[scr]

We're more focused on the "go to this point in 3d space and take a picture" use case, so we don't care as much about the shape of the path in between the points. It is however a totally smooth to the 4 derivative path we are planning and executing to get to that new position, so its quite mathematically pure... Wind and actuator dynamics get in the way of perfect planning though. We did some work on more continuous velocity paths, which are more in line with my computer graphics and cinematography background, but those will have to wait for a future video. =)

[scrumper]

But you care a bit about that path if you're up close to cell towers or power lines, surely? You at least care that your path doesn't cross a minimum distance threshold from the object.

[scr]

Well, sure. I don't really mean we don't care about the path, we care quite a bit about the path, mainly that it gets from point A to point B directly and doesn't hit things, and that it is somewhat as smooth as possible (easy on the actuators to follow). We have a 3d map of the environment we build from the ground robot to directly test against while we are flying to make sure we don't hit things.