Drone not Responding to Video Changes

[John Sno]

Hi Phillip,

For some reason, my drone does not seem to be responding to changes in video settings.

For example, when I tell it to use the ground camera, it doesnt. Or, if I set fps to 2, it stays the same.

Here is a snippet of my code:

CDC = drone.ConfigDataCount
drone.setConfigAllID()
drone.videoFPS(2)
drone.groundCam()
while CDC == drone.ConfigDataCount: time.sleep(0.01)

drone.startVideo()
print "video"
IMC = drone.VideoImageCount
while drone.VideoImageCount == IMC: time.sleep(0.01)
IMC = drone.VideoImageCount

Hopefully the issue is with my code.

You also mention in the Documentation that there is a bug where the drone doesnt respond. Could this be it?

Thanks,
JonSno

[PS-Drone]

Hello John,

I confess, I was not able to recreate your problem. So far your code looks fine, maybe it depends on a missing command at the previous part.

Anyway, here is a code, which worked for me, I hope it will help you:

import time, sys
import ps_drone
drone = ps_drone.Drone()
drone.startup()
drone.reset()
while (drone.getBattery()[0] == -1): time.sleep(0.1)
print "Battery: "+str(drone.getBattery()[0])+"% "+str(drone.getBattery()[1])
drone.useDemoMode(True)
drone.setConfigAllID()
drone.sdVideo()
drone.groundCam()
drone.videoFPS(2)
CDC = drone.ConfigDataCount
while CDC == drone.ConfigDataCount: time.sleep(0.0001)
drone.startVideo()
drone.showVideo()
IMC = drone.VideoImageCount
stop = False
while not stop:
key = drone.getKey()
if key and key != " ": stop = True

The bug in the drones firmware (seen at version 2.2.8) I mentioned in the documentation “overhears” sometimes (around 1%-3%) a command to switch the cameras. Resend the command and it will work.

Have a great day,
Philipp

[Tim Murphy]

Hi Philipp (or John),
I tried the code above and it seems to run ok - when I hit any key (other than space), it terminates as expected. However, I can see no video. This may be a stupid question - how should the video display? Should the call to drone.showVideo() launch a window that shows the video? If it should, it doesn't for me. Any help you can give me would be gratefully accepted.

Regards,
Tim

[PS-Drone]

Hi Tim,

seems something went wrong with your installation of OpenCV.
You mentioned in an other thread, you are running Ubuntu 17.4, so I tested it with this OS, too.
Just (re-)install the python-opencv-package by typing

sudo apt-get install python-opencv

and the video-function will work.
I attached a screenshot, so you can see how firstVideo.py should look like ;-)

Have a great day,
Philipp

[Tim Murphy]

Thank you Phillip,
I tried this but it made no difference.

This Ubuntu 17.04 was a dual-boot O/S on my laptop (installed along with Windows 10). Apart from the problem outlined above, there is unreliable wifi on this Ubuntu 17.04 installation.
Because of both of these problems, I decided to install ubuntu as a virtual installation on my Windows 10. I used Oracle VM VirtualBox and Ubuntu 16.04. After installation, the steps/commands I used are below. I would appreciate (when you have time) to look at what I did and see if you can find any errors/issues.

*sudo add-apt-repository ppa:pinta-maintainers/pinta-stable
sudo apt-get update

sudo apt-get install build-essential
wget http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/bash/bash-4.4.tar.gz
tar xf bash-4.4.tar.gz
cd bash-4.4
./configure
make
sudo make install

cd ..
bash /home/tim/Downloads/Anaconda2-4.4.0-Linux-x8664.sh
sudo apt install spyder
export PATH=~/anaconda2/bin:$PATH
conda updata conda
conda update spyder
conda create --name ann2 python=2
source activate ann2

conda install -c menpo opencv=2.4.11

cd PSDrone/
python useVideoDebug.py *

I then tried to run my debug version of your useVideo.py script. The output is below:
(ann2) server@tim-ubuntu:~/SimpleCV/PSDrone$ python useVideoDebug.py
DEBUG: STARTING
DEBUG: STARTUP DONE
Battery: 85% OK
DEBUG: CALLED ConfigDataCount - WAITING 'until it is done...'
DEBUG: DONE - STARTING VIDEO
DEBUG: VIDEO STARTED
DEBUG: IN 'while not stop:', ABOUT TO ENTER 'while drone.VideoImageCount==IMC' LOOP - IMC=0

My debug version of your script is given below:
*##### Suggested clean drone startup sequence #####
import time, sys
import psdrone # Import PS-Drone-API
import cv2 # Import OpenCV

print "DEBUG: STARTING"
drone = psdrone.Drone() # Start using drone
drone.startup() # Connects to drone and starts subprocesses
print "DEBUG: STARTUP DONE"

drone.reset() # Sets drone's status to good (LEDs turn green when red)
while (drone.getBattery()[0]==-1): time.sleep(0.1) # Waits until drone has done its reset
print "Battery: "+str(drone.getBattery()[0])+"% "+str(drone.getBattery()[1]) # Gives battery-status
drone.useDemoMode(True) # Just give me 15 basic dataset per second (is default anyway)

Mainprogram begin

drone.setConfigAllID() # Go to multiconfiguration-mode
drone.sdVideo() # Choose lower resolution (hdVideo() for...well, guess it)
drone.frontCam() # Choose front view
CDC = drone.ConfigDataCount
print "DEBUG: CALLED ConfigDataCount - WAITING 'until it is done...'"
while CDC == drone.ConfigDataCount: time.sleep(0.0001) # Wait until done (after resync done)
print "DEBUG: DONE - STARTING VIDEO"
drone.startVideo() # Start video-function
print "DEBUG: VIDEO STARTED"

And action !

IMC = drone.VideoImageCount # Number of encoded videoframes
stop = False
while not stop:
print "IMC="+str(IMC)
print "DEBUG: IN 'while not stop:', ABOUT TO ENTER 'while drone.VideoImageCount==IMC' LOOP"
while drone.VideoImageCount==IMC: time.sleep(0.01) # Wait until the next video-frame
IMC = drone.VideoImageCount
print "DEBUG: IMC="+str(IMC)
key = drone.getKey()
if key: stop = True
print "DEBUG: GETTING IMAGE"
img = drone.VideoImage # Copy video-image
print "DEBUG: GOT IMAGE - RESIZING"
pImg = cv2.resize(img,(400,100)) # Process video-image
print "DEBUG: IMAGE RESIZED - SHOWING"
cv2.imshow('Drones video',pImg) # Show processed video-image
print "DEBUG: YOU SHOULD SEE AN IMAGE NOW"
cv2.waitKey(1) # OpenCV for Linux has a bug and needs this line*

[PS-Drone]

Hi Tim,

VirtualBox is great, I use it a lot, too.

You should really give Mint a chance (I prefer MATE-edition). The look and feel is amazing; the standard-installation is also pretty good and everything works out of the box:
https://www.linuxmint.com/download.php

Anyway, as far as I can see, everything should be OK, but the python-openCV-interface is missing. Try: sudo apt-get install python-opencv
It was also the only package I had to install while testing PS-Drone on Ubuntu 17.04.
I also suggest to install synaptic (sudo apt-get install synaptic), it’s a useful packet-manager, but not included in Ubuntu.

If firstVideo.py shows an image, everything works fine.

Best wishes and have success,
Philipp

[Tim Murphy]

Thanks Philipp,
I left this issue to deal with other project work and returned to it yesterday. I went back to my Ubuntu installation and tried the code again and as if by magic it now worked. I didn't make any changes - It seems that a system reboot can work wonders sometimes. I now have video every time.

Thanks for all your help and support. I will try LinuxMint too now that I have a virtualbox.

Regards,
Tim