What was accomplished

●       The Raspberry Pi 4 companion computer was tested and wired onto the Cube, with a serial MAVLink connection established between the Pi and the Cube Orange+.

●       Serial communication was handled in the onboard software so commands such as start recording and stop recording could be transferred between the flight controller and the Raspberry Pi during the mission.

●       An initial in-flight data-logging test was conducted, confirming the Pi could reliably capture geo-tagged images while receiving live telemetry from the flight controller.

Challenges and solutions

The main challenge was synchronizing image capture timestamps with GPS telemetry data precisely enough for accurate geo-tagging. The team resolved this by using the MAVLink timestamp directly to tag each captured frame, rather than relying on the Pi's separate system clock, eliminating timing drift between the two data sources.

Media

[ Raspberry Pi 5 companion computer — reference photo ]

[ Raspberry Pi Camera Module 3 — reference photo ]

Next steps plan

Integrate the gimbal camera and status indicators, then run a full bench validation of the complete avionics stack.