The General Drone-Related Thread

None of the proposals will have any effect on anyone deliberately flouting present guidelines - so typical virtue signalling.
Details remarkably sketchy inparticular the 'testing' part, if they think people are going to travel to a big city to do a supervised test revolving around reciting drone code they may as well abandon it now.
 
Years ago, I used to fly model aircraft / helicopters.
And I certainly don't remember these issues being created.
We used to fly in a field, ( that we paid a nominal rent for) with a short mowed "strip" as did many others, of course.
And away from foot paths / general public access etc.

I'm guessing that because these drones are vertical take off that these numpties think they have the right to fly "anywhere" without any thought to public safety.
And like most things a certain faction will always ruin it for everyone else.
 
Cobra said:
Years ago, I used to fly model aircraft / helicopters.
And I certainly don't remember these issues being created.
We used to fly in a field, ( that we paid a nominal rent for) with a short mowed "strip" as did many others, of course.
And away from foot paths / general public access etc.

I'm guessing that because these drones are vertical take off that these numpties think they have the right to fly "anywhere" without any thought to public safety.
And like most things a certain faction will always ruin it for everyone else.
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I think it reasonable to say that drones are much more accessable/easier to fly/cheaper etc and that makes them more popular
 
boyfalldown said:
I think it reasonable to say that drones are much more accessable/easier to fly/cheaper etc and that makes them more popular
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Pretty much my point, too Hugh. (y)
 
Drone enthusiasts are very fond of the argument that a drone couldn't damage an airliner, but there are much smaller things than airliners, often flying from small airfields that don't have controlled airspace around them that drones could be locked out of. I fly from one of those fields, that sometimes seems to have nearly as many movements as Heathrow, with aircraft ranging from turboprop twins to microlites, plus a parachute club, plus a gliding site next door (we're all regulated - heavily regulated). I don't know that we've ever had a drone incident, but it doesn't even need a hit at a critical moment (landing, for example) to cause a potentially fatal accident. I'm sure most people flying drones are responsible, but unfortunately those that aren't are in a position to do a lot of damage, however unintentional it may be. Drones are relatively cheap and easy to fly, and the way they're marketed encourage people to look on them as toys. A light touch type of regulation, nothing too onerous but enough to dispel the 'they're toys' mindset, should be all that's needed. Their use to fly over prison walls is another issue - one that won't be got round by any sort of regulation.
 
I've owned drones for three years and in that time I've actually seen two others actually in the air in Wales. Whilst accepting that there is a hooligan and criminal element involved in this activity, the majority of users do know what thay are doing and very careful with a flying camera platform that cost, in my case, close to £1000 for a Phantom. The proposed regulations are draconian and won't actually stop the drug running service to prisons or deliberate targeting of airports with drones and laser pens.. The exempt weight of 250 gms and under is ridiculous, this really needs a rethink for a more realistic higher weight. Costs remain to be revealed but might well be punitive for the hobbyist. The genie is already out of the bottle so far as terrorist usage is concerned, a Register of users and aircraft makes not a scrap of difference. Geofencing will only work on current and future models, my older drones wouldn't know what a geofence is. How are drones going to be registered, what if you build your own as I do? What happens when you sell it on? If you have two near identical built drones, how is anybody else but me going to tell them apart, I can only fly one at once?

This has been over egged by the likes of the Daily Mail and risks and statistics ignored for the sake of a (rubbish and scarcely credible) story, but free publicity for Tesco bags. I'm surprised in these times of Brexit negotiations and London moped gangs running amok with impunity, politicians, bureaucrats and the Police will have the time to expend on this sledgehammer.
 
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HarveyM said:
This has been over egged by the likes of the Daily Mail and risks and statistics ignored for the sake of a (rubbish and scarcely credible) story, but free publicity for Tesco bags. I'm surprised in these times of Brexit negotiations and London moped gangs running amok with impunity, politicians, bureaucrats and the Police will have the time to expend on this sledgehammer.
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Bird strikes have been known to bring down aircraft, that's why airports spend 1000's ££ each year on bird control, it's a matter of public safety.
 
Cobra said:
Bird strikes have been known to bring down aircraft, that's why airports spend 1000's ££ each year on bird control, it's a matter of public safety.
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This article published is pertinent to bird strikes in the US and refers to a study by George Mason University. In 25 years there has been only 37 incidents of wild life stikes that caused death or injury with a daily movement of 27000 flights per day. One of those incidents actually involved 2 deer on the runway.

https://arstechnica.co.uk/tech-poli...eally-overblowing-risk-posed-by-small-drones/

So yes, a drone might sometime in the future cause an aeroplane to come down. But sticking with facts, to date there is no verified account of a drone or radio control model bringing down an aircraft anywhere in the World and in the 10 years existence of multirotor drones, nobody has been killed by these craft. Yet last year 1000 people in the UK died falling down stairs. What is missing from a lot of the hype is a proper and sensible sense of proportion.
 
Jannyfox said:
Drone enthusiasts are very fond of the argument that a drone couldn't damage an airliner, but there are much smaller things than airliners, often flying from small airfields that don't have controlled airspace around them that drones could be locked out of. I fly from one of those fields, that sometimes seems to have nearly as many movements as Heathrow, with aircraft ranging from turboprop twins to microlites, plus a parachute club, plus a gliding site next door (we're all regulated - heavily regulated). I don't know that we've ever had a drone incident, but it doesn't even need a hit at a critical moment (landing, for example) to cause a potentially fatal accident. I'm sure most people flying drones are responsible, but unfortunately those that aren't are in a position to do a lot of damage, however unintentional it may be. Drones are relatively cheap and easy to fly, and the way they're marketed encourage people to look on them as toys. A light touch type of regulation, nothing too onerous but enough to dispel the 'they're toys' mindset, should be all that's needed. Their use to fly over prison walls is another issue - one that won't be got round by any sort of regulation.
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Do you fly at the same club a parachutist free fell through a glider wing (killing both) a few years ago?
 
HarveyM said:
What is missing from a lot of the hype is a proper and sensible sense of proportion.
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Very true.

...on the other hand: if an idiot flies a big drone into an aircraft on approach and causes a crash, there'll be dead people and that's unacceptable. It'll be no good saying "we didn't think it likely" when the relatives are calling for the heads of the perpetrators.
 
HarveyM said:
In 25 years there has been only 37 incidents of wild life stikes
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Would you think that's because
Cobra said:
airports spend 1000's ££ each year on bird control, it's a matter of public safety.
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Pro-active rather than re-active. So far it appears to be working (y)

HarveyM said:
So yes, a drone might sometime in the future cause an aeroplane to come down.
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We agree on that.
So by removing them from the area's and maybe restricting the heights, the risk is also removed.

HarveyM said:
Yet last year 1000 people in the UK died falling down stairs.
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And more fishermen die / have died from Leptospirosis then pest control technicians, who'd have thought it?
Of course there are risks in daily life. The idea is to minimize the risks, by education or where possible eradication.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not anti drone in the slightest, but its not something that interest's me. As long as they are used safely,
away from aircraft, traffic, the public high risk areas, such as prisons, government building etc. then I don't see them being an issue.
As for legislation, for licensing etc. I doubt that it would work or could be enforced, certainly not retrospectively.

But Maybe heavy fines ( if there isn't already? ) for users that break the "Common sense rules"
 
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Some good comments afterwards, the location he mentions there are probably barely a dozen days in the year when it's not blowing a gale, foggy or raining - he won't (briefly) hear a drone in the distance then.
It's actually an attempt to push for a National Park ban same as in the US I think.
I've had one nearly four years now and still not even seen another flying.
No doubt some popular locations they might be a minor annoyance if you lived close by, but most flights are about ten minutes it is nothing like as bad as all the other slightly intrusive noise you are affected by every day of the year. At about 200 feet high you won't even hear it.
 
I've seen 3 in use. One on holiday - not sure what the laws on their use are in Greece. It was at night and it was hovering along a row of balconies and made a few appearances during the evening. One was flying slowly along a local (UK) beach over the sand not the water and the last one was hovering over a hill climbing meeting and held up the racing until it ran out of battery.
 
Like a lot of the licencing in the UK, this registration proposal will do not anything to stop people that actually don't care about the rules anyway. They are becoming more accissible to anybody with the cash, they are easy to fly so people think they have the right to anywhere they want because it will do not harm. It won't be long before we maybe fighting for airspace at iconic locations like has happened with tripod space.

We've seen them 2 in the air at once at Glen Coe/Glen Etive, and singly at Old Man of Storr, Neist Point, Callanish, Dungeness, Tay Bridge and a few more.
 
Would any of you pilots have experience of flying at the Ribblehead viaduct?

I would like to take a trip up, but would appreciate some help with choosing an appropriate take off/ landing spot and ensure I can keep to VLOS and to the regulation distances during the flight.

Any advice would be much appreciated. Thanks in advance for your help
 
momoka said:
Like a lot of the licencing in the UK, this registration proposal will do not anything to stop people that actually don't care about the rules anyway.
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Here's a thought.

You're not allowed to fly within fifty metres of someone. Few people can throw a largish stone accurately much further than ten metres. So if you can knock a drone out of the sky with a stone the operator was being naughty.

Would he report the episode?

:thinking:
 
Properly permissionned (if that's a word!) are allowed to fly within 50m IIRC so they probably would. And not all drone operators are male.
 
nigpd said:
Would any of you pilots have experience of flying at the Ribblehead viaduct?

I would like to take a trip up, but would appreciate some help with choosing an appropriate take off/ landing spot and ensure I can keep to VLOS and to the regulation distances during the flight.

Any advice would be much appreciated. Thanks in advance for your help
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The problem this summer will be finding a day with lightish winds and not foggy or damp.
Best chance of lighter winds will be early or late but the midges will attack you then.
You can park practically below and that might be as good as anywhere when you can back away or run alongside at a suitable distance
 
4wd said:
The problem this summer will be finding a day with lightish winds and not foggy or damp.
Best chance of lighter winds will be early or late but the midges will attack you then.
You can park practically below and that might be as good as anywhere when you can back away or run alongside at a suitable distance
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Thanks for the info. I'd forgotten about the midges....... Avon Skin So Soft, here I come :D

I'll probably need to back away quite a distance then, to be able to see in time when a train comes along (keeping in mind all the regulatory distances, of course)
 
4wd said:
Mavic Pro - new favourite settings:
D-Log / 25 FPS / 2.7K / +1, 0, 0 / render at 1440p

The +1 sharpness is too hard to tame at 4K IMO, best use 0,0,0, for that.
But you risk that ugly Mavic trick of patchy NR smoothing in darker areas.

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KnbGGxk0Qe4
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My settings for the Mavic are very nearly the same. Have kept to 2.7K and not bothered with 4K.

I use Groundcontrol LUTs, though and they are set up for +1, -3, -3 as I'm not very accomplished at colour correction
 
boyfalldown said:
Can't understand why you'd chose to do that. Some idiots in the world.


How do you geo fence a ship though?
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Very easily, the ABWs (Above Warfare Specialists) have some very sophisticated toys wouldn't take to much to tweak it. Failing that give the MOD Police / Royal Marines onboard a 'drone catcher ' when in port.
 
Blank_Canvas said:
Very easily, the ABWs (Above Warfare Specialists) have some very sophisticated toys wouldn't take to much to tweak it. Failing that give the MOD Police / Royal Marines onboard a 'drone catcher ' when in port.
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That's not geo fencing though :)
 
nigpd said:
My settings for the Mavic are very nearly the same. Have kept to 2.7K and not bothered with 4K.

I use Groundcontrol LUTs, though and they are set up for +1, -3, -3 as I'm not very accomplished at colour correction
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I have that LUT too and it works OK with contrast and saturation on zero - but you need the intensity down to about 30-40%.
The advantage of not going with -3 is easier to see live feed when recording.


Blank_Canvas said:
Drone landing on HMS Queen Elizabeth. This is a wake up call to the MoD. This will no doubt increase the call for licensing and geofencing and rightly so.

https://ukdefencejournal.org.uk/com...B&utm_medium=FacebookPage&utm_campaign=social
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It's odd how there are various accounts of this.
That link describes it as a Parrot Drone then BBC reported a DJI and showed stock photo of P2 (again)
Then the naughty man says the drone decided to land itself due to high wind warning.
This is not what it would do, and makes me think the whole incident is fabricated by someone with limited knowledge but a liking for publicity.

Since ship isn't commissioned yet it only landed in a dockyard anyway.
 
4wd said:
Since ship isn't commissioned yet it only landed in a dockyard anyway.
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Well a jetty...

That's makes no difference whatsoever, it's manned by a Royal Naval Crew and is currently on sea trials, just porting in for the weekend before going into her home base next week, Her Majesty's Naval Base Portsmouth.
 
There seems to be quite a lot of over the top opinions on drones at the moment.

Luckily most of the people I've met so far have been curious rather than antagonising.
Yes, there are people who are going to use them wrongly, but to say all drone fliers are using them to invade privacy is like saying all owners of telephoto lenses are paedophiles.

I find a lot of drone videos a bit boring, I think it's far better when used for different perspectives, mixed in with other footage, which means I really only shoot for a few minutes at a time. I also like shooting stills to give different perspectives on shots, how many times have you thought 'that would make for a great picture if I could get over those trees?
 
boyfalldown said:
Quick explanation of geo fencing for you https://www.aisc.aero/what-is-geofencing/ at least in terms of a drone
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I know all about that mate but RFID underpins it all. The below article is a good starting point for you though.

https://econsultancy.com/blog/65068-what-is-geofencing-and-why-do-you-need-it/

Mind you there is plenty of open source on the net available to you on electronic countermeasures (ECM), jamming radio frequencies etc if you want to explore this further.
 
For the first entry of HMS Queen Elizabeth there will be a no-fly exclusion zone around Portsmouth Harbour as flying displays will take place during the event.

Drone operators and military flying share the same low level airspace. Due to the speeds, the chances of spotting a drone are almost impossible and for safety reasons, as indicted by the Civil Aviation Authority Guidance, all drone users should avoid operating in the vicinity of the harbour on the day HMS Queen Elizabeth enters her home port for the first time.

Further information on safe flying can be found at: www.dronesafe.uk or www.caa.co.uk/droneaware
 
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StuartH said:
So any spark owners here?..If so whats your take on it
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Got the Spark bundle in my hands now, flown an outing at local park. Ask me anything :)

It's small and it's very stable, I've not found a way to change the remote's gimbal speed, nor craft rotating speed, so videos were a bit twitchy. Photos are great, an improvement over my previous Phantom 2 Vision, but loss of DNG RAW meant I need to get the exposure right during challenging lights. Sport mode is great, but there's too much lag in the wifi connected phone feed, so it's not possible to fly it like a racing drone around trees.

Gesture control work 60%, I've not got waving to work yet, only the palm movements and taking photo. It will be good for quick selfie shots, but because the drone needed things to fix the props, it isn't as quick to setup as Dobby or Hover, sort of defeats the purpose of gesture control. Might as well spend 20s more to connect the phone, or further 20s to connect the RC.
 
Can you not change the gimbal speed via the app,I thought it uses Go4 same as the others.
I don't expect the gesture control will get much use in normal use ,more gimmick really which looks clever in the publicity.
 
I've not found the option yet, should be in there somewhere..... Need gimbal and the yaw sensitivity. I also tried active track and "quick shots", both worked great. I expect I'll use these more often for videos if I can't find those options.

I found myself taking more videos than anticipated. A lot more than during P2V ownership. But I'm happy with the auto generated video in Go4 app as I've no patience editing videos.



17-Aug edit:

Found gimbal sensitivity setting, reduced from 50% to 25%, works great. Also assigned a Fn button to quickly switch between looking down and straight ahead.

I've also flown it a bit more, longest was 10m and down to 33% battery, most of the time I got 7m for 50% of battery. It's more than enough for most things. Longest I might need is motion timelapse, 8m flight time at 2s shot interval means 10 seconds of timelapse, more than enough.
 
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