Solex for Solo

[Jubalr]

Documentation is built into the app. Here is the online manual at his new website..

 

[Pedals2Paddles]

Hey! Was wondering if there's any plans to implement live streaming through Solex with with Facebook or Instagram? That would be awesome! Thanks!

I don't think that is something Solex (or any app) can do. That is a function of Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, or whatever you're using. Those apps are specifically written to use only the device's onboard cameras. There is no provision in those apps to take a video stream from some other source or the screen.

 

[FlyXlsa]

Documentation is built into the app.
Here is the online manual at his new website..

Thanks for that link! I made a quick PDF. Looks like a few edits may be needed, but I like to have some things like this printed. My wife even printed the bound the 3DR Solo Manual for me!

Solex Manual.pdf

 

[Twd]

Four questions re Solex (I hope this is the place to ask Solex questions!):

Is documentation for Solex available -- preferably with screen shots or at least a few GUI images? All of the download links to docs here that go to Facebook storage yield an error message when I log in with my FB credentials. I found one Dropbox link but the result is a subset of what's built into the app.

How do you select or initiate Spot Mode?

Do the A and B buttons on the controller have any effect when using Solex?

In the left side of the Solex window is a Controls button, and just below the battery icon is a "target"-like icon that initiates and announces "Guided" when pressed. What is this about?

Kelly kindly replied with an answer about Spot Mode:

The little icon that looks a bit like a gun sight is the Spot mode icon. What you do is point the gimbal down at some point on the ground and click that icon. It will turn green, and temporarily switch to Guided mode (hence the announcement). It does this so it can set an ROI (region of interest) on the target you were pointing at. As you fly toward (and away from) the target, the gimbal will turn down to stay pointed at the target. When you click it again to turn it off, it will again switch to Guided mode temporarily to clear the ROI.​

So that answers my questions about Spot Mode and the meaning of the Guided function.

 

[SeanGold]

Hello,

So I just took the plunge and purchased solex today and off to bit of a rocky start.

First, Selfie smart shot kind of wigged out on me and spun Solo around and I had to hit the pause button to prevent it from flying off into a tree. I can't imagine that's normal?

Second, I tried to initiate a pano, and it didn't take the photos, just some video clips?

I had no issues using these features on the Solo app and am wondering if these are issues, and if they are, if theres any timeline to fix them?

Thanks!

 

[Pedals2Paddles]

Selfie mode has been broken on the solo firmware end of things for almost a year. It is intermittent and I don't think anyone has found what combination of circumstances makes it wig out. But it happens regardless of what app you use.

You have to set the GoPro to photo mode first for Pano.

 

[SeanGold]

Selfie mode has been broken on the solo firmware end of things for almost a year. It is intermittent and I don't think anyone has found what combination of circumstances makes it wig out. But it happens regardless of what app you use.

You have to set the GoPro to photo mode first for Pano.

Thanks for your reply!

I went out to try out your suggestion, and even with it in photo mode it still only gives me video files. Very frustrating.

EDIT: Also wanted to add, without making too many posts, that I just tried the HDR feature a few times as well. THe first time it failed for unknown reasons. I then just tried it again on another flight for sunset and it said it went through and captured HDR, though right after I lost video feed and couldn't see anything but a black screen. I put my card into the computer and I have no photos of the sunset, let alone a bracket of photos, and the one video file I shot through Solex as well, is corrupted.

I know many speak highly of Solex, but I've tried it multiple times on 3 different devices and keep running into issues.

 

[Pedals2Paddles]

Sounds like a GoPro or SD card problem.

 

[SeanGold]

Sounds like a GoPro or SD card problem.

But everything I shot on the Solo app, such as the spherical Panorama and video files, and still images came out fine and imported to my Lightroom. I will continue to tinker with the Solex app, as I like some of the features, such as saving logs and tracks, and HDR if it works, but it seems very temperamental to me so far, and it did freeze up my gopro as well a couple times, which I haven't had happen since I owned my Solo.

 

[BigTulsa]

Question...and this may be targeted more at NVidia Shield users (as I have one). Just got a chance to use (a little) the Solex app yesterday and noticed that my connection seemed to drop out fairly frequently and sometimes could never get it back. I haven't tried with the stock Solo app much to see if I was having issues, but was definitely aggravating to lose connection. It could be interference I suppose but was having a hell of a time staying connected. Any others see this happening..specifically on the NVidia Shield? Thanks.

 

[fliersguy]

Thanks for your reply!

I went out to try out your suggestion, and even with it in photo mode it still only gives me video files. Very frustrating.

EDIT: Also wanted to add, without making too many posts, that I just tried the HDR feature a few times as well. THe first time it failed for unknown reasons. I then just tried it again on another flight for sunset and it said it went through and captured HDR, though right after I lost video feed and couldn't see anything but a black screen. I put my card into the computer and I have no photos of the sunset, let alone a bracket of photos, and the one video file I shot through Solex as well, is corrupted.

I know many speak highly of Solex, but I've tried it multiple times on 3 different devices and keep running into issues.

I, and a few other other users mentioned this same issue a few pages back. Its not a GoPro issue, I use this camera for time lapses, panos, many things not connected to Solo. With the GoPro set to PHOTO mode it still gives me video files for each shot in a Pano. I also have the same selfie issue of spinning 180 degrees and random crashes. I've also had a few corrupt video files using Solex, never have in Solo or using the camera stand alone.

The Solo app works very well for me, panos work perfect, selfie mode works everytime and its easier to navigate smart shots. HDR I don't care about because I do my own in Photoshop. You are not alone!

 

[SeanGold]

I, and a few other other users mentioned this same issue a few pages back. Its not a GoPro issue, I use this camera for time lapses, panos, many things not connected to Solo. With the GoPro set to PHOTO mode it still gives me video files for each shot in a Pano. I also have the same selfie issue of spinning 180 degrees and random crashes. I've also had a few corrupt video files using Solex, never have in Solo or using the camera stand alone.

The Solo app works very well for me, panos work perfect, selfie mode works everytime and its easier to navigate smart shots. HDR I don't care about because I do my own in Photoshop. You are not alone!

Glad to hear I'm not alone! And I do agree that the layout of the smart shots are cleaner in Solo app.

But I'm very curious, when using Selfie in Solo App, does the gimbal move to keep you in frame, as per designed (I believe?), or does it reset the gimbal to 90 degrees and will only let you lock the gimbal (not track, but at least keep it's position you set) on the second run, or if you move the gimbal manually? Because that's what's happening to me and I'm trying to figure out why that is.

Thanks again for your input!

 

[Greg Parker]

Used Solex today. Cable Cam recorded well short "Fly me there" return worked well longer one (close to 3000 feet out) reached location but had problems. It needed to climb 66 feet on the way back but didn't and then wouldn't start the recorded CC.

 

[andrew.baker.142]

Kelly,
Two Quick questions for you.
1) If I have Solex up and running during an auto mission (from Mission Planner) should I expect Solex to respond if the aircraft leaves the active geofenced area? I have a 1 mile loop around my neighborhood (that I run 3 times) when I want to run a battery down to storage voltage. It was not until the last time I flew it that I was watching the map page in Solex and noticed the mission took the aircraft outside my active fence, but with no response from Solex.
2). I noticed that after I enable some of your flight profiles that my A or B button gets mapped to "Autonomous" which is great. The problem is I've not seen that as an option when I'm manually assigning functions to those buttons. What is the trick?
Thanks again for the great product!


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

 

[Pedals2Paddles]

Solex is not operating or monitoring the geofence. The Solo's companion computer is doing that work. Solex is just the user interface to choose what you want for a fence. The companion computer takes that and handles it. If you turned off your phone/tablet, the geofence would still be there since it doesn't require the app or a device to function.

 

[SteveReno]

Kelly Schrock
17 hrs
Incoming! A Solex update, the first in 30 days. 1.3.0 should be on its way to your devices. Here's what's in it:

Speed setting controls on the flight screen

Sometimes it's handy to be able to change performance settings on the fly, without having to back out of the screen to do it. So there's a little "sliders" control on the Controls panel that pops a little control panel out when you click it. You can adjust speed and steering speed from there, hit Back, and it will adjust to the new speed settings. Note that this is the same as setting it from Vehicle Settings, so the settings stay what you adjust them to until you change them again.

. Tap Fly (map): Point to a map location and fly to it

Tower has a handy "long press to fly here" feature on its map that's now replicated in Solex. Open the Map view, hit the Layers button, select Guided from the list, then long-press on the map. A marker appears. Click on it, and you get a "Fly me there" screen that lets you fly to the location. As soon as it reaches the location, the marker disappears. It's a way to fly to a specific location without having to screw around with saved locations, etc.

. Tap Fly (video): Long-press a location on the video screen and fly to it

Every once in a while, you think of an idea, and don't realize that it falls into the "not really that cool" category until you've had a chance to play with it. When you're the guy writing the software, this means you have to implement it first. That's the story with this feature. Long-press a location on the *video* screen, and a marker appears. Click it, and fly to it. Pretty much the same as the map-based version of the same feature, except it's flying to the object you poked on the screen. Having built and tested it, I'm not all that excited about it. Now that I think about it (and talked to Scott Manthey about it), really it should let the video screen be fully visible, and allow some finer control over how fast it flies, as well as allowing course corrections as it goes. This is basically just "Fly me there" on the video screen. So, I'm already working on something different for this, but I thought I would put it in this release to see if people think it's cool, and I'm wrong about my opinion of it (which I'm probably not.

:-D )

. Default viewing angles

As it happens, it's possible to come up with a set of mostly accurate viewing angles based on resolution and selected FOV for the GoPro. Not totally accurate, but pretty close. So this version of Solex will still check to see if you have a calibrated viewing angle, but won't stop you in the middle of what you're doing to ask you to enter some angles. It will just fall back to angles that it knows about for your current resolution and FOV. Some have asked for "Camera profiles" so they can have different viewing angles for special lenses (e.g. Peau). This isn't that, but that is in store for a future update.

 

[Deleted member 7413]

Kelly Schrock
17 hrs
Incoming! A Solex update, the first in 30 days. 1.3.0 should be on its way to your devices. Here's what's in it:

Speed setting controls on the flight screen

Sometimes it's handy to be able to change performance settings on the fly, without having to back out of the screen to do it. So there's a little "sliders" control on the Controls panel that pops a little control panel out when you click it. You can adjust speed and steering speed from there, hit Back, and it will adjust to the new speed settings. Note that this is the same as setting it from Vehicle Settings, so the settings stay what you adjust them to until you change them again.

. Tap Fly (map): Point to a map location and fly to it

Tower has a handy "long press to fly here" feature on its map that's now replicated in Solex. Open the Map view, hit the Layers button, select Guided from the list, then long-press on the map. A marker appears. Click on it, and you get a "Fly me there" screen that lets you fly to the location. As soon as it reaches the location, the marker disappears. It's a way to fly to a specific location without having to screw around with saved locations, etc.

. Tap Fly (video): Long-press a location on the video screen and fly to it

Every once in a while, you think of an idea, and don't realize that it falls into the "not really that cool" category until you've had a chance to play with it. When you're the guy writing the software, this means you have to implement it first. That's the story with this feature. Long-press a location on the *video* screen, and a marker appears. Click it, and fly to it. Pretty much the same as the map-based version of the same feature, except it's flying to the object you poked on the screen. Having built and tested it, I'm not all that excited about it. Now that I think about it (and talked to Scott Manthey about it), really it should let the video screen be fully visible, and allow some finer control over how fast it flies, as well as allowing course corrections as it goes. This is basically just "Fly me there" on the video screen. So, I'm already working on something different for this, but I thought I would put it in this release to see if people think it's cool, and I'm wrong about my opinion of it (which I'm probably not.

:-D )

. Default viewing angles

As it happens, it's possible to come up with a set of mostly accurate viewing angles based on resolution and selected FOV for the GoPro. Not totally accurate, but pretty close. So this version of Solex will still check to see if you have a calibrated viewing angle, but won't stop you in the middle of what you're doing to ask you to enter some angles. It will just fall back to angles that it knows about for your current resolution and FOV. Some have asked for "Camera profiles" so they can have different viewing angles for special lenses (e.g. Peau). This isn't that, but that is in store for a future update.

Hi Kelly,
In my opinion I like all the added new features. I wish I had the time and favourable weather to try them out. I trust your opinion and judgement.
Thanks for all your hard work.
Cheers;
Sam


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[SteveReno]

Hi Kelly,
Just got back from Seattle, Visiting our newest member of the family "Chris"
I think that the "Fly me there" Mod. is a fine feature for Solex. Can't wait ti try it.
A minimum preset of "height" should be included within settings for future updates
"As you have already noted"

 

[droneswag420blazeit]

Kelly Schrock
17 hrs
Tap Fly (map): Point to a map location and fly to it

Great idea!

 

[speatuk]

Hi Kelly,
Just got back from Seattle, Visiting our newest member of the family "Chris"
I think that the "Fly me there" Mod. is a fine feature for Solex. Can't wait ti try it.
A minimum preset of "height" should be included within settings for future updates
"As you have already noted"

I was just about to say that when I read you had. Lol


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk