DJI’s Phantom 2 Vision+ really upped the ante
for a consumer-friendly all-in-one aerial photography drone. It shot
solid 1080p video, and its built-in stabilized camera kept the shot
super smooth. Well, the Phantom 3 is here—and while it isn’t perfect, it
blows the doors off the 2 Vision+. It’s a mighty sweet birdie.
What Is It?
It’s DJI’s
(that’s China’s Da-Jiang Innovations) latest consumer-facing aerial
photography quadcopter, not to be confused with the more impressive (and
more expensive) prosumer Inspire 1.
It has the same tried and true body as the previous Phantom drones and
it doesn’t go any faster than the last version. So what’s the
difference? It’s way more accessible for beginners, and takes way better
video. It’s got a wonderfully sharp, three-axis gimbal stabilized 4K
UHD camera and vastly improved controls.
Plus a new lower price, depending on the model. The Phantom 3 comes
in two styles: the $1000 Advanced and the $1260 Professional. They’re
very similar but the Professional shoots glorious 4K video at up to
30fps, while the Advanced is limited to 1080p video at 60fps. The
Professional version is the one we tested and will be writing about
here.
Why Does It Matter?
Because they took the best consumer drone and made it significantly better.
Design
At first
glance you’d think the Phantom 3 is just the Phantom 2 Vision+. Look
underneath it, though, and you’ll see a trio of new sensors on the tail,
which let the drone see the ground. This means that the drone should remain stable, even if it doesn’t have GPS lock. Like if you’re flying it indoors. More on that in a sec.
You can’t
see it on the outside, but the GPS has also been improved. In addition
to standard GPS satellites it now works with GLONASS satellites
(Russia’s version of GPS). More satellites means faster signal
acquisition and that it will more reliably stay locked during flight.
And then
there’s the camera. It looks just like the camera on the Phantom 2
Vision+, but it ain’t. It’s now capable of shooting 4K video. The lens
is f/2.8 and has a 94 degree field of view, with very little lens
distortion. It uses the same three-axis gimbal as the previous camera.
This all adds up to gorgeous video.
Remote for its predecessor, the Phantom 2 Vision+
The biggest
and best overhaul, though, is the remote control. With the Phantom 2
Vision+ (above) you had a very basic remote. In addition to the two main
joysticks, it had a pair of three-position switches up top, which were
confusing to use unless you memorized the minutiae of the advanced
section of the instruction manual. You also had an annoying little box
attached to the top, which acted as the wireless bridge between the
drone’s camera and your phone. You had to connect your phone to the
box’s Wi-Fi, which then pulled photo and info from the camera. It was a
pain in the ass.
The Phantom 3 remote control.
The control
for the Phantom 3 is all integrated. The Wi-Fi stuff is all built in
now. You just attach the your phone or tablet directly to the remote via
USB. The remote has done away with replaceable batteries, too, and now
houses an internal rechargeable battery. The charger that comes with the
Phantom 3 allows you to charge the drone’s battery and the remote at
the same time, and it’s been upgraded to charge the batteries faster. I
was able to get the drone’s battery from 10 percent back to full in just
over an hour.
Possibly
the best part, though, is that the remote now has a bunch of buttons
that control the camera’s functionality. You used to have to do
everything by tapping tiny icons on your phone’s screen while you were
flying. Now there are dedicated buttons for start/stop recording, a
shutter button for stills, and a pair of wheels to adjust the camera’s
angle and even the exposure. This is just so much easier.
The remote
also has a prominent new button next to the power button: Return to
Home. Lose sight of the drone, or just want it to come back and don’t
want to do it yourself? Press and hold that button and it will fly over
to where you launched it, and then slowly descend and land itself. It’s
very convenient. There are also two easily accessible trigger-style
buttons that advanced users can customize to do things like reset the
gimbal angle, switch between map view and camera view on your screen,
display battery info, etc.
Using It
It’s hard
to understate just how much easier it is to fly and shoot with the
Phantom 3. The 2 Vision+ wasn’t hard, but with the 3 it’s just so much
more intuitive that it removes a layer of stress, and you can enjoy
flying and focus on what you’re shooting.
It’s just
so much fun to fly. When it takes off near you and you feel this
tremendous wind pushing down, you really get a sense of how powerful
this drone really easy. And yet, the controls are really pretty simple
to learn. On the left stick, up and down controls your elevation while
left and right control your rotation. The right stick moves the drone on
the XY axis—forward, backwards, and side to side. You’l want to start
out flying slowly, because it’s easy enough to get turned around, but
once you’ve spent some time with it, you’ll feel confident enough to
push it to its limits. It’s generally very user friendly. But be
careful. This thing moves at speeds of up to 35 miles per hour and those
plastic propellor blades will slice through a person’s skin.
The
integrated camera controls on the controller are fantastic. I really
hated taking a hand off the controls to tap my phone’s screen when I
wanted to get anything done. With the Phantom 3 I can tilt the camera up
and down, start and stop recording, and even adjust the exposure
compensation without ever removing my thumbs from the joysticks.
So maybe you’ve seen that episode of The Big Bang Theory
that makes fun of how hard it is to calibrate a DJI drone? It used to
be true. On the older models you had to take the right-hand three-way
switch and flip it up and down five times in order to put the drone into
calibration mode... pick up the drone and rotate 360 degrees around one
axis... then twist it and rotate it 360 degrees around another axis to
get GPS to work properly. This was incredibly annoying.
With the
Phantom 3 you don’t have to do that any more. You turn it on, plug the
remote into your phone or tablet via USB, and you’re ready to go within
seconds. I even flew it a few times without a screen attached and
everything still worked perfectly. I definitely noticed the difference
with GLONASS, too. It used to take a minute or so for decent satellite
acquisition. With the Phantom 3 it’s about 5 to 10 seconds. You probably
should still do the weird twisty dance just to calibrate the compass
(which you start within the app), and DJI recommends it, but honestly, I
never did—and the drone never got disoriented.
The Return
to Home button works like a charm, mostly. On several occasions (in
several different environments) I took it to the very edge of the remote
control’s range, and then hit the button. Every time it came back. That
said, it didn’t always come back exactly to the place where it
launched. Usually it landed within a few feet of the spot. Other times
it landed about 8 feet away. A couple of time it was closer to 12 or 15
feet. This is exactly why you shouldn’t launch it off a dock (or a boat)
unless you really know what you’re doing. That said, once it gets back
within range you can just use the joysticks and you’re flying again.
Yesterday I
decided to test the Phantom 3’s range, which DJI claims is 1.2 miles. I
was dubious. So I took it to a large body of water, brought it up to
300 feet, and then hit the gas, sending it flying away. I lost visual on
it after just a few hundred feet, but I could still see the video feed
and the drone’s distance on my attached tablet. It was pretty amazing. I
was able to send it out 8,000 feet before it lost contact with the
remote. 8,000! That’s over 1.5 miles (or 2.4 kilometers). The video feed
got choppy at about 6,500 feet, though, which is the 1.2 miles DJI
claims.
Once the
drone loses contact with the remote (for whatever reason) it activates
its Failsafe mode, which turns it around and lands it at the spot where
it first took off. I found that this generally worked perfectly, except
during that 8,000 foot flight. It was on its way back to me when I
noticed a small plane overhead. I was sure it was a long ways away, but
just to be safe I decided to lower the drone from 300 feet to 100 feet.
Suddenly, poof, no signal. What the hell just happened? I looked closer
at the screen and this is what I saw.
Uhhh,
that’s not good. But luckily it was on land! I was able to use the map
view to meander my way over to it, and there it was.
One prop was still spinning. Apparently it was still trying to finish its mission. Poor little guy.
Nothing
near the crash site was anywhere near 100 feet tall. The signal wasn’t
the strongest on its way back, so maybe as I was bringing it down it
became disconnected with the remote and just kept heading down. Or maybe
a seagull swooped and knocked it out of the sky? Seagulls hate this
thing. Unfortunately, I wasn’t recording video, so I’ll never know what
happened. I picked it up, cleaned some grass out of the props, and then
zzzzzzp it started up again like nothing had ever happened. This things
are really tough. I once crashed the first Phantom 2 Vision into a tree
at about 35 feet, and it fell straight to the ground and survived.
Anyway, where was I?
I can’t
prove this because I don’t have an earlier Phantom with me, but I’m
almost certain that the Phantom 3 is quieter. I’m not sure if the blades
are shaped slightly differently or what, but it seems to me (and my
friends who have flown a lot of these) that the Phantom 3 produces
lower-pitched whirring sounds than the previous generations, which had a
higher whine. This makes it less obnoxious to be around. Again, I can’t
be sure of this, but I think it’s true. It’s definitely still plenty
loud, but if memory serves it’s not quite as grating as previous models.
Still image shot by the Phantom 3.
Okay, let’s
talk image quality: It’s great. Especially on a bright day. The footage
I brought back from the coast in Santa Cruz, CA (see top video) just
blew me away. It was sharp, colors were bold, motion was smooth, and the
dynamic range was very good. I couldn’t believe that some of that
footage had come off this little flying toy thing. It’s really
impressive. It does struggle a bit in low light, however. There’s a very
noticeable graininess, especially in the darker portions of the
picture. It’s not a dealbreaker, but if you’re shooting at night you
might want to consider some serious post-production editing software.
For most of us, though, where this thing shines is when something else
is shining for it.
I did a
quick comparison with a GoPro Hero4 Black, and while the Phantom 3 looks
good, I have to say the GoPro looks better. The biggest difference is
that the GoPro just has way more dynamic range. Details don’t get lost
in the shadows so much and highlights are less likely to blow out. I
think colors are a bit more lively on the GoPro, too. That said, when
you’re shooting in 4K on the Hero4 Black you are limited to the camera’s
wide field of view setting, which is roughly 170 degrees. I think the
Phantom’s 94 degree field of is better for aerial photography. Another
advantage the Phantom has is that it can shoot stills in RAW, so you
have a bit more flexibility in post.
So, the
Phantom 3 has that trio of ultrasonic sensors so it can fly stably
indoors. The first time I tested it, it really did not go well. It just
had all kinds of drift, and not just front/back/side/side, but also up
and down. Turns out this was my fault, because I was flying over carpet.
Ultrasonic sensors need a hard surface to ping off of—so keep that in
mind before you buy it for indoor video. Before I figured that out I
crashed it into a wall several times while trying to navigate it down a
hallway and thought I broke it. It ended up upside down and I could hear
all the engines struggling to move. Then it went silent. I picked it
up, not looking forward to explaining how I had killed DJI’s latest
drone.
Turns out
it was just playing possum. I picked it up to switch it off, and the
motor roared back to life and took a chunk of my hand as retribution. It
was not dead, just pissed off. Lesson learned.
Anyway, over a hardwood floor the drone held very steadily. It was really pretty impressive. So yeah, avoid carpet.
DJI as also
redesigned its Pilot app for mobile. It finally has the layer of polish
that’s always been missing. There are little bits of animation here and
there (just enough to make it feel fluid) and they’ve made it really
easy to quickly adjust settings. Honestly, though, most people won’t
ever want or need to touch that stuff. The basic controls are very
accessible, but if you start going deeper into menus you’ll wish you had
an engineering degree. That’s part of what makes this drone so
compelling, though. Advanced users can customize the hell out of it, and
beginners can just get up and flying (and shooting amazing video)
without having to mess with anything.
It does
still have advanced midair orientation features like Home Lock and
Course Lock, but now you activate them through the app. Home Lock lets
you record a home point and then the forward/back controls will always
move the drone further or closer from it regardless of what its
orientation or position is. Course Lock will keep the drone pointed in
direction it was facing when you set it. Course lock doesn’t work with
GPS, though, so you have to have to switch the flight controller to the F
mode, instead of P (where the GPS goodness is).
At the
Phantom 3’s launch there was some talk about a Follow Me mode, which
basically lets you establish an angle and perspective for the drone, and
then it will follow you wherever you go, assuming your phone’s GPS is
going. This sounds great for stuff like biking and skateboarding, but
unfortunately it’s not builtright in. DJI has made this kind of stuff
available to developers, so people can build their own apps that utilize
it, but it’s not in DJI’s own app yet. Hopefully that will change soon.
In the meantime, there area a couple third-party apps available.
I did have a
few compatibility problems with the Android app. DJI has said that it
only supports a handful of devices at this point. Using an HTC One M9
went flawlessly. Trying to use an LG G4 didn’t work at all for some
reason. Using a Google Nexus 9 tablet was the best. Not only did it work
quickly (you just have to turn on USB debugging mode), but you’ll
really appreciate all that screen real-estate when you’re trying to fly
by the drone’s point of view. The iOS version of the app has an
integrated flight simulator, so you can learn without crashing your
actual expensive toy. Good idea, and hopefully it comes to Android soon,
too.
Like
Image
quality is phenomenal as long as there’s decent light. The new remote
control is fantastic, especially the camera controls, the integrated
wireless radio, and the Return to Home button. Flying this thing is just
super fun. Also really like the new beefed-up charger which fills up
the drone’s battery faster and charges the remote at the same time. The
drone seems quieter and less annoying than previous iterations.
Written by Unknown
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