Is 50' to Water considered "close"??

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I see a lot of warnings about the visuall positioning going wonky when people fly close to the surface of water. I want to fly a mission following a bridge over the Sacramento River, not a wide river, and I am wondering how "close" is considered "safe."

I will get amazing aerial video at 50'. Is this a safe distance?? Do most people turn off the visual positioning for a shot such as this??
 
I do most of my flying over the water (P4 standard), and I leave VPS on. The P4 manual states that VPS is effective from .3 - 10 meters, so at 50', you will be fine.

The reason that I leave VPS on is because I have found the copter to be much more stable for hand catching with it on (mostly over grassy surfaces), and I have become very used to having all of my fingers.
 
Is this a safe distance?? Do most people turn off the visual positioning for a shot such as this??

Generally, it's a personal preference, although there are some widely-observed cautions that should be observed over surfaces that are not stationary, moving water for example. At 50', you're above the effective range (33'/10M) of the VPS, so you should be OK at that altitude. Like Fly Dawg, I tend to turn mine off most of the time. Good luck.
 
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Thank you all! I am going out to get a visual on the tree line right now. I will let you know how it goes after the weekend! :smiley:
 
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I am wondering how "close" is considered "safe."
Here's a little white noise video from Jamaica Beach on Galveston Island. This was pretty close and I did have vision positioning off. Had quite a bit of sea-spray to wipe off but she still flies fine. The audio is courtesy of my Galaxy 5
 
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Here's a little white noise video from Jamaica Beach on Galveston Island. This was pretty close and I did have vision positioning off. Had quite a bit of sea-spray to wipe off but she still flies fine. The audio is courtesy of my Galaxy 5
Very nice. But you failed to mention exactly how close you were to the waves! LOL. Looks close, but I am wondering "how close?"
 
Just in case anyone was waiting with baited breath for my bridge mission...it went fantastically! Three great scenes....now I have to wait until I have time to edit it all and put it together.

Thanks for everyone's input. I decided to keep VPS on since I was comfortable I was high enough. But am going to try flying without it to see what the stability differences are.

Cheers!
 
I see a lot of warnings about the visuall positioning going wonky when people fly close to the surface of water. I want to fly a mission following a bridge over the Sacramento River, not a wide river, and I am wondering how "close" is considered "safe."

I will get amazing aerial video at 50'. Is this a safe distance?? Do most people turn off the visual positioning for a shot such as this??


I flew this mission maybe 8' off the water (hard to know as the altitude reported as -3.9' due to the river bed being lower than the launch site) and had no warnings or any technical issues, all proximity warnings enabled.

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I flew this mission maybe 8' off the water (hard to know as the altitude reported as -3.9' due to the river bed being lower than the launch site) and had no warnings or any technical issues, all proximity warnings enabled.
Not necessarily. Since the water was dirty and calm, VPS should have had no problem with it.
If you have VPS enabled and you are closer than 10 metres to whatever's below your drone, the VPS will indicate how high the Phantom is above the ground or water.
i-5fDBkqG-M.png

Look at the bottom line in your display to read the VPS height (when in VPS range)
 
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Thanks for the tip about the VPS height. I never paid much attention to that before. I did have the 'radar' display popping up telling me there is an object below the drone though. I'll have to make a note of the VPS display more often. I can see that would be useful in places of 'negative altitude'.
 
I flew this mission maybe 8' off the water (hard to know as the altitude reported as -3.9' due to the river bed being lower than the launch site) and had no warnings or any technical issues, all proximity warnings enabled.

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i love these drones! So much fun to fly. Now, everywhere I go, I am measuring up situations for a fly over! Neat vid.
 
Not necessarily. Since the water was dirty and calm, VPS should have had no problem with it.
If you have VPS enabled and you are closer than 10 metres to whatever's below your drone, the VPS will indicate how high the Phantom is above the ground or water.
i-5fDBkqG-M.png

Look at the bottom line in your display to read the VPS height (when in VPS range)
Awesome! Still so many things to learn!
 
One thing if you fly low over small rivers... watch for wires! In my Housatonic video above, you can see at one point, I'm flying over a piano wire that is stretched across the river. It was not visible on the 720P downlink, but I clearly spotted it on the 4K display in my edit suite.

The other thing is on windy days, watch out for wind shear or downdrafts. You may want to fly higher to give your drone some buffer zone under those conditions.
 
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And watch out for nesting birds of prey as well. They will be very protective of their young, possibly at the detriment of your copter.
 
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One thing if you fly low over small rivers... watch for wires! In my Housatonic video above, you can see at one point, I'm flying over a piano wire that is stretched across the river. It was not visible on the 720P downlink, but I clearly spotted it on the 4K display in my edit suite.

The other thing is on windy days, watch out for wind shear or downdrafts. You may want to fly higher to give your drone some buffer zone under those conditions.
So funny that you warned me, as I saw the EXACT same thing in my post work, as well. Had no idea there was a taut wire crossing the river, but then I saw it on the video feed. Wow. Scared me. I was plenty above it, but the fact that I did not know it was there was a bit annoying because I did do a walk around to get a visual on things. Yep! Watch out for wires on the river banks!
 
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