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I went to the dark side

Oooooh! Nice.
:)
 
A couple of initial impressions.

Obviously it is much smaller than my Karma:
405
Here it is, sitting on top of my karma battery. The whole thing with battery weighs about the same.

I like the size. First flight was in my living room. Very easy to hand launch and catch.

Downsides:

I will miss the Karma Controller when using this drone. I hate having to plug my phone into this thing. First of all, the phone will not fit with my case on. Secondly, the phone does not charge while plugged into the controller. Just one more battery I have to pay attention to.
 
A couple of initial impressions.

Obviously it is much smaller than my Karma:
View attachment 405
Here it is, sitting on top of my karma battery. The whole thing with battery weighs about the same.

I like the size. First flight was in my living room. Very easy to hand launch and catch.

Downsides:

I will miss the Karma Controller when using this drone. I hate having to plug my phone into this thing. First of all, the phone will not fit with my case on. Secondly, the phone does not charge while plugged into the controller. Just one more battery I have to pay attention to.

Get a mount that you can use your phone in a case. Night and day difference between these two drones. Size obviously is one thing, but the Air is just a more refined, capable machine. I, like you, love the controller for the Karma, but that is the only real area where I think it bests any other drone. I do have one other thing I like more and that is just the FOV, but that is camera (not drone) specific. That is also a preference, not one that is actually better necessarily.

The only other thing is I love the hyperlapse function you can do with the Karma. Of course you can't do 4k in linear mode which is just stupid.
 
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Guy I work with has a Mavic Pro 2, and I've been eyeing a Mavic Air for quite some time. I pulled the trigger and bought a Karma because of the price. For the price of one Mavic, I got a GoPro Hero 5, Karma, Karma Grip, two batteries, 5 broken Karma drones (going to break them down for spare parts), and four sets of blades.

Maybe in a couple years when I can pick up a Mavic Air for less. I am fundamentally cheap :)
 
Guy I work with has a Mavic Pro 2, and I've been eyeing a Mavic Air for quite some time. I pulled the trigger and bought a Karma because of the price. For the price of one Mavic, I got a GoPro Hero 5, Karma, Karma Grip, two batteries, 5 broken Karma drones (going to break them down for spare parts), and four sets of blades.

Maybe in a couple years when I can pick up a Mavic Air for less. I am fundamentally cheap :)

Yeah...I've been wearing my wife down for quite a while... I really like the Karma, but with international travel... and frequent outdoor adventures, I'm just not a fan of lugging that thing around on my back. I was really looking for something more portable.

My wife finally said I could pick any drone I wanted. I showed her the Mavic 2 series, and she would have been okay with either drone. I can't say that I wasn't tempted... Ultimately, I really would have had difficulty picking between the two...and I also just couldn't justify the price difference. My heart was set primarily on portability and this is a very portable drone.
 
I think the Mavic Air is a pretty cool drone, especially for portability. Maybe in the future, once I'm a major airline pilot... But then again, by then - there will probably be the Mavic Air 9, compatible with the Smart Controller, and I can pick up a discontinued Mavic Air for $150. :D
 
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Took a 360 photo with the Mavic. Stitching doesn't look all that great. I didn't realize that you can't just export it as a 360 photo...has to be processed first... Wasn't easy to figure out...lots of false leads.
 
Congrats shon... im appreciating reading these feedbacks, im sure most if not all of us eye dji’s and it helps to have a beta tester! Cheers m8
 
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Congrats shon... im appreciating reading these feedbacks, im sure most if not all of us eye dji’s and it helps to have a beta tester! Cheers m8

I think DJI products are put on a pedestal, but that doesn’t mean that they don’t have flaws or that the Karma isn’t a good drone.

Flying the Mavic the other day, it just hit a virtual wall and wouldn’t fly forward and further. There wasn’t any obstacles, it was just being tempermental.

Sometimes, the phone app does not want to pair with the drone...The SD card is a pain to remove from the drone... there are a lot of minor issues that don’t get discussed by fanboys. The more I use this drone, the more I think we take the simplicity of the Karma for granted. Most of the time, it just works.
 
Yeah...I've been wearing my wife down for quite a while... I really like the Karma, but with international travel... and frequent outdoor adventures, I'm just not a fan of lugging that thing around on my back. I was really looking for something more portable.

My wife finally said I could pick any drone I wanted. I showed her the Mavic 2 series, and she would have been okay with either drone. I can't say that I wasn't tempted... Ultimately, I really would have had difficulty picking between the two...and I also just couldn't justify the price difference. My heart was set primarily on portability and this is a very portable drone.

For me there is this thing in my head where I'm very aware of the dollar value of what I'm currently flying. There is a threshold for me at a thousand bucks where it becomes very different and I get very nervous flying. This is why I rarely fly my H with Real Sense. It's stupid, I've already paid the price for it and sitting in a case doesn't secure its value, but I'm very aware of it. The Evo was just a smidge lower than a grand, but it is my fave drone that I fly the most (and it's not even close).

That is one thing I love about flying the Spark and the Karma. I don't want anything to happen, but if it does I'm okay with it. For the GoPro alone I won't part with the Karma, but I could unload my Spark and my Air and not care much about it. The only caveat is my son loves flying the Air.
 
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What a valuable thread this is! Excellent and very helpful comments!
Oh, and i had the BESTEST flight day yesterday since owning my Karma. It was on one of my new refrbed units, but youknow the kind of day.... cool, but bearable, ncie lighting, wind there, but not interfering, relaxed..... i will post a fun clip when i get to editing that just is one of those “picture worth a thousand words” kinda clips... and actually it was a dronie shot... lol!

Thanks for starting this thread and all commetning on it!
Cheers,
JJ
 
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Good feed back!!

Guess the grass is always greener...

Still, these discussions are good and, at least what I'm using mine for - Real Estate photography - multiple solutions could be the answer.
 
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Price and size is not everything! Having to rely on built in sensors to stop you running into trees and the like, even those sensors are not reliable. From recent postings I hear that the DJI cameras are not that hot either.
 
I think you could achieve a similar if not better effect on the Karma, taking individual photos and stitching them in post production software.
 
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Well here you are Shon! A Bubble Pan with no stitches, just good old Wondershare Filmora 16-9 and pan from left to right. There is more than one way to skin a Cat!
 
I do love that bubble thing it's only the 2nd time i've seen it - a member of my local (if you call 2 hours away local) drone club does some real estate droning for his wife's listings. is that a DJI type feature then @Shon ?
 

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