Dave Pitman

With their current TOS, I doubt they will get any traction in moving in where DJI has fumbled the ball with regard to gov't services. A couple of nails are that you must create an account and agree that the manufacturer can "hot patch" and/or disable the drone if you do not update the fw. AND, that you agree in advance that they can change the TOS at will and you agree to the new terms. Sound familiar? But it does look like the best action selfy drone for sure.

Hoping for serious competition to DJI. Homegrown makes it even better. However. Their Terms of Service document is a book, and a quick scan of it shows that they may not have learned enough from the criticism of DJI's shenanigans. Lots of bad stuff for the consumer. https://www.skydio.com/pages/legal

If you are a flight director and are concerned that your operators are getting proper authorization when needed, why not just have them submit copies of their authorizations in any area requiring them? No apps required at all. Seems fairly simple to me.

Mark, My point about the public forum was simply this summary. 1. You ask for advice; Is is okay to test an alcoholic beverage, but not ingest it and thus not raise your blood alcohol level. 2. The FAA basically tells you that even if you are not legally under the influence (by blood volume, not anecdotally) it still may look bad and may lead to more trouble than it's worth. 3. You state that basically you agree with the FAA's statement and you would look more professional if you don't mix the tasting with the flying. I'm just noting that you could have easily skipped the whole thread and went right to #3, that's it. I think it's a good choice! But that doesn't change the fact that if you do not operate with a blood alcohol level above or near the legal limit, you are not operating impaired. That does not mean you cannot be harassed or charged with reckless operation if in fact you are subsequently operating recklessly. I hope you can understand the distinction. Safe Flying!

I'm not sure why you're trying to make something out of nothing. But I gave you the "legal" answer above. The FAA response is more trying to get you to consider that the "perception" of operation under the influence can be problematic and bad for your reputation, IMO. It did not say that you would be operating illegally if your blood alcohol level was not over, or even close, to the legal limit, because you wouldn't be. If you have decided that you would prefer to be seen and taken as a professional and believe that sipping (and spitting) alcohol in the same appointment that you are operating a UAS would negatively affect that perception, that's great. Not sure why you needed to post in a public thread about it, but whatever if it helps you to come to that conclusion.

If you don't ingest the alcohol, then your blood level will not be effected. That is what would determine if you were "legally" intoxicated or not. If you were confronted, which as has been pointed out is unlikely, then your blood level would be checked. Done deal.

I would use the Mavic 2 Pro in my drone services company to provide similar quality imaging products to my other 20MP camera craft (p4p) in environments that would benefit from it's less intrusive presence when compared to larger, louder craft. Thanks! Dave

Okay, thanks anyway. I don't own either but if the point cloud generated directly from Global Mapper is comparable in quality to Agisoft or Pix4D, then the software is definitely a bargain. I know Blue Marble has been working on their point classification tools too. Please PM me if you ever do a comparison.

Have you compared the point cloud generated with Agisoft with the cloud generated with Global Mapper (Lidar Module/Pixels to points tool) ?

My friend, I absolutely see the problem and you have no idea the lobbying I, @Av8Chuck , and a few others have done directly with Brendan Schulman on this issue in another venue over 2 years. I'm simply trying to help you out. Regarding getting in touch with DJI, you can get a custom unlock for the period of your WAA. So, for example, if your COA is good until Sept. 2019, then DJI will give you an unlock for all of your registered craft for that same period. When you renew your COA, renew your DJI unlock and you're good for another year.

Yes, I think I understood you correctly. You do understand that the FAA system has nothing to do with the DJI system. Just because you get a LAANC authorization, that has no effect on DJI's GEO restrictions. If you look at DJI's GEO map, you will see the restriction they have in place. I'm saying, if you contact DJI, and present a copy of your LAANC clearance a couple of days in advance, they can provide you a custom unlock of their GEO restriction that is saved to your craft and that limit should be removed. '

So you received a custom unlock but are limited to 400' above takeoff point?

You can pretty easily get any zone unlocked by (over-reaching) DJI through their custom unlocking process. You may however, still have issue with using alternate control apps.