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Hi everyone so I have been doing a lot of research about getting a phantom 2 setup with a h3 3d and hero 3 with a fpv setup. I have a few questions first I am wondering how you take photos without the dji app. Am I missing something? From what I understand when u go with a transmitter and monitor your only capabilities are to start filming from take off to landing. How is it possible to take stills when your not using a vision camera? do you still need the dji wifi extender?
 
negative, you do not need a wifi extender. The Vision and non-Vision models operate on completely separate frequencies... here's a quick explanation:
P2Vision models run their RC's on 5.8Ghz, leaving the 2.4Ghz band (wifi) available for FPV and control. this is why the Vision models use actual wifi / app to do control (taking pictures, start/stop video) and fpv back to a tablet (or whatever), and you may want a wifi extender because wifi range isn't that great

P2 NON-Vision models (for gimbal+gopro) run their RC on 2.4Ghz therefore you cannot use the gopro's wifi. Furthermore, your FPV system cannot interfere so you need 5.8Ghz fpv devices... a transmitter and a receiver. Now instead of a "wifi repeater" you just need a good powerful transmitter and nice antennas and you can get vastly farther range with your FPV than wifi... like multiple kilometers basically farther than your Phantom battery will take you.

in summary, Vision models are easier but not as powerful. non-Vision is more effort and expensive to really spec out properly, but in the end you can wind up with a much more powerful and long range system.

to answer your other question about stills: you're correct since we don't have wifi control of the gopro, you have to simply hit record on the gopro before you take off... "film" the entire time, then press the button to stop after you return. There are several ways to get stills:
1) many people are happy to simply freeze frame a video and capture a still from that
2) some gopro models have a mode that captures video AND stills simultaneously (stills at certain interval)
3) put the gopro in time lapse mode and have it snapping a picture every X number of seconds... 5, 10, 30 60 whatever. so while you're flying the gopro is going snap snap snap and yes you'll have a bunch of pictures to sift through later

of note: say you're running in video + still mode on the gopro... your FPV transmission will "blink" as in the screen goes blank briefly when the camera takes a still.. this is normal. When the gopro is actually snapping a still picture specifically, it doesn't output video through the port. your video on the gopro will be normal, but the FPV feed/what you see on the screen will blank out briefly (about half a second) every time a still picture snaps... for this reason most people use a higher interval like every 10 or 30 seconds... it's kind of annoying to be honest but it's manageable. This is why most people just cap stills from the video itself so they don't have to deal with that intermittent blinking of the FPV feed.
 
So I am in the process of buying the phantom I am looking at transmitters and receivers I'm wondering if the best route is to go with a all in one monitor with the receiver built in or have a separate one. I'm also looking for a longer range setup if anyone has any suggestions it would be very appreciated. I am not interested in googles. I'd rather have a monitor with visor. Thanks again
 
Lockdo said:
So I am in the process of buying the phantom I am looking at transmitters and receivers I'm wondering if the best route is to go with a all in one monitor with the receiver built in or have a separate one. I'm also looking for a longer range setup if anyone has any suggestions it would be very appreciated. I am not interested in googles. I'd rather have a monitor with visor. Thanks again

it's your preference of course... but indeed I don't see any reason to buy a display without a receiver built in and run a separate receiver / display... a major downside of this setup is you'll need a battery or something to power the receiver and possibly the display too.

Most folks go ahead and get a "diversity receiver" (meaning it has 2 antenna ports and uses the best signal from either port) which has it's own 5.8Ghz receiver and battery built in... that way it's an all-in-one display that just receives the signal and puts it on the screen. just keep it charged and you're good to go with no extra ******** when you're trying to fly.

Once you've made that decision, there are complications. There's a "black pearl" diversity receiver which comes in both 7ch and 32ch flavors... many people say the 32ch version doesn't work well if you go with the ImmersionRC 600mW transmitter that is very popular... you need the 7ch version.
As an alternative, there's a diversity receiver called a RX-LCD5802 (usually branded Boscam) which is a full 32ch receiver (both channel sets). I personally can confirm it works great with Boscam transmitters, and supposedly it supports the ImmersionRC channel set too but I can't speak to if it suffers from the same issue as the Black Pearl 32ch or not.
protip: the RX-LCD5802 does not come with a power supply so either order one for it if you buy, or jog down to your local Radio Shack or whatever and get a generic 12V power supply with a compatible plug
 
So from what I see the ImmersionRC 600mW seems to be most popular. That with a improved antenna gets about how far in range? It does seem the black pearl is the best fit for what I am going for. I really love the great feedback.
 
Lockdo said:
So from what I see the ImmersionRC 600mW seems to be most popular. That with a improved antenna gets about how far in range? It does seem the black pearl is the best fit for what I am going for. I really love the great feedback.

indeed the ImmersionRC is most popular, and there are pre-made cables for both iOSD and non-iOSD install on the Phantom so everything is plug and play with no soldering so that's definitely the easier and slightly more expensive (since you have to buy extra cables instead of soldering yourself) route.

as for range... that will depend on your antennas and the environment you fly in. I just got done writing a big post on that topic, so rather than re-type of copy/paste just go read this thread please? :) it'll only take you a couple mins and I believe it will help you with that range question
viewtopic.php?f=31&t=22940
 
Okay next question if if I were to buy a previously owned vision 2 and then at some point wanted to change it from 5.8 to 2.4 what would that consist of? I am currently looking at a vision 2 in my area with a few extra batteries and accessories for about 750 it would allow me to fly while I build up a parts list for my final build?
 
Welcome new guys. As you can see we are fairly helpful bunch... most of time :) There is ton of good people here with even more good threads. This link below is a good one to add to your arsenal of getting the most out of the forums.
_____________________________________
This is a great way of finding much more relevant results when searching rather than the built-in search:
PhantomPilots.com Custom Google Search Makes a good browser Bookmark!

Sent from Samsung S4 via Tapatalk
 
Lockdo said:
Okay next question if if I were to buy a previously owned vision 2 and then at some point wanted to change it from 5.8 to 2.4 what would that consist of? I am currently looking at a vision 2 in my area with a few extra batteries and accessories for about 750 it would allow me to fly while I build up a parts list for my final build?

LONG story short, it just doesn't work that way. There's no converting back and forth between Vision and non-Vision. what you'd wind up with is an oddball, non-standard heavily modified Vision that you spent way more effort and money on than if you just bought a non-Vision model in the first place.

basically if you want simple, out of the box functionality get a Vision but they are not designed to be modified.

If you want more powerful, gimbal + gopro that is designed to be modded go with non-Vision as your base platform.

If cost is the factor, there are used non-Vision Phantoms advertised here in the Classifieds section all the time, many of which already have full FPV kits built. I strongly recommend you consider that before trying to get a used Vision and spend loads of time, effort and money modifying it.
 
Lockdo said:
But let's say I wanted to change it to 2.4 I could just buy this and I should be good?
http://www.quadrocopter.com/product.asp ... oCyfnw_wcB

I want to be very clear with you that while I'm knowledgeable about FPV, I'm not nearly as experienced or knowledgeable with heavy duty modifications like swapping the controller.

theoretically I guess so ONLY for the RC though... but I would definitely contact the sales department or at least post a new thread here (in a more appropriate forum not FPV) and ask for other opinions.

I believe there is a lot more to converting a Phantom than just he RC... your Phantom's main board will still think it's a Vision model but it won't be able to find the expected camera or gimbal I honestly don't know how the Phantom Vision firmware responds to that. You'll probably face challenges regarding firmware updates among many other topics.

I would highly suggest you go post in the Phantom 2 Vision and maybe even the non-vision forums and ask this community for information and experiences from people trying to convert. Nobody else is going to notice this particular conversation buried down on page 2 of this thread in the FPV forum. :) and others who have more experience will give you much better information than I can about conversion
 

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