Bird’s eye view — The Ins and Outs of drone photography
Although I’ve owned drones since 2014, it wasn’t until 2018 that I got serious enough about it that I went after my FAA UAS accreditation. I’ve been a professional photographer for over 30 years, and I discovered drones opened up a whole new world and allowed me to show an entirely new perspective on what was, before then, a flat world scenario of images. Oh, I could stand on the roof of a building and get some panoramic views of skylines and sunsets, but even those paled in comparison what a drone could do for me. Suddenly, images that were previously only available to the deep-pocketed photographers and clients who could afford renting helicopters for their aerial footage were now in the hands of practically everyone. What also became more evident was the proliferation of these devices. The more popular and the more they came down in cost, the more hobbyists were buying and flying. And they did so with little, if any, regard for the regulations the FAA began instituting to control and regulate their use. Height limitations; time of day restrictions; where and what you could fly over and near…… and, more importantly, proximity to controlled airspace within certain distances of various class airports. It was that regulatory institution that made me realize I needed to apply and get certified to understand how, when and where to legally fly these drones. The certification course took me 6 months (I could have completed it is less time, but things like life and work intruded and kept interrupting the process). The study manual was 120 pages long and read like operating guide to fly the space shuttle. You are required to know and understand aerial navigation charts. You must know how to read and interpret and identify the various objects around airports. You must be able to read elevations and distances and the different classifications of airspaces that surround airports and what is and is not allowed within these spaces. Can you fly a drone within 5 miles of class D airspace? How about C or G? What few people realize is the FAA regards the operation of a UAS (Unmanned Aerial System) or drone to you and me the same way they regard flying a Boeing 767. It doesn’t matter to them that your drone weighs 5 lbs and is 1/600th the size. The rules are the same. An illegally flown drone, at the wrong place in the sky at the wrong time can get ingested into a commercial airliner’s engines and bring it down. The ‘up’ side to being certified and licensed, is I can legally offer my aerial image services for financial gain. They can be published or posted in any venue. Unlicensed drone operators are restricted by federal law from selling of offering images and video for publication and the fines are severe, both for the person doing the selling and the entity buying and publishing such images or video. Newspapers and television stations have been fined thousands of dollars for posting images or televising video supplied by unlicensed drone operators. My situation is rather unique in that I live and work within 5 miles of class D airspace that encompasses a regional ATC Towered airport, so that every time I fly, I have to complete a clearance request and indicate to the tower I am qualified, licensed and aware of the restrictions imposed by flying in and near the airspace. Some drone manufacturers have software installed to prevent you from flying if their GPS shows you are in restricted airspace. Irrespective of the fact you bought, paid for and own the drone, their software dictates where you can fly it. Not all manufacturers have that hardy a control over their products and many licensed drone operators strongly object to these companies ruling when and where they can be flown. The companies claim liability issues are the root cause and are protecting both their interests and assuring the product is flown legally. Whether they need or should have that much control over a product they no longer own is debatable and perhaps worthy of a revisit at another time. There are enough restrictions in place by the FAA regulations, that following them should keep everyone safe, from height limitations (400 AGL) to time of day (30 minutes before sunrise to 30 minutes after sunset). There are more, of course and some have recently been eased by the FAA such as night flying, which previously required a waiver of the rules. I have one and it took 7 months to be approved.
Flying over people was a strong hot-button with the FAA and a waiver was required to circumvent that rule as well. I applied twice and the application was denied twice. Parenthetically, the FAA approved fewer than 3% of ‘fly over people’ waiver applications due to the lack of safety features included with the application to mitigate the danger of a drone falling from the sky over people. They have since relaxed that restriction as well. You can fly a drone from a vehicle as long as you’re not the driver, which, if you think about it, should be a no-brainer instead of a rule, but they put warnings on step-ladders telling you not to stand on the top step, because people stand on the top step and fall. Flying over a ‘public safety’ incident is also not allowed. The FAA defines that as any incident involving fire, police, ems, federal law enforcement or any man-made or natural disaster site requiring the presence of any of these agencies. That rule is to keep the area clear for official helicopter or other flights necessary to assist or contain the incident. Too many hobbyists were flying above structure fires and traffic accidents or weather related destruction to capture the event and post it on Facebook or Instagram or to try to sell to the media. Even though I am the department photographer for a fire department, my commercial FAA license won’t allow me to do it either. I would need a public safety certification license to do that, and, conversely, if I had that, I could not operate as a commercial pilot and sell my images. It’s all a big pot of soup getting stirred by many cooks and each one has their own idea about the recipe.
Some of the more expensive drones have cameras that rival those in the professional camera market. One manufacturer features a Hasselblad Camera. Another features a camera that shoots 48 megapixels. There are only 3 professional cameras on the market that offer that many megapixels. One by Canon for $4000; One by Nikon for $4000 and one by Hasselblad that costs $36,000. So having a $1200 drone with a 48 megapixel camera is kind of a big deal. It means I can fly at 400 feet and get an extremely clear panorama of a city or a seascape or a marina or a resort complex that can be cropped close enough for the client’s needs without losing clarity. It’s a great weapon for the photographer’s arsenal.
I envy my drone brothers and sisters who live far away from airports and the restrictions they impose and the hoop-jumping necessary to operate with their boundaries, but I’ve been doing it for so long, I just automatically wait for the clearance screen to appear and check off the boxes so I get approved. I decided to bypass it one day and cancelled out of it and go on my merry way and fly anyway. What I discovered, with the DJI model I was flying at the time, was the drone automatically stopped when it reached 87 feet of elevation and 30 yards away from the controller. Well, it didn’t stop, as in fall from the sky, but it hovered and wouldn’t allow me to go any higher or further because of the class D airspace restriction. Even with clearance, it constantly warns me “Manned Aircraft Approaching. Proceed at a safe altitude” in what very much sounds like my iPhone’s Siri voice. Those not flying near airports miss that little relationship because there are no restrictions to be concerned with. But it’s not just the FAA that restricts where you can fly. The National Park Service doesn’t allow drones in national parks… Think how many drones would be flying above Old Faithful or herds of wildlife or up and down the Colorado River. PS: They still do and they get caught and they get fined. Go to You Tube and search for ‘drones over volcanoes’ and see how many burn up from the neat and fall into the inferno. It’s kinda funny. Many individual states restrict flying in state parks or around state landmarks without special permission.
Movie producers are more and more seeking permits to fly drones where they are filming. These aren’t your $1200 Best Buy toys. These are $80,000 drones capable of carrying 6k video camera that weighs 20 lbs and requires 2 operators. The pilot controlling the drone and the camera controller who actually operates the camera. I don’t have one of those, although my Yuneec Typhoon H+ does a pretty good job with 4k video. Yuneec is one manufacturer that does not have airspace drone tracking software installed, so you can fly anywhere, at your peril. It doesn’t even tell you if you are entering restricted airspace. The FAA takes the restricted airspace concept very seriously. It can be anything permanent, like within 5 miles of the White House, to something temporary like within 5 miles of any military operation or place of a presidential visit. Try flying one over Camp David and see how long it stays in the air…. Or over the grounds of a federal or state prison. They have become so pervasive that many private companies and individuals have installed anti-drone technology to combat their presence. Super mega-yacht owners have drone detection antennas on their yachts to keep the paparazzi at bay while they entertain. Some of these devices just interrupt the signal between the drone and the remote controller, which causes the drone to enter the ‘return to home’ mode and the drone returns to its home point. Some are a little more severe and they take control of the drone and either drop it in the ocean or fly it to the yacht and you’ve just lost your images of a sunbathing naked starlet.
If you do what I do, and that’s documenting the world around me, either for a client, the folks I work for, for just for the pure fun of flying these things and seeing the images they are capable of capturing, following a few simple rules will make your life with your drone while out in public much more pleasant. Be courteous. Don’t be intrusive and don’t put anyone in harm’s way or make them nervous with the drone’s presence. Oh… and practice. A lot. You can’t just take these out of the box and fly them like a pro. They take getting used to. The controls need to be learned and you need to be aware of what they can do. I’ve got hundreds of hours flying these and I guarantee I can do things you can’t, Like flying a DJI Mavic Air 2 through the center of a tire swing. Hint: You need to disable all the anti-collision settings, otherwise the drone will not go through the center. It will stop or fly above or around it. They require a ‘touch’ and each one is different. The DJI drones have softer, more sensitive controls than the Yuneec brand, but eventually you can get them to respond exactly as you envision. Most of them have features that allow you to get the desired results with a button click. They will automatically follow you or any object on the screen. They will circle any object you select with no input from you at all after you press ‘go’. And they will do it until you tell it to stop. If you have a drone or are thinking about one, if you don’t do anything else, do this: Get FAA Certification. It’s not easy. It costs money. But you will be a better drone pilot; A safer drone pilot, and most importantly, a legal drone pilot. There is a wild blue yonder out there. Fly to it.
