Vertical Studio - Looking for Beta Testers

The Editor · Dec 5, 2015

@Neil Mathew - Neil, many thanks for the email and download link.
I have not had a chance to try things out yet as it is blowing a gale here at the moment and we have high winds forecast for the next couple of days.

As soon as it subsides I will get out there and put it through its paces.
Any news on the iOS app yet (I assume you are awaiting Apple's royal nod?)

Neil Mathew · Dec 5, 2015

The Editor said:
@Neil Mathew - Neil, many thanks for the email and download link.
I have not had a chance to try things out yet as it is blowing a gale here at the moment and we have high winds forecast for the next couple of days.
As soon as it subsides I will get out there and put it through its paces.
Any news on the iOS app yet (I assume you are awaiting Apple's royal nod?)

Yep. the royal nod is one issue but also, there's an weird latency issue we're seeing with the iOS app on DJI inspire. Not seeing it on Phantom 3 yet. So we're just debugging that. We might have to release the Phantom 3 version first but we'll keep trying.

SanCap · Dec 5, 2015

Thanks Neil for the beta on my Android. I also am struggling with rain and winds here in South West Florida. I have lots of nice subjects to track around here.

Neil Mathew · Dec 6, 2015

SanCap said:
Thanks Neil for the beta on my Android. I also am struggling with rain and winds here in South West Florida. I have lots of nice subjects to track around here.

That looks incredible. I'd love to see some wildlife tracking shots

AndrewH · Dec 6, 2015

Thanks for the Android invite. It's all installed and ready to go as soon as the wind drops a little. It has been successfully tracking me around my apart whilst the inspire was set on my kitchen side board. It seemed to work exactly as I expected. Can't wait to get the inspire up in the air though for a real test.

Neil Mathew · Dec 6, 2015

AndrewH said:
Thanks for the Android invite. It's all installed and ready to go as soon as the wind drops a little. It has been successfully tracking me around my apart whilst the inspire was set on my kitchen side board. It seemed to work exactly as I expected. Can't wait to get the inspire up in the air though for a real test.

Great to hear that! For a second I was afraid you were flying your inspire in your apartment. haha.

The Editor · Dec 7, 2015

Neil Mathew said:
Yep. the royal nod is one issue but also, there's an weird latency issue we're seeing with the iOS app on DJI inspire. Not seeing it on Phantom 3 yet. So we're just debugging that. We might have to release the Phantom 3 version first but we'll keep trying.

Hey Neil,

A bit of feedback for you:

Overall I think this has the makings of a fantastic app. The subject tracking works extremely well but there are obviously limitations as with all tracking software - it likes a nice clean contrasty subject best. Even so, I think its doing a really good job!

A couple of points....

Connectivity:
Is there a way to release the USB port to be able to close Vertical and start DJI Go (or vice versa) as at the moment it appears you must switch off the remote in order to do this - unless I missed something
When booting up the remote the operating system asks if you want to connect via USB to DJI Go or Vertical - you have an option 'Just Once' and 'Always' What happens if a user accidentally presses 'Always' to one or the other? Are they then not given the option again to get back into the other app?

Functionality:
It maybe just me but the exposure compensation seems a little sluggish to respond to adjustments either from the screen or using the scroll wheel (slower than DJI Go anyway)?
The GPS indicator appears not to work - It always says GPS Locked. even if you completely obscure all sat reception it still reports GPS Locked.
I would like to see the loss of GPS turn red with maybe an audible warning?

I use the Inspire professionally and hold permission from the Civil Aviation Authority to fly commercially - with that come certain procedures and checklists that must be followed implicitly. One of those things is checking the mod values for the IMU and compass under the sensor section of the DJI Go interface before every single flight.
As it stands at the moment, I would have to turn on the remote, start DJI Go, Check IMU and compass, then power down the remote, exit the app, power back up the remote, start vertical etc.
Is it then possible to have access to the IMU status from within Vertical? - I think this is going to be a must for commercial use.

Hope those comments were of use and look forward to your comments.

Johnnywalker · Dec 7, 2015

Hi Neil !

I have request an invitation for testing the beta program for android and iOs yesterday. When do i will receive the email with the download link.

Thanks alot!

Johnny

Neil Mathew · Dec 7, 2015

Johnnywalker said:
Hi Neil !

I have request an invitation for testing the beta program for android and iOs yesterday. When do i will receive the email with the download link.

Thanks alot!

Johnny

Thanks for reaching out! the iOS app is still under construction and we'll send you an email with further instructions on the iOS beta very soon! Just ironing out a few more issues on the iOS. the Android apps are ready and we're sending out download links right now.

Neil Mathew · Dec 7, 2015

Thanks for the feedback! I'm going to go down the list and see if I can answer all your questions one by one.

The Editor said:
Hey Neil,
Overall I think this has the makings of a fantastic app. The subject tracking works extremely well but there are obviously limitations as with all tracking software - it likes a nice clean contrasty subject best. Even so, I think its doing a really good job!

Thanks! Yep, there's a few limitations like handling occlusions, busy backgrounds and extremely rapid motions but we're working to consistently improve the performance using new tricks in the computer vision algorithms. Although visual tracking will never be a 100% solution I want to find that sweet spot between perfect tracking performance and smething that's enough for most of the hard shots people are interested in doing.

The Editor said:
Connectivity:
Is there a way to release the USB port to be able to close Vertical and start DJI Go (or vice versa) as at the moment it appears you must switch off the remote in order to do this - unless I missed something
When booting up the remote the operating system asks if you want to connect via USB to DJI Go or Vertical - you have an option 'Just Once' and 'Always' What happens if a user accidentally presses 'Always' to one or the other? Are they then not given the option again to get back into the other app?

This is indeed an issue right now. Every time you want to switch between apps, you need to plug out the USB from the android device and plug it in again. Then when you see the notification come up, oyu need to pick the app you want to run. Now part of the problem is actually DJI GO itself. If you accidentally set VS as default. DJI GO will have problems with connecting to the drone unless you go into Android settings and unset usb defaults. Or you can delete the app's cache. BUT if you accidentally set DJI GO as default, our app will have on problems. We can still access the usb. So I suggest try this - Set DJI GO as the default on your phone. And then try opening our app. It should work. If that doesn't work. let me know.

The Editor said:
Functionality:
It maybe just me but the exposure compensation seems a little sluggish to respond to adjustments either from the screen or using the scroll wheel (slower than DJI Go anyway)?
The GPS indicator appears not to work - It always says GPS Locked. even if you completely obscure all sat reception it still reports GPS Locked.
I would like to see the loss of GPS turn red with maybe an audible warning?

Yep. I'm working the problem with this one. Is it actually slower than DJI GO. Could you maybe verify that ? I found the Phantom 3 to be generally slow at exposure adjustments overall but maybe we've screwed something up in the SDK.

Didn't know about the GPS issue! Thanks for that!! We'll get that one fixed - seems critical.

The Editor said:
I use the Inspire professionally and hold permission from the Civil Aviation Authority to fly commercially - with that come certain procedures and checklists that must be followed implicitly. One of those things is checking the mod values for the IMU and compass under the sensor section of the DJI Go interface before every single flight.
As it stands at the moment, I would have to turn on the remote, start DJI Go, Check IMU and compass, then power down the remote, exit the app, power back up the remote, start vertical etc.
Is it then possible to have access to the IMU status from within Vertical? - I think this is going to be a must for commercial use.

Good idea. We're thinking of setting up a professional user profile where you get to see telemetry and flight status information on the camera view or in a settings menu. Is there any data you'd like to view all the time, in addition to GPS status and battery level ? If so we can add it to the main screen. For anything that's not required all the time, we could push it to a second page. Let me know.

I hope that answers your questions! Let me know if there's anything else and keep the great feedback coming

Neil Mathew · Dec 7, 2015

Figbar said:
I'm interested...signed up for an invite. I have the Zenmuse X5...is this compatible?

Here is a link to my demo....Thanks!

Hi Guys,

I wanted to clarify something we just learned from DJI. Unfortunately the X5 gimbal is not compatible with their SDK yet. Not sure why but unfortunately if you have an X5 only we can't control it with Vertical Studio. Really annoying but I hope DJI enables this soon!!

Here's a link to forum post on their developer forum that explains this.
DJI Forum|Inspire 1 Pro-ZENMUSE X5-Wow!!

BobDalePhoto · Dec 8, 2015

signed up to the Beta and hoping to test it out following some skiers as soon as we have snow !

The Editor · Dec 8, 2015

Neil Mathew said:
Thanks for the feedback! I'm going to go down the list and see if I can answer all your questions one by one.

Thanks! Yep, there's a few limitations like handling occlusions, busy backgrounds and extremely rapid motions but we're working to consistently improve the performance using new tricks in the computer vision algorithms. Although visual tracking will never be a 100% solution I want to find that sweet spot between perfect tracking performance and smething that's enough for most of the hard shots people are interested in doing.

This is indeed an issue right now. Every time you want to switch between apps, you need to plug out the USB from the android device and plug it in again. Then when you see the notification come up, oyu need to pick the app you want to run. Now part of the problem is actually DJI GO itself. If you accidentally set VS as default. DJI GO will have problems with connecting to the drone unless you go into Android settings and unset usb defaults. Or you can delete the app's cache. BUT if you accidentally set DJI GO as default, our app will have on problems. We can still access the usb. So I suggest try this - Set DJI GO as the default on your phone. And then try opening our app. It should work. If that doesn't work. let me know.

Yep. I'm working the problem with this one. Is it actually slower than DJI GO. Could you maybe verify that ? I found the Phantom 3 to be generally slow at exposure adjustments overall but maybe we've screwed something up in the SDK.

Didn't know about the GPS issue! Thanks for that!! We'll get that one fixed - seems critical.

Good idea. We're thinking of setting up a professional user profile where you get to see telemetry and flight status information on the camera view or in a settings menu. Is there any data you'd like to view all the time, in addition to GPS status and battery level ? If so we can add it to the main screen. For anything that's not required all the time, we could push it to a second page. Let me know.

I hope that answers your questions! Let me know if there's anything else and keep the great feedback coming

Hi Neil - to save looking (and replying) in two different locations I will limit my replies to your own forum.
I have posted on there with some ideas re 'Basic' and 'Pro' mode. I think that would be a fantastic idea.... (I only wish DJI would adopt something similar for DJI Go, then we could do away with all the daft Social media rubbish and PooTube or Facespace bloat within the app)

Neil Mathew · Dec 9, 2015

BobDalePhoto said:
signed up to the Beta and hoping to test it out following some skiers as soon as we have snow !

Amazing! Let me know how it goes! You should have received a download link if you signed up for Android!

Neil Mathew · Dec 9, 2015

The Editor said:
Hi Neil - to save looking (and replying) in two different locations I will limit my replies to your own forum.
I have posted on there with some ideas re 'Basic' and 'Pro' mode. I think that would be a fantastic idea.... (I only wish DJI would adopt something similar for DJI Go, then we could do away with all the daft Social media rubbish and PooTube or Facespace bloat within the app)

You seem to really dislike PooTube and Facespace

Where do you upload your videos ?