So I’m headed out to fly drones with my buddy Jared. He’s a big YouTuber who lives
close by me and has one of those new Phantom 4s. I’ve had a Phantom 2 since about when
they came out. And it’s been pretty fun to fly. I’m not as good as I wish I was…I
don’t know everything there is to know, I mean, matter of fact last time I flew a
drone this happened…
[classical piano music]
[Brutal crash]
[painful silence]
So I might not be the best flier of drones but this guy, Jared,
he’s pretty good. (Jared) I’ve flown once or twice, so. (Zack) He’s going to teach
us today how to deliver something special. What are we doing? (Jared) So I have a little
gift for my wife and we’re going to use some of the drone’s special features to
deliver it directly to our house. (Zack) Alright, let’s get started. (Jared) Let’s do it.
So we’ve got the DJI Phantom 4, the remote, and the little gift in the bag here. The Phantom
has a pretty unique system called waypoints where you can actually control a set pattern,
they call it a mission, where you tell it where to go, how high, how fast. And we’re
going to set up those different waypoints to direct the drone where to go and drop off
the gift. And you do it all through the remote control on the ipad. It’s really easy; you
just hit a couple buttons as you fly the drone. It’s probably one of my favorite features
on here. (Zack) So right now we have the Phantom 4 turned on and what’s going on here? How
do we set up those waypoints? (Jared) So this is like the main screen that you see at the
beginning when you’re about to take off, and obviously we’re not taking off yet,
but that button right there, that will take you into different fly modes that you can
go through. We’re going to go to “intelligent” and then “waypoints”. Now obviously we’re
not in the air just yet, but that’s the path that you would take. And we’re going
to take off right now so we can show you a little further. Just as simple as “slide”
to take off. There you go. Now again to get back into the waypoints we’re going to hit
the different fly modes, “intelligent”, “waypoints”. We have a…they call them
Missions, and so we’re going to tap “new mission” and it’s going to give us a few
different options here. We can see how many waypoints we have, the total distance of the
mission, delete the waypoint, and record the waypoint. Now you see C2 and C1, those are
actually going to be the buttons on the back here. C1 and C2. So it’s really easy to
fly and record at the same time. So I’m going to hit my first button here. I just
recorded that one waypoint there. I’m going to fly forward at least 25 feet and I’m
going to hit record again. And I can fly wherever I want now as long as I fly 25 feet away from
the previous one and I’m 9 feet high in the air, it’ll be able to record the waypoint.
(Zack) So Jared, is there a limit on how far away you can set these waypoints? (Jared)
So I believe the max path link is 5,000 meters, so I think that’s as long as your mission
can go. And the biggest radius is 500 meters, there, that gives you your limits. And again
you have to be 25 feet from the last point and at least 3 meters high above the ground.
So once you are done with your mission set up there’s a few different options you have
here. You can have it “Head to”: “Consistent with recording”, “consistant with route”,
or “free”. “Consistent with recording” means that the drone will fly in the same
way that you had flown it, whether it’s turned or anything else when you created the
waypoint. “Consistent with route” means it’s going to point to the direction of
the next waypoint. And “free” means you can, like, yaw the drone throughout the waypoints.
When you’re done with the mission you can have two options: you can have it hover where
it ends or you can have it return to the starting point of the very beginning when you flew
off, the home point. And you can also adjust your speed from very low, all the way up to
5 meters per second. Once you’re all ready to go hit “apply” and then you’re good
to go. (Zack) So right now it’s uploading those waypoints that we just set to the drone.
Is it actually starting the mission right now? (Jared) It’s starting. It’s going
to the very first point and once it gets there it’s going to start its mission. (Zack)
Cool. (Jared) So now it’s starting. (Zack) So when you set the waypoint it’s setting
how high the drone is and the location, like where it’s facing and stuff. (Jared) Exactly,
yeah. Now if I was pitched or yawed a different way, I have it set to “consistent with the
recording”, so it’s doing the exact same thing that I did on the drone. If it was a
different point, it would point to it as it’s flying too. So there are different settings
that you can have to get different looks as you’re flying the drone. We’re going to
make it go a little faster. (Zack) Alright Jared, so now that we’ve learned what waypoints
are, how to set them up, I think it’s time that we actually set up this mission for the
delivery. (Jared) I think we should too. I think my wife is ready to receive this gift
and I’m ready to give it to her. (Zack) Ok, let’s do it. So right now what we’re
hoping to accomplish is Jared wants to deliver this gift to his wife without actually having
to fly the drone to her. So we’re going to use the automated system to take the gift,
fly it up into the air, all while no one is controlling the drone. And then drop it off
on his front door step where his wife will be waiting for it. Let’s see what happens.
So we’re flying the actual route right now that the drone is going to fly autonomously
by itself. So we started way down there at the end of the street, we’re going to fly
the drone around this round-about, and then up the street over there all the way to his
front step. And the drone will follow each waypoint as we set it. (Jared) So this is
probably the trickiest part of the whole thing. We’re right by the town homes that we live
and we’re trying to navigate through all of the trees and brushes and everything…make
it look cool while staying safe. So we’re down the driveway but we’ve got to go that
way. (Zack) It looks like we’ve got 20 waypoints set up already. (Jared) Yes, and we’re at
a distance of 242 meters so we’ve got plenty of room to go. (Zack) You said it went up
to 5,000 or something? (Jared) 5,000 length, yeah. So the biggest thing is getting around
that corner with the waypoints. So I’m going to go down here a little further. Now you
can see here, this waypoint is too close to the one I previously just did, within 5 meters.
So I’ve got to go this way a little bit. So it gives you a little warning: “waypoint
altitude is below 32 feet. Maintain a steady speed and fly with caution.” So basically
it’s saying, don’t be an idiot. So Jared’s lining up those final waypoints; making sure
that the camera’s positioned right towards the front door. That way when he delivers
the package, the camera will be focused on his wife, and positioning it so the package
will be ready for her to grab. (Zack) Alright Jared, do you think it’s going to make it?
(Jared) I’m hoping it does. We’ve set it up to do so. So I think with our powers
combined we can make it work. (Zack) Alright. So we’ve learned how to set waypoints, we’ve
actually set the waypoints for this specific mission. (Jared) Check. (Zack) What are the
chances of this actually succeeding? (Jared) You know I want to say that we’ve got at
least an 85% chance of this going through exactly how I want it to. I don’t doubt
the drone’s going to go through and pick the right way and everything. I think that
that drone’s going to make it just fine. Where I have a little hesitation is in the
actual package, if that’s going to hit like a tree or something I don’t know. But I’m
so excited to see. I’m very anxious and I think it’s going to do well, but there’s
a small chance of something terrible happening. (Zack) Hopefully you don’t hit any kids
or trees. (Jared) Right! Exactly! (Zack) Alright, so if you want to watch the actual drone delivery
for the very first time that we’ve ever attempted this, go ahead and click this link
in the center. I’ll also put a card in the top corner and in the video description if
you’re on mobile you can go find it there. I’m looking forward to it. (Jared) It’s
going to be awesome. (Zack) Thanks a ton for watching. Hope to see you around.