these drones were Star Wars stuff.
Although I am finding alot of places within a days drive that I never knew about! I'm glad you get to do what you do!

 

[solentlife]

Most places I travel to - if they saw a P3 ... I'd end up in some prison and forgotten !!

Nigel

 

[chrismartin3391]

Jeez that's gotta suck..

 

[solentlife]

Jeez that's gotta suck..

Depends what you are doing there !!
Hows this for sort of trips I do :



That's the guard assigned to look after me ... and my assistant. That's a Chinese AK47 with modified stock and sights, fully loaded ... ready to use.

Nigel

 

[Cuckaburra]

Nigel, you won't believe this but I actually have one of those, or something just like it. I bought it for an rc airplane, waaaay back in time. Hated flying the plane which is why I got into drones! I will look into Freemake, thank you!

Just curious but why did you hate flying the planes?i was into flying planes and i got tired of it.then i found drones.

 

[Uncle Stumpy]

Most places I travel to - if they saw a P3 ... I'd end up in some prison and forgotten !!

Nigel

There are so many places like that in the world that I couldn't even guess. but from the uniform and the junky AK i would have to say an African country. Are you an oil guy?

 

[Uncle Stumpy]

Just curious but why did you hate flying the planes?i was into flying planes and i got tired of it.then i found drones.

I should say I didn't LIKE flying them. You spend more time goofing with them and they are too easy to crash for us beginners. At least with the GPS the drones are kind of idiot proof - unless you get stupid.
I always wanted an rc plane but when I got a big easy to fly Piper Cub, I found out I was too uncoordinated. Turns out I am way better at flying my Phantom - must be a hand eye coordination thing. Judging by your handle, are you an Aussie?

 

[chrismartin3391]

Yea. Traveled to Columbia for work. Seen that everywhere we went. Very different from being in the states

 

[solentlife]

There are so many places like that in the world that I couldn't even guess. but from the uniform and the junky AK i would have to say an African country. Are you an oil guy?

First - the AK47 is not a piece of junk ... its the worlds longest serving and one of the most reliable assault rifles. Its why its the terrorists weapon of choice ...

I've seen them buried in the ground, thrown in muddy water ... picked up, wiped down and fired. They also say - if the bullet will go in - it will fire ... designed as a street clearing rapid fire gun to replace the 'long gun' the russians had originally. It also has a distinctive sound to it when it fires.

My job ? Oil, chemicals, shipping, blending, supply ... military and civilian.

Iran Iraq War
Nicaragua
Gulf War 1
Rwanda

just a few examples ... some aspects I am not at liberty to discuss ...

I live quite a quiet life now ... getting a bit past it for all the hassle, but I can say I have a few tales to tell !

Delivering fuel up the Saigon River AFTER USA supposedly pulled out ... took a Mortar shell through the wheelhouse ...

Watched the Bridgetown hit the mine going up to Kuwait.

Was shot at by Iraqi's aided by US warship ... after that with another job - was shot at by Iranians !

Watched the first Tornado strikes going out to hit Iraqi airfields ...

Lifes interesting ...

 

[Uncle Stumpy]

First - the AK47 is not a piece of junk ... its the worlds longest serving and one of the most reliable assault rifles. Its why its the terrorists weapon of choice ...

I've seen them buried in the ground, thrown in muddy water ... picked up, wiped down and fired. They also say - if the bullet will go in - it will fire ... designed as a street clearing rapid fire gun to replace the 'long gun' the russians had originally. It also has a distinctive sound to it when it fires.

My job ? Oil, chemicals, shipping, blending, supply ... military and civilian.

Iran Iraq War
Nicaragua
Gulf War 1
Rwanda

just a few examples ... some aspects I am not at liberty to discuss ...

I live quite a quiet life now ... getting a bit past it for all the hassle, but I can say I have a few tales to tell !

Delivering fuel up the Saigon River AFTER USA supposedly pulled out ... took a Mortar shell through the wheelhouse ...

Watched the Bridgetown hit the mine going up to Kuwait.

Was shot at by Iraqi's aided by US warship ... after that with another job - was shot at by Iranians !

Watched the first Tornado strikes going out to hit Iraqi airfields ...

Lifes interesting ...

You my friend have balls of steel. Hard way to make a buck, but obviously something kept you going back. I assume you liked what you did.
Saigon? You must be about my age, 65. I would have been headed to Nam in 1969, but the draft had a lottery that year and my number was so high that I needn't worry. The captain of my high school football team came back in a box - not something I was looking foreward to.

re the AK47. I am well versed in weapons (to a point). What I meant was, the soldier had an AK that looked like it had been used and abused and then used again, as opposed to a brand new weapon.

The only guy I know who has seen more action is my nephew, a Marine lifer - Master Gunnery Sergeant. He has been everywhere, the whole Black Hawk Down thing and I have pics of him sitting on Saddams golden toilet in the Palace. (don't tell anyone)
But my hat is off to you my lucky friend!!! Can you imagine if you had had a Phantom with you during all of your adventures? Now THOSE would be an amazing bunch of videos! But of course it was all Star Wars and Buck Rogers' stuff back then.
Thank you for sharing - truly appreciated. Ray (Aurora, IL)

 

[Mydrone70]

Surely by now, somebody who is very smart must have figired out a way to record some audio without hearing ONLY the blades.

Like the cheering of the crowd at a football game or the music from an outdoor concert, etc.

EVERY time I show somebody a video shot with my drone, they ask "where is the sound"?
All I can say is that all you would hear is the screaming of the blades.

Hasn't anybody figured anything out yet? Thank you!!!

Sure just put a mic on the ground [emoji13]

 

[Sdemaio]

Nigel, you won't believe this but I actually have one of those, or something just like it. I bought it for an rc airplane, waaaay back in time. Hated flying the plane which is why I got into drones! I will look into Freemake, thank you!

The only thing you're going to hear is blades and muffle from wind. You will not even pick up the slightest sound from anything around the quad unless a nuke goes off. You can get rid of the wind noise using foam, but if you've ever stood within 5 feet of your quad, you know how loud it is. Technology for sound, especially separating wanted from unwanted sounds has come a long way. Some hearing aids for example can now completely block sounds from say a crowded restaurant and focus solely on the person you're in a conversation with. But capturing audio from 100+ feet above and away from something while having a quad screaming at 120db inches away will likely never happen, unfortunately. I think the best suggestion was already mentioned - stick a device in the middle of the crowd to record audio and sync it with your video in post.

 

[aburkefl]

Wind and blade noise is a killer on flight vids ..

Of course with sophisticated sound panel - you could filter out the noise - but who has a sound studio desk ?

I must admit that silent video has my ears straining to hear 'something' ... seems unnatural. ANY sound is better than no sound.
But I now add middle road music and maybe a few snippets of commentary ... just to remove that silence.

One thing that does annoy me is some of the music used on vid's ... some add music that is just plain painful to listen to ... the 'author' may like it - but you have to consider the viewer !


Nigel

In theory, there's a lot of music out there that's legal to add to your videos. You have to learn how to search real hard!
You don't really have to have a huge, expensive audio editing system. Virtually all my videos have been edited with the free GoPro Studio. It works perfectly with GoPro video and only a couple of things are "missing" if the videos were not taken with a GoPro. Adding sound is extremely simple.

Stay away from "famous" stuff and popular music - gotta avoid that copyright stuff! - and you'll be fine. And yes, please don't take some snippet of a song and play it endlessly until the viewer exits in disgust!

 

[aburkefl]

And now we are back to my original point. I was asking if anybody heard about any new tech to get around that exact problem. Guess it is still a waiting game.
I will definitely check out Freemake!

I have a Phantom 3 Pro. Obviously can't speak for any other models, but the P3P does not have a microphone. Yes, you could record from your tablet/device, but all you're going to get is whatever commentary you and anyone around you might make.

On the plus side, there are a surprising number of either free or very inexpensive editing programs out there. I use GoPro Studio. It was designed around a GoPro, but works extremely well with other video input. If your video format is unsupported by one program, there are numerous conversion programs out there - many of them also free.

Adding audio to an existing video is pretty simple as well. It's essentially a cut and paste operation in most cases. Just be aware of copyright stuff. (If you're even a moderately experienced YouTube user, you already know this!)

Art - N4PJ
Leesburg, FL

 

[Alan11855]

Here's a recording made via the 'tablet' ..... note the 'drone' sounds as it takes off .. lands ... flies near ... plus you get all the crap sounds around as well as your own 'mutterings' ....

Nigel

Nigel,
I'm sure it's been discussed before but how do you record your actual screen view as seen from your device? It would be cool to add that into a video along with the camera view.
Thanks

 

[aburkefl]

Nigel,
I'm sure it's been discussed before but how do you record your actual screen view as seen from your device? It would be cool to add that into a video along with the camera view.
Thanks

If you're flying with DJI GO you'll need some kind of software to record the video you see on your tablet/phone. If you're flying Litchi, there's a built-in option for selection screen record. Be forewarned - running video of everything that's available is going to place a huge demand on your system. Herky-jerky video is sometimes the result of that huge demand. It takes some pretty robust stuff to capture everything without any hiccups.

Art - N4PJ
Leesburg, FL

 

[solentlife]

Forget any inbuilt Litchi recording of screen etc.....

To get ALL data ... everything that happens on screen ... you need a separate APP .... I tried various that were recc'd by people on forums but eventually settled on DU Recorder for Android. It has a low overhead and on my Nexus Vers 2 generally does not cause problems.

My reason for using it - is two fold.

Main reason is for my own data collection - allows me to read the data while I have flight video .. gives med speed .. height ... distance ... battery .... everything you see when looking at the screen while flying. If anything goes wrong - you have all data to add to the logs etc.

Second reason - is for others to be able to view / evaluate the data especially when I was doing range / FW / App testing earlier in the year ... you have all the auto RTH data ... manual RTH ... manual flight ... everything. Even the disasters !!

Its free ... and available from Google Play Store.

Nigel

 

[Uncle Stumpy]

Forget any inbuilt Litchi recording of screen etc.....

To get ALL data ... everything that happens on screen ... you need a separate APP .... I tried various that were recc'd by people on forums but eventually settled on DU Recorder for Android. It has a low overhead and on my Nexus Vers 2 generally does not cause problems.

My reason for using it - is two fold.

Main reason is for my own data collection - allows me to read the data while I have flight video .. gives med speed .. height ... distance ... battery .... everything you see when looking at the screen while flying. If anything goes wrong - you have all data to add to the logs etc.

Second reason - is for others to be able to view / evaluate the data especially when I was doing range / FW / App testing earlier in the year ... you have all the auto RTH data ... manual RTH ... manual flight ... everything. Even the disasters !!

Its free ... and available from Google Play Store.

Nigel[/QUO