Oh, I'm paying attention! I'm into this technology for about 3 1/2 years now and it's been a real roller coaster. I have been flying Andrews excellent Hexacrafters, two 800mm and one 1100mm. I have been getting very good footage from a 3-axis alex mos gimbal that Hexacrafter manufactured but it just wasn't quite there yet and like Zenmuse if is designed for a specific camera. I wanted to upgrade to larger cameras so I bit the bullet and bought a Movi M10.
Initial flights with the M10 on the HC 1100 were very good and even completed one job with my Sony Nex 7. Noticed slight vibrations/micro shakes and sometimes even the jello effect. I immediately bought the full cage upgrade and while getting ready for the next job I did some tests with a G4 and the shakes were worse, not larger but more frequent. OK, time to check my vibration isolation, made some adjustments to it and the M10 and I thought I had it licked.
We did about 7 flights and upon reviewing the footage the micro vibrations are in about 60% of the footage. I and my client were devastated. On top of that upon landing from the last flight I must have been experiencing a motor failure because it started spinning and descending rapidly, crashed into a tree.
This was not my first crash and I am not one to give up so easily but it was then and there I decided I have had it with this technology. I have about $20,000 invested in all this and although I have paid for that equipment I am barely in the black. Thank God my architectural photography business is doing so well. I was deciding that I would give up on the aerial video and concentrate only on aerial stills. I love my Photohigher gimbal (thanks again Bart).
But after a few days I am thinking "you know you love this business and technology, the excitement of getting incredible footage and even all the challenges." If I continue with aerial video I think the only way is with the Alta, and only if it pans out to be the excellent UAV it is touted to be.
So, Steve, I will be paying close attention to your venture with the Alta. I just hope it turns out to be reliable. So far we all can see that it is integrated to work beautifully with the Movi, which is to be expected so that will solve my vibrations issues and most importantly for the first time I can be using a system entirely manufactured by one company. That is huge to be able to have that. I am so tired of having failures and never really finding out what went wrong.
Sorry for such a long rant.
Frustrated in Florida
John