Yuneec Breeze - altitude loss following water overflight

MyBreeze53 · Aug 31, 2018

After purchase and a month of fun flights I decided to fly a level Journey Mode flight from atop a rock outcropping to a point over the shoreline at the ocean. An immediate drop in altitude resulted after the Breeze left the rock launch pad. This was followed by level flight over shallow water and shoreline. The altitude loss on the return flight was not regained (see YouTube post) and the Breeze came to a tough (no breakage or optical scratches) stop several feet below me on the rock ledge.

Remembering from college chemistry that water absorbs infrared wavelengths (700 nm to 1000 nm)

From:
Water absorption spectrum

The thought came to mind that the altitude loss resulted from the Breeze attempting to increase the IR reflectance signal from the water below. Since some Yuneec Breeze pilots fly over water routinely the 'altitude correction' I experienced may have an explanation in the partial absorption by water of infrared wavelengths (rather than reflectance as detected over rock and land).

Without disregarding Yuneec's warning about flying over water a better Journey mode plan for the described trip would be to position the Breeze over the shallow water first and then start the Journey, followed by Pilot mode back to the landing point upon return.

DoomMeister · Aug 31, 2018

You bring up an interesting point with IR absorption as opposed to reflection over water. I am still baffled by the odd behavior so many have had flying over water, while others routinely fly there with no apparent problems.

That was odd behavior for Journey mode. @Scott_in_Colorado uses his to carry his fishing rig beyond casting distance. He has made many flights over water with the camera in a horizontal position and never mentioned a loss in altitude using Journey mode. He uses Journey mode to control the distance the rig is carried out from his position.

MyBreeze53 · Aug 31, 2018

EXITING A JOURNEY TO THE FLIGHT TASKS MENU TERMINATES THE JOURNEY TO A STABLE HOVER (OVER LAND)

On the return flight in Journey mode, which begins by activating the camera button, I contemplated (too late) on how to deal with the loss of altitude. I'd flown combinations of tasks (pilot and orbit) before but since Journey mode begins by activating the camera I decided to try turning off the camera to end the flight. The result was to only terminate the video.

Back on land at a different and flat location I sent the Breeze on another level Journey. During the return part of the Journey mode flight. I found that pressing the top left app button to exit to the other programmed flight tasks choice menu causes the Journey mode flight to immediately stop with the Breeze placed into a hover at the same 'Journey' altitude awaiting further pilot instructions.

MyBreeze53 · Aug 31, 2018

DoomMeister said:
You bring up an interesting point with IR absorption as opposed to reflection over water. I am still baffled by the odd behavior so many have had flying over water, while others routinely fly there with no apparent problems.

That was odd behavior for Journey mode. @Scott_in_Colorado uses his to carry his fishing rig beyond casting distance. He has made many flights over water with the camera in a horizontal position and never mentioned a loss in altitude using Journey mode. He uses Journey mode to control the distance the rig is carried out from his position.

Here is a video of a Journey mode flight that was terminated mid flight by accessing the Breeze's app flight tasks menu. The video is immediately stopped and the drone hovers at that point.

In the second video the Breeze is hovering at that point before I used Pilot mode to return the drone to the landing area.

Return from hover:

Along the coast people fish from shore and from boats for striped bass. Baits, lines and sinker for surf casting tend to be heavier than for fresh water.
In the 1990s I used to scuba dive with some buddies during the striped bass season. These fish often swim in small groups and can be approached by divers at an arm's length. One of my buddies taught me how to feed the striped bass by first looking for small baby crab (2-3 inches across) and then 'dropping' the crab a few inches in front and above the striped bass. Usually the hungry fish, looking for similar food in shallow water, will open its mouth and inhale the crab when it comes into view at eye level as the crab slowly sinks back to the bottom.

I'm fairly active in another forum for riders of electric unicycles. For the most part the Breeze is fairly dysfunctional as an 'active tracker' in follow me mode'. Forum readers are most excited by videos showing the lastest drone tech where electric unicyclists are actively followed at 15-20 mph while carving turns. I managed to get good reviews on one ride video by hovering the drone above a road and splicing the ride back together as a smooth continuous video.

DoomMeister · Aug 31, 2018

MyBreeze53 said:
Back on land at a different and flat location I sent the Breeze on another level Journey. During the return part of the Journey mode flight. I found that pressing the top left app button to exit to the other programmed flight tasks choice menu causes the Journey mode flight to immediately stop with the Breeze placed into a hover at the same 'Journey' altitude awaiting further pilot instructions.

Thanks for mentioning exiting to the Task Mode menu to halt the Journey mode! That should come in handy for pilots seeing an obstruction get in the way of a Journey flight.

I have found that the Smart Follow Me mode works better with the Breeze at least 10 meters up and 10 meters away from the subject to be followed. It seems to give the GPS tracking more time to follow changes in direction and speed without the subject leaving the frame.

Scott_in_Colorado · Aug 31, 2018

I started using Journey mode but decided to just fly it out and back giving me more control to where I wanted to end up. I have not seen any issues; I start over land, hover about 5' off the ground, attach the fishing line, then fly the Breeze out, turn it 180 degrees, the line falls off, and I fly it back (RTH) and land.

MyBreeze53 · Sep 11, 2018

I tried flying the Yuneec Breeze in the opposite direction in level flight Journey mode from the rock ledge where altitude loss was experienced over water.

The Breeze dropped a few feet. Since I was interested in making a video of the coastline I exited Journey mode and continued in Pilot mode after the drone started to return to home.

It might be something about that location and what the drone sees as the Earth's surface altitude.

Here is the landing

Rafe's Chasm is this feature

robbie2 · Sep 11, 2018

It certainly seems that the switch from using IRS to be GPS for holding altitude doesn't work entirely smoothly. I wonder what would happen if you gained some altitude right at the start - above IRS level - and only then started the horizontal flight...
Unrelated to that, I should say that your video is rather smooth given that you were apparently flying per smartphone without the controller! But even with my very limited experience, me thinks that using the controller allows for producing even smoother flights, and accordingly smoother video.

MyBreeze53 · Sep 11, 2018

robbie2 said:
switch from using IRS to be GPS for holding altitude doesn't work entirely smoothly.

The end of the journey and start of return to home is seen at the end of the journey mode flight video. The camera simply turns off when leaving the app display for the tasks menu and the drone held that position and altitude at that point.
The start of the coastline video is after using pilot mode to reposition the Breeze to a higher altitude.

robbie2 said:
your video is rather smooth

I had set the drone speed to about 6 feet per second deliberately to slow speed down (in pilot mode but not journey to- according to the app) I guess it was a good choice but the speed max applies to pilot mode.
Lag in case in video transmission to the app made drone rotation input out of sync. LOS was useful in determining orientation.

robbie2 said:
using the controller

Controller mode seems to have many advantages for this flying site.

Flying 1080p stabilized mode makes a nice smooth video!

Recorded 4K unstabilized video gets 'twitchy' in a way that post flight processing software for image stabilization doesn't correct well with my 'CyberDirector 16 Ultra'. Since my phone can't play 4K video but plays full HD just fine the 1080p video choice for the drone camera works for me.

robbie2 · Sep 11, 2018

Good idea to restrict the speed to get smoother video, I hadn't thought of that (newbie that I am). It would of course be good if one could also limit yaw speed, which does not seem to be possible (I had thought of THAT before, because I find yaw so difficult to control with the phone, and even with the controller it takes practice to get it smooth).

Regarding the altitude loss issue, my point in relation to your original video is this (it may of course be void, because I cannot tell from the video when the Breeze is at what height above surface level...): the IRS is determining the altitude on the first part of the flight because of the initially low elevation above ground. But with the ground sloping downwards so quickly, IRS tries to keep the craft at its altitude relative to the actual surface level. Now, the Breeze is also moving forward, and while it is still decreasing altitude in following the ground profile, it is also moving out of IRS range to the ground and switching to GPS altitude control. At this point the altitude stabilizes and remains constant. I don't know for sure if that could be seen in the flight logs, but I imagine it should be somehow possible to investigate whether there is a coincidence of switching to GPS altitude control and actual altitude (changes). If that story fits your experience, it might have nothing to do with water or not water, in this instance, but just with the ground level profile?

MyBreeze53 · Sep 11, 2018

robbie2 said:
it might have nothing to do with water or not water, in this instance, but just with the ground level profile?

Yeah.....I'm not very knowledgeable about geo-spatial stuff so I find myself guessing.

robbie2 said:
if one could also limit yaw speed

I found that by using orbit mode at certain settings that I could make smoother looking 360 panoramas with the Breeze. It's not the same as spinning the Breeze in one spot.
If you do the math for the circumference of a circle, using the drone settings for distance from default center, and an appropriate setting (slow) for max. speed (feet per second) I could slow the rotations to about 1 RPM for 360 pans at a height. The Breeze seems to pitch up and stall at two or more points along the circle at any location I tried. Maybe it needs to get a gps fix or something along the way?

The video effect is different from spinning where beyond the center distant objects never comes into view other than line of sight for flat spins.....but the camera in an orbit makes the objects in the distance to move slightly relative to the foreground when using big orbits.