3 Axis Gimbal for Iris+ - looking for suggestions.

Posted by Erik Graham on January 23, 2015 at 10:04am

Does anyone have a recommendation for a 3-axis gimbal for an Iris+?

The only option I have found out there is the DYS 3 Axis.  Are there any others that work with a GoPro Hero 4 Black?

Thanks, erik

p.s.

If someone who owns a DYS and an Iris sees this, I have a few questions:

  1. Does the DYS integrate with pixhawk?
    • Meaning in auto missions or follow me, will the Iris+ be able to tilt the camera up and down to keep the subject in frame?
  2. Is there an interface plate, or do I have to find someone to 3D print one for me?
  3. Does the DYS work with a GoPro 4 black?
  4. How are the vibration levels?
  5. Is it difficult to install
    • Complicated software config I can handle, but on the hardware side I'm pretty awful at soldering and tend to really mess things up.

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Replies

  • This reply was deleted.
    • Erik Graham April 27, 2015 at 2:50pm

      I have tried to stabilize the footage with premiere 6 but find it goes to crap when stabilized because of all the fine detail of the foliage. Plus if can introduce some funky side effects.

      The Warp Stabilizer in Adobe Premiere is very good, so I'm surprised you are having issues.  Overall, I find Adobe's User Interface to be to clunky and complicated, so I have pretty much switched over to Final Cut X.  In Final Cut, I find the "inertia cam" setting is best for most aerial video, except selfies/dronies.  I think you should be able to get good results with the Warp Stabilizer, but you might have to experiment and research.

      For part of the video I simply let the wind take the iris wherever it wanted so I have no interaction with the controller. I way trying to illustrate how it has the jitter without any interaction from me.

      Would you mind pointing out a section of the video where you do that.  ie. from x to y seconds in.  I just want to make sure we are looking at the same thing.

      I do have the black dampners installed and even tried the earplugs but didn't see any improvement so I removed them.

      Have you tried the grey dampners that came with the DYS?  Personally I use the black, but maybe in your temperature/atmosphere the grey will work better.  As I mentioned previously, what I see in that video isn't so much "jitters" as it is sloshing (for lack of a better term).  I could be completely wrong about this, but maybe the DYS grey dampers will work better.

      I haven't calibrated the imu/6 point ever so I will try that. I may also experiment with the pid settings if that doesn't work since I can always reload the settings

      The best tip I got was from a pro who gave me the rule of thumb, regardless of gimbal or any other setup, recalibrate your IMU every few hours of flight time (I do it every 8 hours) or every 2 days - whichever comes first.  Also, the ESC calibration is easy and quick, so thats worth it.  The compass calibration is a different story.  Sometimes if the compass is just a little off, I think you can get some weird little jiggling even though you don't get the full toilet bowl effect.  It could just be in my head though.  Anyway, I finally got my compass dialed in really tight, and now I don't mess with it (though I might when I travel).

      I was wondering Erik if you are totally happy with yours as I got the impression it was better than trot but not totally smooth.

      I'm actually pretty happy with it.  Its not perfect unless there is literally no wind.  But its good enough that I can always  make final tweaks in post to get the footage stable and clean.  I may have linked to this video earlier in this thread, but it was all shot while I learned the Iris+ using the DYS gimbal.  Its a practice video, but I was pretty happy with the results.  I have some other videos that I have to get permission to show, but this should give you an idea of what I think you can get.  Notice how windy it is in the opening sequence (you can see the trees blowing starting at about 14 seconds in).  I thought the Iris+/DYS/GoPro did a pretty good job.  https://vimeo.com/121777897

    • Erik Graham April 28, 2015 at 12:31pm

      LOL.  Thank you.

      To be honest that was just a test video.  As far as color correction, I try to get by with the stock color board in Final Cut.  First I do exposure.  Within that I do the blacks first.  Then the highlights.  Then the midtones. If I need more control, I use Nattress Curves Luma.  Then I do the color.  For the most part I just try to get the white balance correct, or skin tones if there are people in the shot.  So basically I do a pass on all the clips to get exposure and color balanced out and corrected.  Others skip right to the grading.  Until last week when the color board was moved into Effects, I used an adjustment layer I created in Motion.  Its basically a title with no content.  i put that over the slip and then do any color grading to that.  In this video there wasn't a lot of color grading done.  I wanted to show my parents their farm (and the mountain) in different lights.  

      As for sharpness, I almost never sharpen.  The image naturally sharpens up when you adjust the exposure.  What I do is shoot and edit almost exclusively in 4K.  When you shoot in edit in 4K, then export to 1080P, you get a better image than if you shoot in 1080P.  There is one sequence in that video where I shot in 1080P by mistake though.  Since it was just a test movie (mostly to show my parents their farm from the air), I used the 1080P footage anyway.  You can tell if you watch the video.  Its all the shots from the top of the mountain.

      So my GoPro settings are 4K, 30fps, Wide, Protune, Flat Color (lately I've been trying GoPro color and liking it), Native white point.  I like using the native white point instead of setting it to 5500 because I want the GoPro doing as little processing as possible - just capture the data and record it at the highest bit rate possible.  

      In this video, I also added some blur around the edges because I like the look.  And I guess I should mention that I letterboxes it - but thats kind of obvious.  There is very little slow motion in the video, I just fly super slow.  For example, the opening scene and closing scene look like they are slow motion, but they are at full speed.

      Oh and one other thing.  I happen to like the look of fisheye.  Especially for mountainous and hilly areas, I think it looks good.  By the time I crop in the image a bit to reframe, or apply image stabilization (which crops in automatically), combined with letterbox... the fisheye is reduced.  I almost always try out a fisheye remover on clips, but never end up liking it as much.  Its different for more flat landscapes though.

    • Erik Graham April 28, 2015 at 3:56pm
      In general I do not apply LUTs. Mostly I do it by hand. I do use filmconvert (but not in the video you are looking at). I might apply a LUT depending on what look I am going for.

      There is nothing wrong with 4K at 24 fps. Combine that with a 23.5 Letterbox and you get a very cinematic feel.
  • This reply was deleted.
    • Erik Graham April 27, 2015 at 7:49am

      Just tilt on the Iris+

      Unless you have retractable landing gear, you would not want to pan anyway.  Better off doing that by yawing the whole Iris.  Basically there is just enough side to side real-estate to allow the gimbal to soften yaw twitches and jiggles.  Actually, if you yaw to fast, you can easily expose the landing gear... but fast movements like that don't make for good video anyway, so seeing the landing gear is the least of your problems in those instances.

  • Erik Graham February 25, 2015 at 7:08pm
    Here are links to 3 images that *might* be helpful if you are trying to install a DYS 3 axis on an Iris+.

    Front View: http://screencast.com/t/pxSSqPmCqH
    Back View: http://screencast.com/t/7PnKfx9kEO5z
    Close up of pins: http://screencast.com/t/9aIBYPxHn0YV

    These images will eventually get removed from the site where they are hosted. If someone has the time and wants to "do a good deed" it would be great if they could properly upload these images to this thread and embed them in a post. I'll probably do it myself at some point, but I'm feeling kinda lazy...
    • Erik Graham > Erik Graham February 26, 2015 at 9:21am

      I decided to go ahead and upload these images to this thread.  They are slightly different than the ones linked to above (same pictures, just changed some of the labels).

      I hope this helps anyone looking to install the DYS someday:

      3702551191?profile=original

      .

      3702551252?profile=original .  3702551068?profile=original

    • Joe Dietrich > Erik Graham February 26, 2015 at 9:32am

      Erik:

      Would you be interested in sharing your PIDs / settings?

      Also what firmware revision are you running?

    • Erik Graham > Joe Dietrich February 26, 2015 at 9:41am

      I would be happy to.

      I will have to cart out my PC to connect and check.  Probably will be a while before I get around to that (within a few days at most).

      I did not actually configure much myself - thats why I went for the more expensive xproheli version.  There was a warning in the instructions about NOT using the latest firmware and not updating whenever firmware comes out until they have a chance to check things out at xproheli.  

    • Joe Dietrich > Erik Graham February 26, 2015 at 10:02am

      Thanks, that would be much appreciated.

      For the most part, following the settings in Kerry Garrison's video (RocketVideo / RCGroups), I've been able to get a fairly stable image.  The problem I have been struggling with is getting YAW to operate properly in the "Follow" mode.  Mine always seems to drift a few degrees to the left when moving in the forward direction.  There is a YAW offset, but it doesn't seem to help much.

      Just curious what settings you are running, then I can compare.

      Thanks again!

This reply was deleted.