Photographer
Sulp oiloftrop
Posts: 239
Destin, Florida, US
I am seriously thinking about getting a Drone for shooting golf courses and architecture. Any advice from anyone who owns one will be greatly appreciated.
Photographer
PhillipM
Posts: 8049
Nashville, Tennessee, US
Have you ever flown RC devices... Planes, Helicopters, Quads?
If not, try to visit an RC Flying Filed near you. You can gather all the info from the guys that are flying already.
I fly. Not drones but Nitro Planes. I drove to a field an hour away last weekend to talk over Quad & FPV gear from someone that fly's everything.
I'm going to build my own Quad and ground station to fly FPV for fun in a month or so. He flew his quad while I watched via Fat Shark Goggles from the ground station.
Photographer
Michael Alestra
Posts: 539
MOUNT ROYAL, New Jersey, US
my advice.
dont be an idiot with it.
too many people lack respect and common sense and as a result we get legislation that doesn't allow us to have such cool stuff.
Photographer
Fred Greissing
Posts: 6427
Los Angeles, California, US
Yup an idiot brought one to a kitesurfing beach and wanted to fly the damn thing with loads of kites around. I told him it would be a hazard to kiters and asked him if he had insurance. I used to fly model planes as a kid. Even back then I carried $ 2,000,000 insurance just incase. Anyway the idiot still put the thing in the air. Crashed it into his friends kite lines and both kite and drone with fancy Canon get dumped in the water. I enjoyed the show. High performance slingshots are fun when there are drones around 
Photographer
Fred Greissing
Posts: 6427
Los Angeles, California, US
Sulp oiloftrop wrote:
I am seriously thinking about getting a Drone for shooting golf courses and architecture. Any advice from anyone who owns one will be greatly appreciated. Architecture.....
What type of locations are you talking about.
Be careful of liability. Flying a drone can lead to all sorts of risks.
Lose control and the damn thing can fly off .... get carried by wind .... go through a windshield or something.
I am guessing that it would be very difficult to get commercial insurance to fly "toy" drones.
I used to fly model planes. Even then insurance was quite difficult to get and confined to non commercial use and in approved locations. I remember a case of a small electric glider losing control and crashing into a girl. She had a small injury, but the injury as to an eyelid resulting in permanent disfiguring of her face and no longer able to close one eye. The owner of the small light electric glider lost his parents home and ended up with pretty much life long wage garnishing.
Be careful what you get yourself into.
All this drone stuff is all techie and cool until the shit hits the fan (pun intended)
Photographer
Dorola
Posts: 479
Toronto, Ontario, Canada
I fly the Phantom 2 Pro. It is easy to fly and has amazing gyro stabilization, even in wind. The battery lasts very well at 25 minutes max. The best part is the Point-of-View display. I cans see through the GoPro camera in real time. Typically, I set the GoPro at narrow view ant 30 frames per second and get great video. I have inspected golf courses, roof, chimneys and eve-troughing. Once, I got brave and careless and the quad ended up under 4 feet of water. All it did was fry the battery. After it dried out, I went flying again.
Photographer
Michael Alestra
Posts: 539
MOUNT ROYAL, New Jersey, US
Fred Greissing wrote:
Be careful of liability. Flying a drone can lead to all sorts of risks.
Lose control and the damn thing can fly off .... get carried by wind .... go through a windshield or something. the one my brother has will come back when the battery dies and is stabilized against wind. it will hold its position with GPS, pretty remarkable.
The danger lies when its human operated, he probably is a bit too cocky with it and it has gotten it quite close to family members by his own command. Closer then I felt comfortable with my kids around.
Photographer
John Fisher
Posts: 2165
Miami Beach, Florida, US
I have a good friend, Felix Mizioznikov, who does really well with his drone here in the Miami area. He gave me a wonderful demonstration, and good piece of advice (at least I thought so!). What he suggested is that if I was interested in drones, it would be a good idea to buy a cheap remote controlled helicopter and play around with that until I was proficient flying it. Apparently the toy helicopters are a bit more difficult to control, and once you get the sense of them, a drone would be much easier to operate. So, for what it's worth, that was Felix's advice. John -- John Fisher 700 Euclid Avenue, Suite 110 Miami Beach, Florida 33139 305 534-9322 http://www.johnfisher.com
Photographer
Jerry Nemeth
Posts: 33355
Dearborn, Michigan, US
Dorola wrote:
I fly the Phantom 2 Pro. It is easy to fly and has amazing gyro stabilization, even in wind. The battery lasts very well at 25 minutes max. The best part is the Point-of-View display. I cans see through the GoPro camera in real time. Typically, I set the GoPro at narrow view ant 30 frames per second and get great video. I have inspected golf courses, roof, chimneys and eve-troughing. Once, I got brave and careless and the quad ended up under 4 feet of water. All it did was fry the battery. After it dried out, I went flying again. I saw some photos of fish taken by a drone that crashed in the water.
Photographer
Sulp oiloftrop
Posts: 239
Destin, Florida, US
PhillipM wrote:
Have you ever flown RC devices... Planes, Helicopters, Quads?
If not, try to visit an RC Flying Filed near you. You can gather all the info from the guys that are flying already.
I fly. Not drones but Nitro Planes. I drove to a field an hour away last weekend to talk over Quad & FPV gear from someone that fly's everything.
I'm going to build my own Quad and ground station to fly FPV for fun in a month or so. He flew his quad while I watched via Fat Shark Goggles from the ground station. Thank you Phillip, I see open fields in my future.
Photographer
Sulp oiloftrop
Posts: 239
Destin, Florida, US
Michael Alestra wrote:
my advice.
dont be an idiot with it.
too many people lack respect and common sense and as a result we get legislation that doesn't allow us to have such cool stuff. I agree Michael. FWIW, I'll be using it for videotaping golf courses and getting different angles of buildings for the architecture portion of our business.
Photographer
Sulp oiloftrop
Posts: 239
Destin, Florida, US
Fred Greissing wrote:
Architecture.....
What type of locations are you talking about.
Be careful of liability. Flying a drone can lead to all sorts of risks.
Lose control and the damn thing can fly off .... get carried by wind .... go through a windshield or something.
I am guessing that it would be very difficult to get commercial insurance to fly "toy" drones.
I used to fly model planes. Even then insurance was quite difficult to get and confined to non commercial use and in approved locations. I remember a case of a small electric glider losing control and crashing into a girl. She had a small injury, but the injury as to an eyelid resulting in permanent disfiguring of her face and no longer able to close one eye. The owner of the small light electric glider lost his parents home and ended up with pretty much life long wage garnishing.
Be careful what you get yourself into.
All this drone stuff is all techie and cool until the shit hits the fan (pun intended) Thank you, I start out over cautious and this example makes me even more cautious.
Our clients are resorts in the Florida panhandle and, other than the golf courses, we'll primarily be photographing/video taping the resorts from the beach side at angles we can't get without one, or a helicopter, which I don't even want to get into.
Model
Caitin Bre
Posts: 2687
Apache Junction, Arizona, US
Photographer
PhillipM
Posts: 8049
Nashville, Tennessee, US
Footnote. When I say rc fields, I'm talking about clubs that fly rc's in general for support and info.
Photographer
Sulp oiloftrop
Posts: 239
Destin, Florida, US
Dorola wrote:
I fly the Phantom 2 Pro. It is easy to fly and has amazing gyro stabilization, even in wind. The battery lasts very well at 25 minutes max. The best part is the Point-of-View display. I cans see through the GoPro camera in real time. Typically, I set the GoPro at narrow view ant 30 frames per second and get great video. I have inspected golf courses, roof, chimneys and eve-troughing. Once, I got brave and careless and the quad ended up under 4 feet of water. All it did was fry the battery. After it dried out, I went flying again. Thank you Dorola.
Photographer
Sulp oiloftrop
Posts: 239
Destin, Florida, US
Michael Alestra wrote:
the one my brother has will come back when the battery dies and is stabilized against wind. it will hold its position with GPS, pretty remarkable.
The danger lies when its human operated, he probably is a bit too cocky with it and it has gotten it quite close to family members by his own command. Closer then I felt comfortable with my kids around. From the research I've done so far the one I'm looking at automatically returns home if the battery gets low or gets too close to restricted air space.
Photographer
Blaschke
Posts: 137
New Braunfels, Texas, US
Point of order: Unless the craft you are flying has advanced autopilot software that allows it autonomous operation, it's not a drone. It is an RC plane/helicopter/quad.
This is not semantics. RC aircraft operate under far less restrictive laws. One could get into significant legal trouble piloting an actual drone in areas where RCs are perfectly fine.
Photographer
Sulp oiloftrop
Posts: 239
Destin, Florida, US
Thank you for the clarification. That's why I asked specifically about a drone.
Photographer
Ben Cliffe
Posts: 283
Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
Do your research. You may also want to consider reviewing this course Creative Live did. https://www.creativelive.com/courses/ta … eff-foster Also be aware rules are changing quickly when it comes to using drones. Doing things like this commercially have entirely different implications then if you are doing it as a hobby. Also you may want to decide out of the gate, are you doing stills or video's. That can drive what solution would work best. While I have a lot of RC toys have yet to make the jump to a quad aerial photography platform. Waiting for another couple of iterations of the technology. A newer version is appearing quickly. Once the fly away problem is solved to a high degree of confidence then I may pick it up. Cheers BC
Photographer
PhillipM
Posts: 8049
Nashville, Tennessee, US
One more thing...
Join the AMA
Photographer
dd photography
Posts: 944
San Diego, California, US
PhillipM wrote:
One more thing...
Join the AMA Why join the American Medical Association?
Photographer
PhillipM
Posts: 8049
Nashville, Tennessee, US
Photographer
Sulp oiloftrop
Posts: 239
Destin, Florida, US
That's what I first thought too dd.
Thanks Phillip.
Photographer
dd photography
Posts: 944
San Diego, California, US
I'm in the same boat as you, looking to purchase and just not sure. Seems the legal landscape is quickly changing and a decent set up is $1200-$2000. That's a big drop for something so dicey right now.
I am researching and will share what I learn and eventually do.
Photographer
Jeffrey Blake Adams
Posts: 609
Jacksonville, Florida, US
currently the FAA doesn't lisc drones for commercial use, although many are using them commercially, which makes insurance a problem as well and staying within local and FAA regs.
Photographer
dd photography
Posts: 944
San Diego, California, US
I'm looking only for private use.
Photographer
Leighsphotos
Posts: 3070
Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Sulp oiloftrop wrote:
I am seriously thinking about getting a Drone for shooting golf courses and architecture. Any advice from anyone who owns one will be greatly appreciated. First advice...stop calling them drones (now) before you start sounding ridiculous.
2nd...start with a smaller/simpler RC craft on which to learn before moving up to a larger more complex model.
3rd...shooting gold courses and buildings might seem like a good idea but many businesses and local governments are shutting that down to all but the most experienced and INSURED operators.
Photographer
Stephoto Photography
Posts: 20158
Amherst, Massachusetts, US
I've been watching the RC copter tech also, but haven't really needed to get into it yet... Waiting for the tech to get a bit better-- and there's no way in heck I'm risking my d800 by sending it up into the air!!
Unless you have clients that are requesting it, you can easily stand on top of your car (which I do often to get the extra height) or work a bucket truck rental (if you're working with a construction co, they should already have one) into your quoted price to get the extra, needed heights.
Is the copter something you can work into your pricing either way, if you're already booked with your golf courses? I've seen some beautiful shots come from them every once in a while
Photographer
Jerry Nemeth
Posts: 33355
Dearborn, Michigan, US
SPierce Photography wrote:
I've been watching the RC copter tech also, but haven't really needed to get into it yet... Waiting for the tech to get a bit better-- and there's no way in heck I'm risking my d800 by sending it up into the air!!
Unless you have clients that are requesting it, you can easily stand on top of your car (which I do often to get the extra height) or work a bucket truck rental (if you're working with a construction co, they should already have one) into your quoted price to get the extra, needed heights.
Is the copter something you can work into your pricing either way, if you're already booked with your golf courses? I've seen some beautiful shots come from them every once in a while Send up a GoPro.
Photographer
Jerry Nemeth
Posts: 33355
Dearborn, Michigan, US
Leighthenubian wrote:
First advice...stop calling them drones (now) before you start sounding ridiculous.
2nd...start with a smaller/simpler RC craft on which to learn before moving up to a larger more complex model.
3rd...shooting gold courses and buildings might seem like a good idea but many businesses and local governments are shutting that down to all but the most experienced and INSURED operators. Call them a quadcopter.
Photographer
MostlyBlack
Posts: 85
London, Ontario, Canada
Sulp oiloftrop wrote:
I am seriously thinking about getting a Drone for shooting golf courses and architecture. Any advice from anyone who owns one will be greatly appreciated. If you want something easy to fly, you can get something like DJI Phanton. If you are more serious and have budget for it, DJI also offers "pro" models. like Spreading Wings S900 or S1000. Another option is to build your own.
If you are into RC, I suggest to do own research, maybe join or read through info on one of dedicated to multirotors forums, like
http://www.rcgroups.com/forums/channels.php?id=34 .
I own Quadframe heavy lift sixcopter, size about 80cm, good enough to carry small mirrorless camera (I use sony Nex5n).
If you use common sense multirotors are "relatively" safe.
Never fly over or towards people, be aware that at any point engine, prop may fail and your bird may drop like a stone spinning 4, 6 or 8 blades a few hundreds times a minute. Hexcopter and Octacopter may recover from the single motor failure, but not from the software or major hardware malfunction.
Photographer
Zone7
Posts: 73
Washington, District of Columbia, US
Phantom2 offers the best balance of performance/cost
Photographer
Stephoto Photography
Posts: 20158
Amherst, Massachusetts, US
Jerry Nemeth wrote:
Send up a GoPro. I've been watching them closely, but I'm kinda iffy on the photo quality-- I've seen good shots and unacceptable ones and it isn't something I can risk/experiment with, not for that much $$$. If I'm going to sell it to my current clients the quality has to be on par with me and my camera. It's definately something I want to play with when my busy season starts again though. Have you seen anyone do interiors with one yet? That'll be the biggest use for what I do
Photographer
GER Photography
Posts: 8463
Imperial, California, US
Dogs and drones should be kept as far away from each other as possible. Nuff said!
Photographer
dd photography
Posts: 944
San Diego, California, US
Leighthenubian wrote:
First advice...stop calling them drones (now) before you start sounding ridiculous.
2nd...start with a smaller/simpler RC craft on which to learn before moving up to a larger more complex model.
3rd...shooting gold courses and buildings might seem like a good idea but many businesses and local governments are shutting that down to all but the most experienced and INSURED operators. what's wrong with calling them a drone?
Photographer
TerrysPhotocountry
Posts: 4649
Rochester, New York, US
Fred Greissing wrote:
Yup an idiot brought one to a kitesurfing beach and wanted to fly the damn thing with loads of kites around.
I told him it would be a hazard to kiters and asked him if he had insurance.
I used to fly model planes as a kid. Even back then I carried $ 2,000,000 insurance just incase.
Anyway the idiot still put the thing in the air. Crashed it into his friends kite lines and both kite and drone with fancy Canon get dumped in the water. I enjoyed the show.
High performance slingshots are fun when there are drones around I hope you asked the guy "What Happened" ?
Photographer
studio36uk
Posts: 22898
Tavai, Sigave, Wallis and Futuna
Sulp oiloftrop wrote:
Thank you, I start out over cautious and this example makes me even more cautious.
Our clients are resorts in the Florida panhandle and, other than the golf courses, we'll primarily be photographing/video taping the resorts from the beach side at angles we can't get without one, or a helicopter, which I don't even want to get into. That's all well and good as long as you don't video Florida's COWS. Didn't they make filming cows unlawful in Florida a while back?
Studio36
Photographer
PhillipM
Posts: 8049
Nashville, Tennessee, US
MostlyBlack wrote:
If you use common sense multirotors are "relatively" safe.
. THANK YOU!
Ditto on RCGroups... as well.
Photographer
Jerry Nemeth
Posts: 33355
Dearborn, Michigan, US
|
