P4 image recording issue

[vonaurolacu25]

Hi guys,

I bought a second hand phantom 4 at a pretty good price (600$). Though I knew that the drone was crashed before (there were clear signs indicating this) I tested it and it flew great, no issues when I bought it. Of course, this being my first drone I didn't have the time and opportunity to test every small detail in it.

Now I have found the reason for which it was cheap: it seems I have some "video" artefacts in dark colours and very light ones. In dark colours I get these strange pixels, moving around that dark colour, while in bright light, I get vertical stripes. The strange issue is that sometimes I get this...sometimes I don't. Also, while in 4k and low iso (or whatever seeting used to reduce to maximum the luminosity) I can see vertical lines formed out of these so-called "moving pictures".

You can see clearly what I'm talking about in the video below (windows of the hall and then the green area in the right of the screen).

Also, why I believe tha cable may somehow have an improper contact on one of the connections inside the gimbal is because the above tends to dissappear when I make the gimbal make some sudden moves while holding the drone. It comes back once the gimbal is moved from that position.

Now I searched online and the only close thing I could find was a dude who also hitted it in a wall and got this. He solved it by checking the ribbon cable of the camera...some connector moved during the crash. The thing is he doesn't give a lot of details about the repairament so I would need some other oppinions on how to overpass this (without paying 500euros for a new camera obviously)

thanks in advance!

 

[Duchunter]

Omg! Have you remotely looked at the manual or played with the settings? To start with turn your overexposure warning off in the camera settings. There is nothing wrong with your camera. You just need to calibrate and update the operator. Lol

 

[vonaurolacu25]

Omg! Have you remotely looked at the manual or played with the settings? To start with turn your overexposure warning off in the camera settings. There is nothing wrong with your camera. You just need to calibrate and update the operator. Lol

Yeah, I have "remotely" looked at the settings. And I can tell you that this thing dissappers when I turn the gimbal all the way left/right. Comes back right in when it somehow centers the image. With the exposure way down (almost pitch black image) you can see this "static" all over the place, organized in vertical lines somehow.

You are talking about the zebra lines of the overexpossure setting. I can assure you it's nothing like that and moreover, there are none like that in the video above, I don't know what you're looking at. There are other people on youtube with the same issue (ussually a bad ribbon cable in the gimbal).

 

[Duchunter]

Honestly I didn't see anything wrong with your video. Was that from the memory card or the phone video. You may want to try a high quality memory card. I'm confused about the gimbal. You said it goes black when u move it side to side? The gimbal only goes up and down. It doesn't pan, it just tilts unless you mean you move it by hand. You could have a ribbon wire problem I suppose I just did not see anything wrong with the video other than it looks like the streamed video on your mobile devise.

 

[vonaurolacu25]

Honestly I didn't see anything wrong with your video. Was that from the memory card or the phone video. You may want to try a high quality memory card. I'm confused about the gimbal. You said it goes black when u move it side to side? The gimbal only goes up and down. It doesn't pan, it just tilts unless you mean you move it by hand. You could have a ribbon wire problem I suppose I just did not see anything wrong with the video other than it looks like the streamed video on your mobile devise.

)) how can u not see the pixels on our right part of the sports hall I was filming :O they are obvious (at least on my PC). Anyway, since I posted it, the situation got waaaaay worse. You will see it for sure in the video below

the gimbal doesn't go "black"! when I move it by hand, it goes back (to it's original, front facing position) and the static comes back. If I hold it in place on the left let's say, the video is ok.

What is weird is that in photo mode, the transmision is good, but the photos are awfull. Attaching one below.

Everything is taken from the SD.

 

[Duchunter]

Ok I see it now. I suppose it could be the ribbon wire but more than likely it's the camera but before you do anything try a different video card. So this video is straight from the card, not the mobile device? Sometimes a bad lightening cable will cause poor transmission on the video but the video on the card would be perfect in that situation. The ribbon cable is cheap but it's not exactly easy and it's fidelly work fishing it all through the gimbal. On a scale from 1-10 I'd give it a 5. A lot of small pieces have to come off and go back on in a particular order. I replaced mine this week. Don't get a cheap cable. The aftermarket cable I got shorted out and fried my pitch board. Get OEM if at all possible. If it's the camera then your looking at about $300-$400 usd. You would probably be better off selling it as a replacement airframe without the camera. You can sell the controller seperate. You wouldn't have any problem getting your money back.

 

[vonaurolacu25]

It's not the camera my friend I just finished tying up some plastic tighteners around a place of the cable where I observed that if I press, than the image gets better and surprise surprise...it works. Not perfect, but almost perfect. Of course, tilting now the camera produces the distortions but for me it looks like the cable. There are places, along the movement of the gimbal, where the image is crystal clear. Also, what started a few days ago as a few pixels making issues (that even you could't see in the footage) now escalated to what you saw in my last post. For me this smells like a fault in the cable that was waiting to happen.

Tomorrow I'll have a drone service replace the cable. I'll come back to close the thread with the solution if (hoppefully) this will be it.

 

[Duchunter]

Those cables are a constant problem, even on the p3. A hard landing or minor crash will cause them to not work properly. DJI really should make replacing that wire on the p4 a little easier. It's really easy to screw it up during the installation. It has to wrap twice around the pitch motor shaft and then fished through the yaw arm to the gimbal controller and the yaw motor cable also hooks up there. Then into the frame and another small board and then to the main board. There are like five places the ribbon cable has to connect to.