Drone Controls

Controlling drone and its payload from the FlytBase dashboard

Flight Controls

The flight control tray enables the operator to have access to crucial in-flight commands like Return To Docking Station (RTDS), Return To Safe Location (RTSL), Land, Precision Land, Return To Home (RTH), Pause/Resume the ongoing mission and Emergency Stop.

Emergency Stop

Emergency Stop feature is currently supported with Mavic 2 series drones and M300 drones (with Odroid-based edge devices) only.

Required FlytBase APK version: 2.5.0-6 and above

Implementation: Once the 'Emergency Stop' button is pressed, it effectively overrides all ongoing operations. The drone instantaneously enters a standstill mode, refusing any additional commands from the dashboard. This safety measure meets any potential emergencies head-on, allowing operators to prevent unintended movements swiftly.

By clicking on the 'Re-activate Operations' button, operators can smoothly transition back to command acceptation mode from the dashboard, once the need for an emergency stop has passed.

This replaces the "Abort" button that previously existed on the platform where any new commands given by the operator were accepted by the drone.

Steps to use the 'Emergency Stop' feature:

While the drone is performing a flight, the operator can click on the 'Emergency Stop' button located at the bottom right corner of the FlytBase dashboard.

Upon pressing the button, the operator would receive a confirmation on the dashboard in the form of toaster messages (notifications).

Expected Behavior once Emergency Stop has been executed by the operator:
1. The drone will hover and hold its current position.
2. The following controls will not be available until operations are reactivated:
  i) RTDS (Return To Docking Station)
  ii) RTSL (Return To Safe Location)/ RTH (Return To Home)
  iii) PL (Precision Landing) iv) Pause/Resume v) Land vi) Manual Controls of the drone using the dashboard vii) Operators would also no longer be able to: a) Start another mission b) Perform Go to location

The drone will carry out pre-configured failsafe actions for Low Battery, Critical Battery, and RC Link Loss Failsafe, even if the Emergency Stop is engaged.

Steps to Re-activate operations once Emergency Stop has been executed:

Operators may click on the Re-activate Operations button in the bottom right corner of the dashboard in order to continue flying with the respective drone.

Once the operations are reactivated, the drone can accept all flight commands as well as perform failsafe actions without any exceptions.

For a better understanding of the drone's behavior in common situations involving the use of the Emergency Stop, please refer to the subsequent table.

Scenario	Expected Behavior
During a pre-planned mission	Once the Operator engages Emergency Stop, the drone will abort its actions and hover at its location. It would also no longer accept any commands from the dashboard. After the Operator reactivates the operations, the drone will keep hovering although, it can accept commands from the dashboard. The operator may then resume the mission, perform RTDS, RTSL, land, etc. and control the drone normally as before.
When a Failsafe is triggered	When Emergency Stop is activated by the operator, the following failsafes would override the Emergency Stop and reactivate operations: 1. Low Battery Failsafe 2. RC Link Loss Failsafe 3. Critical Battery Failsafe Except for the above-mentioned failsafes, all other failsafes would be rejected by the drone if Emergency Stop is active.
Manual Controls being accessed by the Operator	In case an Emergency Stop is engaged while the Operator has taken Manual Control of the drone, the drone will hover at its position and will not accept any commands from the dashboard. Once the operations are re-activated, the operator needs to enable Manual Controls again to continue using the drone using the keyboard, joystick or the on-screen joypad.

Scenario

Expected Behavior

During a pre-planned mission

Once the Operator engages Emergency Stop, the drone will abort its actions and hover at its location. It would also no longer accept any commands from the dashboard.

After the Operator reactivates the operations, the drone will keep hovering although, it can accept commands from the dashboard. The operator may then resume the mission, perform RTDS, RTSL, land, etc. and control the drone normally as before.

When a Failsafe is triggered

When Emergency Stop is activated by the operator, the following failsafes would override the Emergency Stop and reactivate operations: 1. Low Battery Failsafe 2. RC Link Loss Failsafe 3. Critical Battery Failsafe Except for the above-mentioned failsafes, all other failsafes would be rejected by the drone if Emergency Stop is active.

Manual Controls being accessed by the Operator

In case an Emergency Stop is engaged while the Operator has taken Manual Control of the drone, the drone will hover at its position and will not accept any commands from the dashboard. Once the operations are re-activated, the operator needs to enable Manual Controls again to continue using the drone using the keyboard, joystick or the on-screen joypad.

Live HD video feed

Once the drone is turned on and connected to the FlytBase Mobile, the drone status will be online on the web dashboard.
Select the drone and its live video can be seen on the top right window of the FlytBase dashboard which is its webpage cockpit view.

If the operator is not able to see the live video in the cockpit view, click on the refresh button on the left-top corner of the cockpit.

If the operator is unable to see the live video they can take remote access via the remote access tool shared by the FlytBase support team and then follow the steps mentioned for live users. Please contact support@flytbase.com.

Note: To stop the video stream close the mobile app.

Video recording

With the operator's AWS S3 Cloud bucket ready, they can start recording the video feed of their mission. Moreover, they can playback and download these videos on demand.

To stop recording the video, the operator should click on the same icon again.

The operator can replay, download and manage the recorded videos in the Video Manager.

For sharing navigate to Guest Sharing.

Video Streaming Optimization

This feature gives operators the capability to optimize the video stream to achieve better FPS (frames per second) or better picture quality in cases of limited/poor bandwidth connections. On a good network connection, this optimization is not necessary and both FPS and picture quality are expected to be at their best. However, for limited/poor bandwidth connections, the optimization of the video stream may be considered to cater to the use case. The value can be dynamically set by the operator and should take effect within 3-5 seconds.

Video content hint can be set by the operator to one of the following values:

Default: No hint/optimization is applied.
Motion: Priority will be given to the number of frames per second streamed. This results in a smooth video, for example, when the drone is flying at high speed. This may result in blurred/pixelated images.
Detail: Priority will be given to the quality of the image in the video stream. This results in a high-quality image but may cause stuttering/choppy video, for example, when zooming onto a car number plate, the text would be much easier to read.
High Detail: Its applicability to a particular situation is yet to be determined.

This widget can be used by operators to troubleshoot issues with network connection quality and bandwidth that usually cause low-quality video streams.

Video Bitrate (Time vs kbps)
Bitrate is the measure of the amount of data sent over the network. A good quality video stream for Mavic 2 (HD Quality) requires about 2000 kbps bitrate.
Graphs in the FlytBase Dashboard are displayed for:
- Video stream from Drone to Cloud: This is the current bitrate of the video stream from the drone to the media router in the cloud. If this bitrate is lower then the network connection of the drone/SBC/starter kit may have lower bandwidth.
- Video stream from Cloud to FlytBase: This is the current bitrate of the video stream from the media router to the user’s browser. If this bitrate is lower then the network connection on the user’s machine (running dashboard) has lower bandwidth.
User-interface to view
- Packet Loss: High packet loss will result in a jittery video feed and loss of frames
- RC resolution: RC resolution is the downlink bitrate from the Drone to the Remote Controller
- RC channels: This is the Operational Frequency Range for DJI drones i.e 2.4 GHz, 5.8 GHz or, both 2.4 GHz and 5.8 GHz (Dual Channel)
- RC bit rate: The bitrate is related to the transfer capacity between the drone and the RC connected to the SBC/edge kit