Thanks to Smartypig, I bought a new camera; except it has a quadcopter attached, and I'm very happy!!
I really love photography and really I love flying too, but the current cost of renting a small plane to exercise my private pilot's license has priced me out of that market as the exact same plane that used to cost $60.00 an hour is now $160.00 an hour, and while I enjoy flying myself, I can think of other things that I can do with that $160.00 that would last way longer than one hour!
But I still love that truly unique perspective of aerial photography that most people will never get to see, and I have taken many, many photos from various aircraft over the years and really missed that aspect of photography a lot and was always looking at ways to get back to it affordably for me.
But I still love that truly unique perspective of aerial photography that most people will never get to see, and I have taken many, many photos from various aircraft over the years and really missed that aspect of photography a lot and was always looking at ways to get back to it affordably for me.
A few years back, long before they started making the news for landing on the lawn of the White House and being considered "threats", I'd first heard of this 'new' thing in photography magazines for getting some amazing aerial photos and videos.
A small 4 engined quad copter that can be modified to carry the small GoPro camera by a company called DJI. Back then those early adopters of quadcopters were paying well over two thousand dollars to get the copter and all the things necessary to get a GoPro hooked to it.
As the idea literally 'took off' as the videos started to get posted on YouTube the interest spurred the sales that spurred the technical advances that make it now something almost anyone can learn to fly, for better or worse.
New designs, better designs, the ability to do photos and video and watch exactly what the camera sees with a screen on the controller, and to a big degree, less cost!
Over a year ago daughter Sandy was telling me about an online savings bank she likes quite a bit called "Smarty Pig", after checking into it myself I thought I'd try it. A savings account that is totally away from any easy access like my bank attached savings account would be a great place to save up for a copter of my own without disturbing it. So I set it up and let it grow.
You actually even get interest that accrues with Smartypig as well as the availability of some good discounts depending how you cashout your money at the end of the "goal" you've set up or if you close it early like I did for this purchase.
For longer than that year I had my sights on DJI and felt it was going to be some model of DJI's Phantom line as the company continues to improve its basic design and adding things like their own video/photo camera that comes stabilized so no more shakes or "jello" in the videos. You could now even watch the video and photos by attaching your own smartphone or tablet and linking it to the controller to watch the footage. Fantastic!!!
Now it's late October, I'm talking with Stacy and she suggests now would be a great time to get my own copter since I had saved more than enough to get some highly rated model as there are several brands that are now better 'camera ships' than the DJI Phantom models, some with even longer lasting batteries and available in complete "Ready To Fly" kits.
So, as I'd continually been shopping to keep up with the market and watching the example videos on YouTube I'd already picked out what I wanted so I ordered it.
It's not from DJI, it is from a company called Yuneec (pronounced unique) Electric Aviation. Their model Q500+ Pro "Typhoon". A Typhoon it is not, to me anyway, so I stick with just Q500+.
As it was shipped in a large heavy box it took a week to get to me. Thirty pounds! In the photos below, my 'unboxing' after work on November 4th, 2015;
I wasn't able to fly it for the first time until the following weekend with the time change on the 1st and it now getting dark at 5 pm, as well as cloudy rainy fall weather finally moving in after a warm and dry fall so far. I was glad for the cooler weather change but could have done without the rain at the moment!
Oh well, on the morning of the Saturday the 7th since the rain let up for the morning, after Stacy left to attend a sewing class in town I loaded up one of our trucks and went down to the area of the county fairgrounds because I knew there would be a large enough area to get flying and start to learn the ins and outs of flying my copter.
I was pretty nervous myself, even after seeing all the YouTube videos I found on my brand copter, and there are quite a few of them. I had also seen several videos of catastrophic mistakes pilots had made destroying their copters, like hitting the only tall tree in an almost empty field, and I did not want that to be me!
So I got it ready, set it on the ground, pressed the red 'start' button and the motors were going, then lift off, straight up to about 20 feet. Let go of the control stick and it will just sit there hovering at whatever altitude you want. The controls are very lite, the angle control to tilt the camera up or down is slow but sensitive due to wireless lag and I'll still need to practice more to get all those controls nailed but the basic abilities of the Q500+ are great and I'm extremely happy with my purchase!
As you can see in the photos above, photo quality is excellent as is the video quality too with a 16 megapixel still shot and 1080p HD video quality camera, it is really nice. Rock steady and smooth giving that 'floating' video look. At any altitude it will hover in place, pivot to any direction, the camera can be angled straight down or to the horizon. I wound up flying through both battery charges and almost an hour of flight. Brand new batteries like these are reported to last close to 30 minutes as long as you're not trying to go really really high or fighting winds to stay in place.
I was very surprised how easy it actually is to fly, although I still need to get better with directional control so I can get the camera pointed the way I want it whether flying straight or flying sideways.
I'd picked this brand and model due to the many reviews that it is a superb camera ship. It is larger than the DJI Phantom models like this, and heavier too with a ready to fly weight of over 2 pounds. The controller unit has it's own built in display screen as I'd mentioned above and it's an Android tablet incorporated in it and the screen is crystal clear. I found that the screen protectors for my old Note II fit perfectly so I put on one of the 'mat' finish screens to cut the glare a bit yet still protect the screen from any scratches.
After I get a good selection of video clips together I'll post those on YouTube and add them to a later post.
If you are also considering getting a "drone" like this and are serious about your photos and videos, I can definitely recommend this model or you can even spend a bit more, about $100.00 more at the time of this writing and get their Q500+ 4 K model with the 4K resolution camera.
I imagine other manufacturers may get the Ready To Fly kit set up going as Yuneec has, but this kit makes the Yuneec a bargain in the more premium quad copter game!
As other reviewers have said, it's not the fastest quad made but I can attest it is one of the most stable camera platform of any of the I've seen taken by the other brands.
If I had the money I wouldn't mind trying them all to be sure, but these are NOT toys and are not inexpensive! You can get small "toy" quadcopters in the $30.00 range or even less and you can also go thousands of dollars more than this model.
I like the 6 engine Yuneec Tornado 960 "professional" video copter for around $5,000.00. It can carry a bit more like a larger camera with an 18X zoom and it has retractable landing gear like the DJI "Inspire" that starts at about $3,000.00.
And as far as the FAA regulations many are griping about? With people doing what they're still doing with the popularity of these machines, it was bound to happen at some point so no one should have been surprised.
The rules of the sky aren't that strict! As a pilot I know this! As with so much it often comes down to using some common sense and don't do things to piss off people just because you can! I also live in a very rural area and can imagine flying in the cities often being a problem for somebody.
Like so much, it is so often the rumors and unsubstantiated stories that the news loves to focus on that gets the public paranoid. I'm sorry to the believers but I do not see how a pound and a half DJI Phantom is going to "bring down an airliner" A 10 pound flying bird doesn't always by itself so how could a small plastic quad? Now, a flock of birds can and has on more than one occasion brought down an airliner, but I have yet seen any flocks of quads anyplace.
And as far as a stealth weapon against someone, still no in my opinion. The DJI Phantoms are reported to last on average about 15 minutes flying time per battery, as I said my model is "up to" 25 minutes flying time per battery and it can only carry one battery at a time! These are also all radio controlled!
Get too far away, and that distance can vary greatly especially with buildings around to block the line of sight to the pilot and you've probably lost a $1,400.00 or more copter! There are a lot of videos of "fly away" when you get beyond the line of sight for the transmitter or the transmitter drops the signal and drone keeps going without direction or control. There are only videos from the ones found, there are many where the quad is never found like the video I recently saw where on a fishing boat in Alaska the captain wanted to fly his new Phantom, I'll stop right there and say out in the ocean is absolutely not a place to try and learn the machine! Of course it got too far away and was lost in the ocean as it was watched to hit the water and sink. Too heavy to float people!
And to carry a dangerous 'payload'? A GoPro weighs about 2 or 3 ounces, and as with many aircraft, much of the weight is the cost of getting airborne, the frame, engines, heavy battery and electrics in a small copter so the payload is also very small. More weight, if you can strap it on, eats up power and shortens flight time. And with no wings, quadcopters can NOT glide, no engine equals crash from whatever altitude it is.
So there you go, off my soapbox and happy to be flying again, even if it's vicariously through the screen, photos and videos from this quadcopter. I figured the cost of this aircraft would have been about 7.5 hours more real flying time in my logbook. But as long as I don't wreck it being foolish this should last a long time!
Till next time, Tad
A small 4 engined quad copter that can be modified to carry the small GoPro camera by a company called DJI. Back then those early adopters of quadcopters were paying well over two thousand dollars to get the copter and all the things necessary to get a GoPro hooked to it.
As the idea literally 'took off' as the videos started to get posted on YouTube the interest spurred the sales that spurred the technical advances that make it now something almost anyone can learn to fly, for better or worse.
New designs, better designs, the ability to do photos and video and watch exactly what the camera sees with a screen on the controller, and to a big degree, less cost!
Over a year ago daughter Sandy was telling me about an online savings bank she likes quite a bit called "Smarty Pig", after checking into it myself I thought I'd try it. A savings account that is totally away from any easy access like my bank attached savings account would be a great place to save up for a copter of my own without disturbing it. So I set it up and let it grow.
You actually even get interest that accrues with Smartypig as well as the availability of some good discounts depending how you cashout your money at the end of the "goal" you've set up or if you close it early like I did for this purchase.
For longer than that year I had my sights on DJI and felt it was going to be some model of DJI's Phantom line as the company continues to improve its basic design and adding things like their own video/photo camera that comes stabilized so no more shakes or "jello" in the videos. You could now even watch the video and photos by attaching your own smartphone or tablet and linking it to the controller to watch the footage. Fantastic!!!
Now it's late October, I'm talking with Stacy and she suggests now would be a great time to get my own copter since I had saved more than enough to get some highly rated model as there are several brands that are now better 'camera ships' than the DJI Phantom models, some with even longer lasting batteries and available in complete "Ready To Fly" kits.
So, as I'd continually been shopping to keep up with the market and watching the example videos on YouTube I'd already picked out what I wanted so I ordered it.
It's not from DJI, it is from a company called Yuneec (pronounced unique) Electric Aviation. Their model Q500+ Pro "Typhoon". A Typhoon it is not, to me anyway, so I stick with just Q500+.
As it was shipped in a large heavy box it took a week to get to me. Thirty pounds! In the photos below, my 'unboxing' after work on November 4th, 2015;
Above: inside the larger shipping box was the still large but very stout and well made Yuneec shipping box.
Below: Inside that box was the locking aluminum carrying and storage case holding the copter and all the parts that go with this "Pro Version" I'd ordered that includes everything to get flying!
Above: The top of the inside packing and protector part of the container has some accessories, paperwork and manuals, as well as 2 sets of propeller blades, the black thing under them is the sun shade for the controller screen due to reflectivity of the 5.5 inch screen. and below is the Q500+ with 2 batteries, the controller under it, chargers for home and car.
I wasn't able to fly it for the first time until the following weekend with the time change on the 1st and it now getting dark at 5 pm, as well as cloudy rainy fall weather finally moving in after a warm and dry fall so far. I was glad for the cooler weather change but could have done without the rain at the moment!
Oh well, on the morning of the Saturday the 7th since the rain let up for the morning, after Stacy left to attend a sewing class in town I loaded up one of our trucks and went down to the area of the county fairgrounds because I knew there would be a large enough area to get flying and start to learn the ins and outs of flying my copter.
I was pretty nervous myself, even after seeing all the YouTube videos I found on my brand copter, and there are quite a few of them. I had also seen several videos of catastrophic mistakes pilots had made destroying their copters, like hitting the only tall tree in an almost empty field, and I did not want that to be me!
So I got it ready, set it on the ground, pressed the red 'start' button and the motors were going, then lift off, straight up to about 20 feet. Let go of the control stick and it will just sit there hovering at whatever altitude you want. The controls are very lite, the angle control to tilt the camera up or down is slow but sensitive due to wireless lag and I'll still need to practice more to get all those controls nailed but the basic abilities of the Q500+ are great and I'm extremely happy with my purchase!
Above: first photo and first videos were of me learning to control the Q500+
Above: the playing field at the county fairgrounds from about 200 feet, the Kootenai River to the left and the bridges in the distance over the river are railroad and the main highway through the area Highway 95.
Above: I'd just panned right just a bit and got the fairground buildings and the stadium where the Rodeo, Lawn Mower Races and Destruction Derby is held every year. As you can see there is some distortion near the bottom edge of the camera lense but with a 16 megapixel image you can crop it down a bit to crop out any problem distortions like that if you feel it too bad. What I really like about this camera platform is I can get lower than I ever could in any airplane, I usually used my zoom lenses for air to ground photos like these yet it is still high enough to get some great area shots. I can say also that at this altitude you can not hear the sound of the engines at all on the ground and it's hard to see too even with the lights that display when it's running.
As you can see in the photos above, photo quality is excellent as is the video quality too with a 16 megapixel still shot and 1080p HD video quality camera, it is really nice. Rock steady and smooth giving that 'floating' video look. At any altitude it will hover in place, pivot to any direction, the camera can be angled straight down or to the horizon. I wound up flying through both battery charges and almost an hour of flight. Brand new batteries like these are reported to last close to 30 minutes as long as you're not trying to go really really high or fighting winds to stay in place.
I was very surprised how easy it actually is to fly, although I still need to get better with directional control so I can get the camera pointed the way I want it whether flying straight or flying sideways.
I'd picked this brand and model due to the many reviews that it is a superb camera ship. It is larger than the DJI Phantom models like this, and heavier too with a ready to fly weight of over 2 pounds. The controller unit has it's own built in display screen as I'd mentioned above and it's an Android tablet incorporated in it and the screen is crystal clear. I found that the screen protectors for my old Note II fit perfectly so I put on one of the 'mat' finish screens to cut the glare a bit yet still protect the screen from any scratches.
After I get a good selection of video clips together I'll post those on YouTube and add them to a later post.
If you are also considering getting a "drone" like this and are serious about your photos and videos, I can definitely recommend this model or you can even spend a bit more, about $100.00 more at the time of this writing and get their Q500+ 4 K model with the 4K resolution camera.
I imagine other manufacturers may get the Ready To Fly kit set up going as Yuneec has, but this kit makes the Yuneec a bargain in the more premium quad copter game!
As other reviewers have said, it's not the fastest quad made but I can attest it is one of the most stable camera platform of any of the I've seen taken by the other brands.
If I had the money I wouldn't mind trying them all to be sure, but these are NOT toys and are not inexpensive! You can get small "toy" quadcopters in the $30.00 range or even less and you can also go thousands of dollars more than this model.
I like the 6 engine Yuneec Tornado 960 "professional" video copter for around $5,000.00. It can carry a bit more like a larger camera with an 18X zoom and it has retractable landing gear like the DJI "Inspire" that starts at about $3,000.00.
And as far as the FAA regulations many are griping about? With people doing what they're still doing with the popularity of these machines, it was bound to happen at some point so no one should have been surprised.
The rules of the sky aren't that strict! As a pilot I know this! As with so much it often comes down to using some common sense and don't do things to piss off people just because you can! I also live in a very rural area and can imagine flying in the cities often being a problem for somebody.
Like so much, it is so often the rumors and unsubstantiated stories that the news loves to focus on that gets the public paranoid. I'm sorry to the believers but I do not see how a pound and a half DJI Phantom is going to "bring down an airliner" A 10 pound flying bird doesn't always by itself so how could a small plastic quad? Now, a flock of birds can and has on more than one occasion brought down an airliner, but I have yet seen any flocks of quads anyplace.
And as far as a stealth weapon against someone, still no in my opinion. The DJI Phantoms are reported to last on average about 15 minutes flying time per battery, as I said my model is "up to" 25 minutes flying time per battery and it can only carry one battery at a time! These are also all radio controlled!
Get too far away, and that distance can vary greatly especially with buildings around to block the line of sight to the pilot and you've probably lost a $1,400.00 or more copter! There are a lot of videos of "fly away" when you get beyond the line of sight for the transmitter or the transmitter drops the signal and drone keeps going without direction or control. There are only videos from the ones found, there are many where the quad is never found like the video I recently saw where on a fishing boat in Alaska the captain wanted to fly his new Phantom, I'll stop right there and say out in the ocean is absolutely not a place to try and learn the machine! Of course it got too far away and was lost in the ocean as it was watched to hit the water and sink. Too heavy to float people!
And to carry a dangerous 'payload'? A GoPro weighs about 2 or 3 ounces, and as with many aircraft, much of the weight is the cost of getting airborne, the frame, engines, heavy battery and electrics in a small copter so the payload is also very small. More weight, if you can strap it on, eats up power and shortens flight time. And with no wings, quadcopters can NOT glide, no engine equals crash from whatever altitude it is.
So there you go, off my soapbox and happy to be flying again, even if it's vicariously through the screen, photos and videos from this quadcopter. I figured the cost of this aircraft would have been about 7.5 hours more real flying time in my logbook. But as long as I don't wreck it being foolish this should last a long time!
Till next time, Tad
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