Choppy video

DoogieH · Jan 2, 2017

First Solo flight, very smooth flight and impressed with the Solo, Much better than any drones we have flown in the past but we expect that from a "pro" model. Just love the drone. The issue seems to be with video though, it is very choppy and is being recorded directly to the go pro. No issues when not on drone, any thoughts. Used the recommended settings by 3DR.

andrew.baker.142 · Jan 2, 2017

Silly question- are you using the gimbal?

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SARDG · Jan 2, 2017

DoogieH said:
First Solo flight, very smooth flight and impressed with the Solo, Much better than any drones we have flown in the past but we expect that from a "pro" model. Just love the drone. The issue seems to be with video though, it is very choppy and is being recorded directly to the go pro. No issues when not on drone, any thoughts. Used the recommended settings by 3DR.

So... when you playback video from the SD card that was shot when on Solo, it's 'choppy', and when you play back video from the SD card that was shot with the GP standalone, it's smooth? I doubt it's dropping frames, the gimbal's likely rubbing on an internal cable. Can you post the video?

DoogieH · Jan 2, 2017

andrew.baker.142 said:
Silly question- are you using the gimbal?

Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

Yes Gimbal attached and working properly

DoogieH · Jan 2, 2017

SARDG said:
So... when you playback video from the SD card that was shot when on Solo, it's 'choppy', and when you play back video from the SD card that was shot with the GP standalone, it's smooth? I doubt it's dropping frames, the gimbal's likely rubbing on an internal cable. Can you post the video?

Will try to get the video posted. Yes correct I am going to change the SD card just incase as well. Thanks I will check the connections to the gimbal as well, would not have thought of that. Really like this drone, features are great.

DoogieH · Jan 3, 2017

Here is the video seems to be dropping frames, almost as if blocks of time are missing.

Frank Foster · Jan 3, 2017

Hummm, the video above plays perfectly, NO drop outs. Maybe it's whatever you were viewing the video on, that has a problem.

erikgraham · Jan 3, 2017

I'm not seeing any dropped frames. However, it looks a little "hot". My guess is that you are flying without an ND filter and the GoPro is selecting a super fast shutter speed. There might also be some vibrations in there from the gimbal wires.

My advice would be to reinstall the gimbal, paying extra special attention to how you route the cables so as to reduce the translation of vibrations down into the gimbal. Lots of posts here on how to do that.

I'd also recommend flying with an ND filter. Start with an ND4, ND8, and ND 16. If you don't know already, ND filters are like sunglasses for your GoPro. An ND4 reduces the amount of light that enters your camera by 4 times, and ND8 by 8 times, and so on.

You want to pick an ND filter for the lighting conditions you are flying in. Brighter light, stronger ND.

The goal is to use an ND filter that allows your GoPro to use a slower shutter speed, ideally twice your frame rate (or a tad faster than that). So if your shooting at 30 fps, you want your shutter speed to be 1/60 or 1/80. This will give you smoother, more cinematic footage.

DoogieH · Jan 3, 2017

Thanks for the advise, really appreciate it. The video when I first downloaded it to go pro software was choppy (all 3 actually). Even after the conversion, but uploaded to the Tube and all is good. Very odd but will change a few things this week and see how it goes.
I will take your advise and run with it, thanks again.

DoogieH · Jan 3, 2017

Frank Foster said:
Hummm, the video above plays perfectly, NO drop outs. Maybe it's whatever you were viewing the video on, that has a problem.

The video showed up on the Tube fine, but even in Go Pro software it was choppy. I was surprised myself. I am not even going to try and explain that one or worry about it unless it continues. Odd that all 3 videos on that session acted the same.

erikgraham · Jan 3, 2017

DoogieH said:
The video showed up on the Tube fine, but even in Go Pro software it was choppy. I was surprised myself. I am not even going to try and explain that one or worry about it unless it continues. Odd that all 3 videos on that session acted the same.

Ah. Yes. That is common. It just means your computer is struggling to display the 4K video content. Once it's been processed and compressed by YouTube, it plays more smoothly, but if you look closely, the image quality is probably degraded slightly. Also, in addition to compression, YouTube automatically generates lower resolution versions of your video, which are less taxing on computers.

You could change your settings on the GoPro to capture at 1080P instead of 4K. That's should play much more smoothly on your computer (at the cost of resolution and detail).

DoogieH · Jan 3, 2017

erikgraham said:
Ah. Yes. That is common. It just means your computer is struggling to display the 4K video content. Once it's been processed and compressed by YouTube, it plays more smoothly, but if you look closely, the image quality is probably degraded slightly. Also, in addition to compression, YouTube automatically generates lower resolution versions of your video, which are less taxing on computers.

You could change your settings on the GoPro to capture at 1080P instead of 4K. That's should play much more smoothly on your computer (at the cost of resolution and detail).

I shot it at 2.7k, I am going to check settings as I never had an issue reviewing 4k on my cpu before. Thanks that makes me think it might be a settings issue.