# Unlocking Automated Drone Operations with DJI Dock and Cloud API

- Event: NestGen ’23
- Published: March 10, 2023
- Length: 41:02
- Watch: https://nestgen.org/library/watch/Ulql0brq8aQ/

> The transcript of a recorded NestGen session, for reading or for use with an AI tool. It comes from the video's
> captions; automatic captions can mishear names and terms.

## About this session

Take an in-depth look at DJI Dock, the much-anticipated rugged, reliable, weather controlled drone charging dock for their DJI M30 series.

## Transcript

**[0:00]** questions [Music] we are live here so every session would have his chat so if you can go to the session tab you can go to the chat polls and Q a and introduce yourself you can tell us what you do where you're coming from and what excited you to join this session and I can already see David there hi David uh as you post your message so please head to the session tab here on the right side you'll see even my agenda and session and you can go to the chat polls and Q a there are polls for the sessions as well which are already live so please take part in those polls as well as there is a q a uh tab as well where you can post your questions so let's move forward let me quickly talk about the session today so we would be talking about unlocking automated drone operations with DJI Dock and cloud apis and we have flora and Grant

**[1:02]** uh with us uh from DJI team uh to talk about uh more details here so let me uh quickly uh introduce Flora over here uh hi Flora uh so Flora has experience or as years of experience at the intersection of cloud and traditional platforms now working at DJ Enterprise he is responsible for expanding Global SDK Partnerships to create more Diversified drone ecosystem let let me stop my screen share and maybe you can get started with the session uh I hope you can hear me uh -huh okay I your voice is clear but we need to yeah we need to make the video so while Flora is sharing that video we'll be uh talking about the entire uh session uh we're looking at the more details at how you can unlock automated drones with DJI Rock and cloud apis and then we'll be open for question answers where flora and frienda would be joining us to answer those questions

**[2:03]** okay so um sorry guys we are just adjust our computers so later we will share some videos from our North American teams the leader of the solution engineer Grant will share some case study about the North Americans and also share some performance of stock and also from my side of introduction introduce the cloud apis and we also put the post on the chat group so you can share okay so let's start hello and welcome to our Nas gen session on unlocking automated drone operations with DJI Doc and Cloud API my name's Grant hostko I lead our Solutions engineering team in North America here at DJI my colleague Freda has talked about why we have designed the DJI Doc and I'm excited to take you through how the system can be integrated into your business and cover some key information you need to know before

**[3:05]** a DJI doc arrives at your site we'll be going through the different steps today including the capabilities is the DJI doc an m30 series The Right tool for the job site survey where can the dock be installed deployments go through the installation and configuration steps for a successful deployment Mission planning after the doc has been installed how do you plan emissions out and what are some of the tools available and finally use cases from various end users and testing in the field so first going into some of the capabilities of the system when determining if the system is a fit for your location as you saw in the keynote with Freda we've certainly put the doc through its Paces

**[4:07]** in a variety of testing as we knew this dock was going to be deployed in a variety of extreme environments let's review some of the key specs so you can understand what environment the dock is suited for first off temperature wise Tec air conditioning enables DJI dock to withstand temperatures of negative 35 degrees Celsius up to 50 degrees Celsius and supports drone flights at negative 20 degrees Celsius to 50 degrees Celsius when talking about protection for the dock has an ip55 rating with core components rated to IP67 the Drone can take off and land and it wins up to 12 meters per second lightning protection is included as well alongside power failure production the DJI dock has a built-in backup power supply battery which can supply power for 5 hours after power failure so the Drone can safely return home

**[5:15]** after aligning the Drone it will be centered on the pad by the push bars and then is able to charge through ports built into the m30 series dock version legs DJI doc can charge a drone from 10 to 90 in 25 minutes aided by the Tec air conditioning you can see in the video there are the Drone legs connected to the dock as well charging when thinking about range of the dock you have to consider the flight time of the Drone which is 40 minutes which allows the dock to cover a maximum radius of seven kilometers from the dock itself in regards to going out to that location and then coming back to the dock and Landing with sufficient battery life as we talked about the dock utilizes the m30 series dock version which has the same capabilities as your regular m30 series except it adds the ability to charge through

**[6:21]** the ports attached to the legs of the Drone the m30 or 30t sensor is built with inspection and OverWatch scenarios in mind the laser or rangefinder allows for users to collect location information and also helps the zoom camera to focus the zoom camera provides detailed Viewpoint from a further distance away the wide camera gives an overview of the scene or area that's being inspected and the thermal camera is an industry standard 640 by 512 and produces radiometric images for analysis after data capture so though 2D mapping is possible with the wide camera for a general overview results will not be a survey grade or comparable to something like the mavic 3 Enterprise with the rtk module or m300 and P1 as you can see the sensor is much smaller it is

**[7:26]** also a electronic rolling shutter so you might also consider the zoom camera for mapping to the high megapixel count however there's also not a good option for mapping due to the narrow field of view and variable focal lengths ultimately at the end of the day it's a good idea to test your mission out beforehand with the m30 or a similar sensor to make sure it is capable of the job at hand we know thousands of m30s are in use across the world and it's been great to see of the success of that system so far so we look forward to continuing to build on that success with the dock system itself after understanding the capabilities of the system next up is determining if a site is a good fit for the dock and there's four key items to consider for your site first off power supply you're going to need a stable power supply without frequent

**[8:28]** outages you can see some specs here on the slide as well for Network you want a minimum of 10 megabits per second upload speed with 40 recommended the location of the dock should be at an elevation or below 4 000 meters want to avoid sites prone to water accumulation and lightning select a secure site to avoid any tampering and then you're going to need a clear backup landing spot between 5 to 500 meters away from the dock and at the same height the backup Landing point will be used in case of emergency where the Drone is not able to land back in the dock you also need to consider any signal inclusion or interference at the site you want to avoid any signal obstructions and there should be no obvious signal Shields within the ground altitude angle of 25 degrees from the dock so you can utilize the m30 series to collect satellite data and environmental measurements whether that's

**[9:33]** electromagnetic interference any transmission interference or GPS or Compass issues before the dock arrives on site some civil work will need to be done as well first off mounting if there's a risk of flooding or no hard ground a sweat or stainless steel base is needed wiring is going to need to follow standards for wire type size installation and distance and finally the dock will need to be grounding using the existing system or by installing a system and connecting the dock to it when moving into installing the dock we'll need to mount it to the base in place connect power and internet you'll be able to connect the RC plus to the dock itself with a cord and then foul prompts to set up the dock drone backup Landing point and

**[10:39]** connect to the Flight Hub 2 or a different server flight testing will then follow to make sure that the installation has taken place successfully now we are ready to fly and moving in to Mission planning within our flight Hub 2 you can Define overall settings for the mission and then determine a route for the Drone and add different actions at waypoints currently the DACA only supports Waypoint missions but we do plan to add manual flight in the upcoming months after you've planned the Waypoint Mission you go ahead select the dock you'd like to deploy the route at select the flight route we're on the mission immediately or in the future one of the Cool Tools we have for Mission planning is the ability to import 2D Maps

**[11:40]** or 3D Point clouds into Flight Hub 2 and then utilize those for Mission planning you can also capture and upload imagery directly to Flight Hub 2 from the pilot 2 app on the remote controller for processing into a 2d map after import you can utilize flight planning tools putting you in a fpv view at a waypoint you can then manipulate that point Cloud to see what exactly the Drone is going to capture during the mission and add that action so you can see the example here we're able to go to the Waypoint that's been dropped move the camera view to the area we'd like to take a picture of add that action and then it is automatically added to the Waypoint and you can see the field of view will be capturing what we're looking at after we've gone ahead and run the mission you'll be able to view the dock and the drone's live feed before and during the mission and then track the progress of the

**[12:44]** drone on the map as well when the Drone comes back and lands videos and images will be automatically offloaded from the Drone to your Cloud platform of choice this example we have Flight Hub 2 here and from there you can review the imagery zoom in zoom out and see its location on the map other Cloud servers are also an option through the cloud API where folks are able to build their own platform to work with the dock with trade out will which get into shortly I'm sorry Flora not Freda let's dive into some use cases for DJI doc first I'm going to share some insights from two of our early test Partners oxy and BNSF who both presented at our 2022 airworks conference C is a good potential for the dock in providing repeat inspection capabilities on a

**[13:45]** regular basis and then being able to utilize AI for change detection also they'll be able to utilize the dock to complete flights for on-demand inspections for critical situations so they can quickly get necessary information and finally being able to leverage one dock for multiple use cases and asset types from a single location will provide additional savings the NSF shared their future vision for the doc at our airworks conference which includes rapid response in a situation where sensor data including a situation such as a rock slide they need to clear the track or properly plan resources to respond by deploying a drone from the dock they'll be able to get information faster and save critical time they'll also be able to execute repeated missions collecting visual data to enable

**[14:48]** up-to-date stockpile volumetrics and finally utilize the dock for automated routes to increase Rail Yard efficiency by collecting data on inventory locations the current m30 series is a strong platform for a variety of Public Safety and Security Programs we are excited for the doc to help these programs continue building on their Successful deployments by automating response police departments have started to utilize drones to respond to 9-1-1 calls as part of drone as a first responder programs or what some call dfr DJI doc provides temperature control and charging capabilities alongside an Avenue to fly to a location from a computer both right up the alley of dfr when considering site security which is a requirement for a variety of Industries the dock allows for an operator to plan and automate repeated perimeter flights monitoring live video feed and reviewing recordings after the flight the operator

**[15:53]** will also be able to utilize manual control as it's added in the upcoming months to further investigate any potential issues so these variety of features that both the dock Flight Hub 2 or Cloud API will be able to enable are useful for both security and Public Safety applications share this image of one of our testing Fields it excites me to think about all the innovative ways you will put the DJI dock to work at this point I'd like to pass it over to Flora to share more about our DJI Cloud API hi everyone thank grant for sharing I'm Flora the SDK relationship development manager we are excited to see the current progress of the Department of the dock and also the POC test so we are hoping to release the potential of the dark autonomous by working with our

**[16:58]** ecosystem partners and also to develop the product that is able to integrate with the DJ doc so today I will have the five chapters to elaborate how what is cloud API and how to start the development based on the cloud API so developers is the stakeholders of the DJI ecosystems so we have seen a lot of excited development based on the DJI drones from the data capture to data processing the other way of the end-to-end flight workflows so before we go give into the cloud API so I will make the Highlight just how far we are in the SDK communities thank you So currently there are one 100 000 developers in the SDK communities

**[18:02]** and there are more than 1 000 apps are released and for the hardware communities it continued to grow larger and larger based on the payload SDK and there are more than 110 different kinds of the psdk hardware was released and in the Productions so with this kind of a success we are still keep the same aims to create the values for the end users and transform the life with the product that anyone can use and also we are trying to simplify the development process so that comes the cloud API the cloud API is the new members of SDK portfolios and we see Cloud API is the first open capabilities of the open interface is is not

**[19:03]** directly from the Jones called API will aggregate the features feature set from the DJI remote controller app pilot to app and also the DJI doc so developers can develop their web face the cloud platforms based on the cloud API and there without knowing the complex Zone logic and also the control logic of the docs and also Cloud API will give them the flexibilities to combine the different kind of functions and also to allow them to choose a different kind of the deployment environment it can be the public basic environment or it can be your private servers and also it gives you the flexibility to do the UI designs to determine wage terminals will allow you to access your Cloud platform

**[20:07]** and we see that called API will play very important the role in DJI ecosystem by because of the following benefit first it will help the developers to develop a unified platform to accept to access the djm mainstreams products the Jones and the DCI doc so it will give the users the very keeps the user experience constant and also it will simplify the development process accordingly API will let the pilot to app and the DJI doc to isolate the complex Zone control logic and no need to develop the remote controller app if you just want to get some status or you just want to send commands to the Jones and also no need to follow every update of the hardware if the apis keep the same

**[21:09]** and it will be very easy to use because Cloud API adopts the standard protocols such as mqtt https and websocket so it will be quite easy for the developers to start and the called AP we also design some typical features that is vertical oriented in the cloud API and we see it quite easy we see it's quite easy to pass the Drone data to multiple platform for further applications so with think cloud API will be a great will be a bridge to connect to the DJI stable Hardware to the integrated vertical in vertical insight together to provide the better extra experience to the end users

**[22:09]** so let's go into the details detailed features of the cloud API there are eight features that what is which is published on the DJI website from access to the from the access to the Cloud Server to the maintenance stage so these five these eight features will covers end-to-end workflows and access to the Cloud Server device management live streaming media management and develop management it's a five fundamental features for the dock development so with these five basic features you will get a real real time get the Drone or drone and the dog stay tuned on real time and also you

**[23:10]** can send the missions to them and have the ways to manage the the captured dators well HMS function remote debug firmware upgrade will make will make the debug process more easier and also there are some Advanced features coming soon such as menu control so it will allow you to control your gimbals and the Drone handy during mission this is very important features in the public safety Industries select the color palette in free in infrared camera mode this kind of things will be made it's more more easier to control the dock and there are a lot of the features will be coming soon please keep an eye on the release note on the DJI developer website

**[24:12]** so till now you will find the quotient relationship close relationship between the desired dog and the cloud API the desired purpose of the DJI dock is to do the remote operations without the pilot on site and then also the doc can do the automated operations so wild cloud cloud platform is unnecessary part of the host Solutions which is used to configure and send the autonomous missions and to monitor the missions and DJI have the self-developed developed Cloud platform called code Flight Hub 2. well we know there are some specified and customized customized requirement in different verticals so Cloud API is calm it gives the flexibilities to the end users to the developers to have their own and

**[25:13]** customized platform to control stock so as the dock was widely tested and and accepted in China and the other areas we will find a lot of the developers are joining joining to develop the autonomous Solutions based on the called API and there are 800 different Developers drawing since the release date last year March and we will see a lot of the different kind of solutions come into the market for example the solar farm integration they're education grade and for the power grade inspection there are hundreds of these Sky things and go Ai and for the public safeties therefore yeah a joint flight red point and bingo

**[26:14]** flights and even in the Water Production there is there are developers there so you will see the examples UI examples of the cloud API was used in the emergency response so talk with their existing platform to do the Drone Festival response and also you can see that dog was used in the solar farm Integrations inspections the dog will be used as advanced terminals into into integrated into their existing digitalized planned form so as a requirement and the dog development became more and more mature we find there is a big opportunity in the cloud plan Bond measurement centered to the autonomous autonomous missions so we are looking for more and more

**[27:15]** developers and integrators joining and according to our experience John Cloud management solution provider vertical solution provider and documentary factors they are good and candidate because they know they are familiar with DJI drones control logic and they are not the specific Joe Solutions in the different verticals and also for the data analysis plan Prov providers platform providers it also is a good start they are suitable for the massive data analysis which is generated or produced by the doc and it will help them to expand the business scope by providing our end-to-end solutions to end users and it is very easy to get started you just need to get one MCT Series standard version and a one RC plus to get start

**[28:17]** the first step you need to finish the five fundamental features on the pilot 2 app and then move to the dog environment there are two kinds of dog environment first one is development board it is dog Simulator the other one is a physical doc so the before the dog officially seals DGL will provide a limited development board to let users to let integrators and reduce the time to the market and also the integrators could work with digit dealers to get to the demo dog for test and the solution validation so after the official sales integrated or developers can also purchase digital DOC for development so after the development we need to do the PLC test and the solution validations so DJI will go with the selected integrators to do go to market promotion and also

**[29:22]** help them to find a proper business mode FlytBase as examples they are just took less than one month to from the receiving the development board to do the live demo in 2022 airworks so you know flood base is a have the EXP much experience in the talk platform development so they'll continue to optimize their platform based on the code API other things so we will provide and continue to optimize the technical support channels by giving the developers more resources tutorial guide for example the API documentation demo code which is open and Public public published in the developer website it will help developers get started

**[30:27]** easily and there's also the test test guide to make sure the developers on the right directions and on the right platform and there are several different kind of technical support channels SDK Forum it's kind of the database from all over the world and also you can submit the request in the DJI web developer website so there will be there are technical Engineers engineer engineer give your feedback as soon as possible and the communication between you and the technical engineer will be recorded and you can follow up and for the selected integrators will give the special cooperation with them to help them to help to accelerate the development so I'd like to go back to the large directions our building uh integrated in ecosystems

**[31:30]** so all we hope that by cooperate with our developer purpose and ecosystem partners that we can release the promiser potential of the DJI doc thank you thank you so much Flora thank you I hope you can hear me yeah sorry for the income in clinical issue we had in the beginning first time to use the Hub in platform no problem no problem it happens all of us so technical but something could always happen but glad we could do this sessions and we have good 80 plus people joining uh at the middle so it was really good uh let's uh Deep dive into some questions uh so let me just uh bring that up so uh of course uh the session let me pick few uh here so people have asked one of the questions where right now it's about m30 but

**[32:34]** with the dog would be available for smaller drones in the future or not yeah I mean in general definitely see this as a trend for it drone towards drone automation towards drawing and box Solutions definitely this is the way we're heading towards and also but you know things will also depends on the market feedback for the first generation of the DJI doc right right right absolutely so uh yeah let's have more questions so guys feel free to put your questions we also have polls over there do we have any more questions from the audience feel free to use the chat box and put your questions and Flora and Freda would be happy to answer so one of the questions that we are asking uh Flora is about this open rolling box approach right to uh without asking to every speaker right in terms of the modularity and the benefits that it brings so you'd like to get your thoughts on this kind of open ecosystem where people can develop use the choice of a docking

**[33:37]** station the APK apis as well as stuff to build apps so if you can share some of your thoughts and what is the thought process of DJI uh and how do they see this open the IB ecosystem okay so as you know we before uh DJI has a very large Decay and we know all this SDK is directly open from the Jones or yes directly from the Jones liked psdk mobile SDK and onboard SDK so before if the developers want to control okay great so uh yeah I we were answering the questions uh back then for the open dib approach so if you can just answer that question that what are the benefits that you see for this open ecosystem okay so for okay full Cloud API first we say it will be very easy to start because for the developers they no need to know much about the flight control logic or physical logic of the Drone working with with

**[34:38]** Doc so they just to know some standard protocols like HTTP mqtt and this kind of iot focus so it's very easy to start and another thing is that we see that cloud the Gateway of the cloud API is coming from the pilot 2 app and also from the dock so there will be not needed to follow each update of the firmware if the API is not changed so normally the API will be not changed along with the firmware so it can be for them to make the same experience or not to update so from frequently so it will be reduce the home workload of the developers and also for we see that the opportunities for the cloud management platform when the dog go to the international market so Cloud API will also give them much more opportunities to develop a web-based platform so it's a long-term open interfaces the interface

**[35:45]** transportable digital dog Candace Jones in the coming Zone coming coming products another question that I see is uh that when would be the dock available in South Africa somebody's asking do you have any kind of insight there that you could share um yeah in general for the global market we're looking forward to uh roll out the dock in Q2 this year however for I mean for specific countries or regions we're still you know trying to figure out internally with our after sales team like what could be the our capability to to support in different regions and countries let's look for it definitely we want to expand the I mean the the deployment of the dog to more countries as much as we can okay that's great another question is can DJ LT modem be used with the dock the LTE

**[36:47]** modem which is there for the Drone I think that's the question yes yes I see so currently it's available in the China Market but for the global on the global side I'm afraid the um the connectivity from the dock to the cloud will be based on the ethernet connection so but if you're you're if you're considering about like the other ways for example like LTE or 5G even I guess that can also be realized through a like a 4G router and also I've seen people currently our colleagues and also the customers that are exploring more options such as the starlink right okay that's great that's great to hear uh Gene amical is asking can we use a drone to fly over two docking station I think this is kind of a request that's going to come soon fly from one and land another so do you have any comments on that yeah yeah definitely I guess at this stage So currently uh I believe with our dog May support you know to

**[37:51]** take off and Landing in the same dock but definitely I I believe this could be a like a common request for people who are doing the inspection for a you know linear or a long area for example like oil and gas pipelines or river or you know highways so I'm I guess this could also be a featured for for our R D team to consider in future right and uh could you just jog the memory of it pretty how what is the range of DJI Dock and m30 there how long it could go and come back what what what are the typical ranges that a drone could fly and come back yeah speaking of the coverage range of the dock you know it actually depends on two factors one of them is the transmission range so the dock where the speaking of the m30 inside the dock it supports maximally 15 kilometers transmission range for FCC but obviously also depends on the environments you know the signal uh you know performance there so it

**[38:57]** could vary from case to Case and the other factor is the flight time or the battery battery percentage so if you're talking about like uh definitely you know different types of operations could also impact how much distance you can cover exactly effectively with the dock and according to our experience the maximum range we can cover is seven kilometers that's great that's that's great uh Zhang is asking here then can m30p SDK payloads be used with Cloud apis for data transfer control Etc yeah yeah yeah I see this is could also be a very interesting direction to go so currently um we're still our R D team are still working on it you know I guess uh Grand and Flora also mentioned some of the uh fascinating features that we look forward to in future for example to support like manual control as well as the like the payload

**[39:58]** SDK this is something like has been uh planned in our roadmap okay okay that's great uh one more question is about Cloud API right so Cloud API the dog portion of it where other DJI drones would that be compatible uh with other dogs so Zhang is asking will you open for cloud apis for dog portions where other people can leverage it or if we uh just for the n30 and the DJI dock so for the cloud API I think we're supporting not only DJ doc but also like our journals right the m300 m30 and the mavix 3 Enterprise series that's right right okay sounds good I think those were the questions that I have uh and I think we are already up on time so uh I thank you both as well as grant for sharing the session and Amy to help us with the technical issues uh it has been a great session will of course have a recording made for everybody who could join again and see this that

**[41:01]** would be available Within