PX4 / QGC Camera Trigger Issue – Image Capture Stops at Exactly 255 Photos

MAVLink
1

Hi everyone,
I’d like to ask for help and confirm a behavior we are consistently seeing during survey / mapping missions using PX4 + QGroundControl.

:wrench: Setup

  • Flight Controller: Pixhawk 6X

  • Firmware: PX4

  • GCS: QGroundControl

  • Camera: SIYI ZR10

  • Mission Type: Waypoint / Survey

  • Trigger Mode: Time-based (every 3 seconds)

  • Connection: MAVLink camera trigger

:red_exclamation_mark: Issue Observed

During survey missions:

  • The drone starts capturing images normally

  • Mid-mission, the camera suddenly stops taking pictures

  • Flight continues normally, but no more images are captured

  • This behavior is repeatable and consistent

After multiple tests, we noticed:

:camera_with_flash: Image capture always stops when the image count reaches exactly 255 photos

Restarting the mission or power-cycling the system resets the counter and image capture works again — until it reaches 255.

:red_question_mark: Questions for the Community / Devs

  1. Is this a known PX4 or QGC limitation?

  2. Has anyone else seen a 255-image capture limit?

  3. Is there a parameter or firmware fix to remove this?

  4. Is this handled in PX4, MAVLink, or camera-side firmware?

  5. Any recommended workaround for long survey missions?

    Is there a fix for this?

2

Can you maybe share a sample mission that you set in QGC? You can just export the mission plan file and attach it here.

3

I don’t see where in PX4 this is wrong. I would suspect this to be an issue with your camera. Have you checked with SIYI?

Edit: I just asked in SIYI’s Discord.

4

Sorry for any inconvenience caused to your use.
I need to confirm the ZR10 firmware version you are currently using and try to reproduce the exception.
Please take a photo and share it with me. Thank you.

1 Like
5

I took some time to use ZR10 for continuous photography testing. Send SDK command 0x0C to trigger photography, and send the command in a loop at intervals of 1500ms.

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image
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At present, a total of 18722 bytes have been sent, with each 0x0C command containing 11 bytes and sent 1702 times. Viewing the folder, a total of 1702 photos were actually recorded. I did not encounter the situation you described.

The current firmware of ZR10 is shown in the figure:

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image847×598 11.8 KB

image
image846×596 15.1 KB

Please kindly send me the ZR10 firmware version you are currently using. Thank you.

6

Hello sorry for not replying. I’m currently out of town. I’ll send the details here on monday when I get back home thank you.

My only problem in Siyi ZR10 is when i set the mission in px4 to capture every 3 seconds, some of the captured image have grey part like it was not able to render the whole image properly.
what could be the problem there?

i see that you set zr10 to capture image every 1500ms and have gotten 1702 images. are all the images captured here is complete no greyed part?

What is the best SD card can you recommend for Siyi ZR10?

ill send my sample copy of the images with grey part and also the screenshot o firmware of the ZR10 by monday thank you

8

I checked over 300 consecutive photos from 1300 to 1700 this afternoon and did not encounter any gray screen phenomenon.
I will use the Ardupilot firmware to configure the MAVLink protocol for testing.

9

I did two rounds of testing this afternoon. The conclusion is as follows:

  1. Two tests were conducted, taking 280 and 345 photos respectively, and the situation of stopping shooting after 255 photos was not reproduced.
  2. I checked all 280 photos taken during the second round of testing and did not see any gray screen.

Test environment:

  1. Flight control firmware: ArduPilot v4.6.2 firmware
  2. Flight simulation software Mission Planner: v1.3.83
  3. Trigger photography through MAVLink protocol
  4. Automatic shooting of planned flight routes

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企业微信截图_17686319416737
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10

@JulianOes I’m sorry I can no longer locate logs for this image capture during mission that stops triggering capture image once the image count is 255. Ill try to recreate the mission and submit the logs here this week.

@SIYI_Support Hello this is the sample of grey part images we encountered during mapping.

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image1712×837 286 KB

IMG_0178
IMG_01782560×1440 725 KB

something like this.

its not happening in one image only.

also for the firmware of our ZR10 I forgot to take screenshot but it is same like what you posted
I updated it last month using the firmware posted in siyi website for ZR10.

Gimbal Firmware is v0.4.2
Zoom Firmware is v0.2.3
Camera Firmware is v0.3.8

this is the vibration of the UAV during mission ( mission + capture image every 3 seconds)

bokeh_plot
bokeh_plot840×336 38.2 KB

this is the flight log during mission ( Ulog ) : https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Nc8oj3p-EMSov3HA1vRfVM4c1L1hQXdX/view?usp=sharing

You have used a software to simulate capturing image every 1500ms . is there a way to replicate this by using esp32(microcontroller) thru SBUS or UART of ZR10?

like for example in siyi App
setting capture image button of ZR10 in channel 10 then letting esp32 to set pwm(high) to this channel every 2 to 3 seconds for 5min to simulate capturing images like in waypoint mission.

11

Thank you for providing the original image.

I need to communicate with the R&D engineer to see if it is possible to use MCU to send data to UART serial port for control. I will synchronize with you here if there is any news.

I would like to know more information. Could you please provide me with the following:

  1. How long have you been using this ZR10?
  2. Could you please provide the SN or QC card photo of this camera.
  3. Did this type of malfunction occur repeatedly during previous use (before and after firmware updates)?
  4. Is it only triggered stably during flight?