future support for Blue List (or at least NDAA 848 compliant) drones?

Hi all,

I've been a long-time, very happy user of Map Pilot and still recommend it to colleagues for research applications. In my research group, we are in the unfortunate circumstance of needing to explore using non-DJI drones for University of California research and for our National Park Service partners. I'm wondering whether you all have any plans/aspirations to support NDAA 848 compliant aircraft?

As you probably know, the Blue List is one means of achieving NDAA 848 compliance (https://www.diu.mil/blue-uas-cleared-list), but there are drones that are NDAA 848 compliant that aren't on the Blue List. I understand that the Skydio 2+ is supported by DroneDeploy and is NDAA compliant, so maybe there is some programmatic interface to work with there?

We're bummed that we have to consider overhauling our equipment/flight software workflows since we've had so much success with DJI/Map Pilot since 2017, but we're facing a possibility that our fleet will be entirely forbidden to use for our research given new policies coming down the pike.

Thanks for any thoughts you have!

Mike Koontz

Research Scientist

University of Colorado Boulder

Michael Koontz April 28, 2023 23:16

Official comment

We have added support for Autel. They are basically a nightmare to work with and stopped adding support after the EVO II V1. The Skydio has a fine SDK but the numbers just don't make sense and the cameras are bad for photogrammetry. We are up for supporting anyone that has a good SDK, high camera quality and numbers to make the development make sense. We would likely setting for just having the first two if they looked promising. Sadly, there just isn't anything even close out there...

Zane April 30, 2023 00:45

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3 comments

Hey Mike,

Unfortunately, you will have to pay a lot more for your equipment and you will get a lot less capability with it. For example, anecdotally, Skydio spends more on lobbying to have Chinese drones banned than they do on RD in order to bring equipment to market that can beat, or even compete with what has been in the marketplace for years now. So, you get to spend more and get less. It is becoming a problem with first responder users is certain states as well.

It is too bad, when it is easy to guarantee data security using Chinese drones, but the political atmosphere, exasperated by lobbying, couldn't care less about such facts.

Dave Pitman April 30, 2023 19:40 0 votes

Hi to you both,

I came back to write on another topic and saw that my response to you must have been eaten by the internet. A short re-write:

I totally concur and sympathize here. There just doesn't seem to be anything NDAA compliant out there that gets you even close to the same bang for your buck as a Phantom 4 Pro or Mavic 2/3 enterprise.

Our research group has decided to buy a stop gap drone for non-National Park missions (a DJI Mavic 3 Multispectral) and we're going to hold off on an NDAA compliant drone until next year when hopefully some of these companies will have a more research-ready product (or at least one that is at least cheaper!) One or the other would suffice, but spending $25,000 on equipment that doesn't quite do the job compared to spending $3,000 is a hard pill to swallow...

Thanks to you both for the thoughts and the commiserating.

Michael Koontz June 30, 2023 19:48 0 votes