With summer in full swing, we’re excited to share a new 4K edit from Snap in its natural habitat: capturing stunning footage during all of life’s adventures!
We had the pleasure of working with professional mountain biker, Dustin Schaad, to shoot a dusky mountain bike ride outside of Auburn, CA, a couple of weeks ago. Check it out:
Schaad rides for Discrete Clothing, among others, and has ridden in notable competitions like the Red Bull Rampage; you can check out more of his biking here and here. “The Auburn-area trails are some of the best, year-round mountain biking trails in all of Northern California,” says Schaad. With over 200 miles of singletrack, you could spend a full year there and never ride the same loop twice.”
We’re pleased with how the image quality is improving, but also are still making tuning improvements to the lens, camera firmware, and flight control software. Astute observers may notice minor issues with sharpness, chromatic aberration, yaw movement, and lens distortion. We are working with the best image tuning firm in the world to continue to refine this so the image quality will be world class at launch.
We can’t wait to share more footage in the coming months! Leave any questions in the comments, and let us know where you’re excited to take Snap!
Until then-
Tobin, Joe and the Vantage Robotics team
© 2024 Vantage Robotics
What happened after the 00:34 time? I saw some tree branches about to get hit. Can you show the whole clip?
No. We didn’t hit anything. Just wanted to show how close we can get!
Nice video :). I can’t wait to get mine.
Thanks Fady!
Looks awesome!!! I sure can’t wait to get a hold of mine. I hope it holds up in the cold temperatures as i will be using mine mostly in the mountains snowmobiling.
Thanks Chad. We expect a temp range of 0°-40°C, but you might be able to push that a little.
So excited to get ours! It’s looking good!
Thanks Melanie!
I must remember to select the correct quality setting before having a panic attack 🙂 Looking forward to mine too
haha. It happens to the best of us! Looking forward to getting you flying.
Raw, unedited footage would be better to see its true capabilities. It’s a nice piece.
Thanks Jim. We will get something raw out soon.
I must agree with Jim Oliver above, please do show raw footage. The video is great, but I personaly pre-ordered because of how compact, safe and smooth the design looks, but mostly because I think also that snap is, as Tobin so says “a flying camera” rather than another drone. When buying a new camera you have to look for raw capability, a brilliant raw capability reduces editing time and effort and allows a better resolution and video quality. You guys got me to preorder soon after I saw your promotional video so I´m all on board with snap but I would still very much appreciate some 10-15 second raw video to get an idea, you know..?
We sure do know and will get something out as soon as we can.
Since I may be the exception to the rule, I will use my pre-ordered Snap for shooting commercial raw stills….any Still samples would be cool to see.
Sorry for the delays on the stills here Brad. We’ll get some out soon.
Hey guys looking good! My question doesn’t have anything to do with video but it’s been on my mind so I’m going to bring it up anyway. In the “what comes in the box” section it says that Snap will come with a carry case. Can you go into any detail on what kind of case you guys are thinking? I’m one of those people who has to have a case for any valuable piece of equipment to protect It. So question is. Is this going to be just more like a bag to put all of the stuff in? Or will it be a case with molded foam (or something such) to help protect Snap as we carry it on our many adventures? Also if it is just more like a bag do you guys have plans in making a protective case that we would be able to purchase later on?
Thanks for the updates!
Thanks Jeremy. Snap is really designed to be hardy. We typically keep the body in a soft case, and leave the rotors loose in our back packs without any issue. That being said, the case will be semi-hard (think of a molded foam). We will post more details as we get them.
Please show all raw footage, let the community understand out what we can really expect. All the edits make for a nice marketing video, however it does not provide for a complete perspective on real world function. If you embrace the awesomely positive trend among your preorder customer/fans by embracing the love of your transparency this beautiful product by releasing raw footage, everyone will benefit. ツ
Thanks Bryan. We very much agree with your sentiments here and hope to get some raw footage out soon!
How much longer is your reduced price pre order good for. I want to order just need a few weeks to have the money. I am blown away by your product guys.
Thanks Berne! We don’t have an exact date for ending the pre-order sale, but will make sure to announce before taking it away.
Sweet guys! Keep the videos coming! I was hoping to get mine before our summer vacation, but I can’t wait for the ship date anyway! For the commenters on this blog…
Do you think people need help studying for the FAA initial aeronautics knowledge exam to fly their commercial drone legally? I was trying to find study helps on the exam and can’t find much (especially for online exam prep with video, etc) but my good friend is a Senior Captain at American Airlines and has trained hundreds of pilots as well so we thought about posting a video series to help people get prepped for the exam (some of the info is known, some is unknown at this point). What do you think? BTW… I’m waiting on my SnapDrone to ship in Sept and can’t wait!
Chris
Thanks Chris and good luck on your exam!
you guys should have brought it to auburn the past weekend for the western states 100M. that would have been epic!
Sounds fun. Once we get these pre-orders filled, we will have much more time to play!
That would be awesome Chris! How do we start about this?
Hey guys,
I’m not sure if this has been asked in another blog feed, but a month or so ago an update was released regarding the operating software for Snap. In the interim of waiting for the drones to be shipped, would it be possible to get a video tutorial of how to use the app software for the drone? I’m sure some/most of us are wanting to see a demonstration before Snap’s arrival to those who have preordered.
-Justin
Great idea Justin. We have talked about this before, but want to wait until the interface is finalized.
I Had a few of questions:
(1) For this video you have multiple sources of video including a helmet mounted cam, some ground based cams and of course the camera on the Snap – I was trying to figure out which camera is used throughout the video – in particular, what was used to film the scene toward the end where the camera was leading the biker at about the bikers head level and then the biker passes by. Was that the Snap?
(2) Regarding the use of the Snap – how much and what sorts of calibration are required before a flight? For best results, how often do you calibrate?
(3) The Snap is a very light weight system – how does it do in the wind – do you see a lot of drift if there is a noticeable breeze?
Thank you
(1) The clip you mentioned was taken on a Snap
(2) Calibration shouldn’t not be needed very often. Your phone’s compass might need to calibrate from time to time. You might also need to recalibrate if you are storing the body near some magnets or magnetic metals, or if you swap out the components on Snap, like the rotors
(3) Snap handles great in the wind. In fact, it was quite windy on the day we shot this video. We’ve flown it in winds up to 20 mph and it works awesome. We will be launching a high speed thrust module later that let’s us hit 60 mph, but you will have to wait a bit for that.
I was wondering, does this represent the final design? The propeller guards are slightly different to the new homepage pic. Does that one need updating?
The footage looks great!
Good eye Toby. The prototype used in this video is more current than the rendering on the home page. It is closer to the final product that we will be shipping. However, there will be some minor design changes (that will be hard to notice unless you know what to look for) along with different coloring.
Is there any word on when shipping the final product will start? I pre-ordered a while ago and am really looking forward to actually having it in my sweaty anticipating hands.
We sent out a blog post last month that went over our best estimates for shipping dates. Those estimates are still current. Take a look: https://vantagerobotics.com/news/delivery-update
Been at least a couple of weeks since we have heard anything from you guys. Anything new or videos would be great to see. Getting real anxious to hear something about what’s going on. Thanks
Sorry Scott. We are spending most of our bandwidth on manufacturing at this point, but will make sure to get something out soon!
I know you are busy with manufacturing, but you promised some raw video. It would only take a few minutes to post raw video from that bike run. For those of us who have preordered, we have put out a lot of money with no guarantees. Maybe you could use your lunch break to upload a piece of raw video or two.
thanks
Sorry for the delay Radman. Its a bit more complicated than that, and you are assuming that we take breaks for lunch, but we did promise this and will try to get something up soon!
Looking like this is getting pushed back again, eh?
We are pushing forward as quickly as we can, and will make sure to send any updates as we get them.
Funny…. I tried leaving a comment about the lack of updates and for whatever reason it’s not posting…. Something up?
Comment get approved before getting published
Lunch is important… but it shouldn’t be complicated. After all, I plan to take video right off my snap and post… I don’t plan to always have to edit. Shouldn’t that be easy?
James,
Personally I would prefer the team not to rush as I want my pre order to be correct when it is sent out & not full of bugs because of pressure to ship them, I to have invested my money in this & thats why I want it to be a great experience when I first receive it.
Many Thanks for all of your hard work.
Thanks Gizmo! You are going to love this.
Any news on getting some raw video? If it could be hosted somewhere other than YouTube (since YouTube’s compression will degrade the video), I think it would be a great confidence booster.
Sorry for the delays here Orko. Its coming.
Your recent blog entry about needing new people really makes me nervous. These are critical functions you are looking for.. For example, if you are just looking now for a manufacturing expert, how is this going to be ready in the early Fall?
Radman, please note that we mentioned in the blog post that these roles have been filled for some time now. Our investors like what they see, so we are growing. As we scale, we need to add more members to the team. Two awesome professionals can do more than one.
I totally agree with you!!! Can’t wait to get mine!
Thanks Angel!
So the SNAP has an obstacle avoidance or did I understand that by mistake? I ask because I want it to fly indoors. Is this possible?
Hi Dimitris,
Snap comes with ground avoidance, which will detect any object below it. Later this year, we will be coming out with a 360 degree avoidance accessory. Flying indoors may affect the GPS position hold feature as well as some of the autonomous flight features in Snap, so we generally recommend flying outside. That being said, with its protected props, Snap is much safer in small spaces than most flying cameras. We fly in the office all the time and haven’t had any issues.
Thank you very much the answer. I understand absolutely that there is a possible problem with the GPS signal inside, but if you ask from it just to follow your phones WiFi it will probably won’t have a problem, will it? So later this year you will have a pre-order 360 version or it’s gonna be right out in the market because I’m really exited from the news you wrote to me. I tried with other drones inside it was hopeless and you are my last chance cause if you made it 360 avoidance it will the best indoor usable drone in the market I believe.
Thank a lot!
Hi Dimitris,
Just to clarify. The position hold, tracking, and autonomous flight features all need GPS to function. The WiFi connection will not substitute. Later this year, the 360 degree obstacle avoidance accessory will come out. It will be an add-on that will work with existing units. Please let us know if you have any other questions!
Hi Tobi,
When this month are you shipping our Snaps out? And I am looking for your smartphone app in google play, shouldn’t it be out there already for us to at least get a feel of it? Or maybe I’m just looking for the wrong app name. What do you call it anyway?
Thanks
We have not released the app to the store yet, and will be sending out an update later this week.