Aerial Photography with RC Helicopters

[legg360]

As title suggests looking to start doing aerial photography, just wondering if anyone does this? Been reading up on it but the prices seem to vary from £100-£1000+ with not much explanation in what changes.

Im only interested in the helicopter and mounts side as I already have a DSLR to mount to it

[Ridg]

RC Helicopters are notoriously hard to fly and odds are you'll be throwing your new chopper and DSLR away on the first flight.

The second problem is helicopters aren't that stable during flight so you would want a stabilising gimbal, this will also give you the option to tilt and pan the camera too, instead of being limited to where you point the camera and the pitch / yaw of the chopper.

Anyways, most people are using multirotor system for aerial work, main reason is they are much much easier to fly, more stable and given their design (lack of tail) the centre of gravity is better suited for hanging a DSLR from.

If you want a cheap introduction the dji phantom is a good place to start;

http://quadcopters.co.uk/dji-phantom-ready-to-fly-quadcopter-570-p.asp

You will need a gopro for that platform through as it wont take a DSLR

You could probably get a DSLR on something like;

http://www.buildyourowndrone.co.uk/ArduCopter-3DR-Hexacopter-Full-Kit-p/ac-hexa3drfk.htm

but you're looking well over a grand for a decent setup with the gimbal, this depends on the weight of your gear.

Starting point would be, what DSLR and lens will you be sending up, that's your payload, and find a suitable drone / chopper.  I would avoid the chopper route as you will endup breaking it and your camera.

GoPro + phantom is your cheapest route into it, search for a specific forum where you'll get much better advice esp if you go the drone route.

[legg360]

Yea ive heard they can be a little bit hard to fly, until I could fly it well my camera wouldn't be going anywhere near it, I currently got a Nikon D3200 (looking at changing possible to the D7100) and with my heaviest lens it weights just over 1.4kg so need something with a bit of lift power.

I have been looking at the Hexacopter, but they don't seem to be able to lift as much for the extra cost in buying.

Its something that I will have todo a lot more research into, might just buy a cheap little copter and start to learn to fly it 1st before I spend a lot of money on an expensive rig for it fall out the sky lol

[DubFan]

Anything big enough to hold a DSLR needs 6 months of special training. I know a couple of people who've done it.
Here's a little info on the Hexacopter (like the kit linked above) that's being used by the BBC:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-24712136
And there are restrictions on where and when you can fly them.
Oh and once you're into that sort of set up, you need a two person crew, one to fly the helicopter and one to control the camera/gimbal.
Here's a bit more info from the BBC's training and R&D team:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/academy/technology/broadcast-technology/television/article/art20130802172449829

Even professionals get it wrong with 'copters.
Here's Chase Jarvis losing his into the ocean.
http://youtu.be/u937rXvj1Jc

[legg360]

I think going down the DSLR route isn't going to be viable, looking now towards a go pro as this seem to be a lot more common.

As far as getting a licence and training from what ive read you only seem to need one if your flying it and filming for commercial reasons

[DubFan]

I suspect the hexacopter needs licencing or training because of the size and height it can go. You'd also need permission to fly it in certain places.
If you're interested, I could try to find out from my friends who use a hexacopter.

What are you wanting to do with one though? Filming or stills?
I don't think the GoPro has image stabilisation so it's probably not going to give really sharp stills. But the Hero3+ is 12mp, which is decent enough. You'd probably still need a second person, so one of you could fly it and the other control the camera via an iPad/iPhone.

[mcgee9t2]

+1 on rc choppers being hard to control. i have one and it took me ages to be able to fly it for around 1 min with out crashing/having to emergency land it.

also the weight of a dslr your going to need a big and most likely expensive chopper.

i agree with the above, get a multirotor chopper. no idea what the crack is with lisences etc though.

[legg360]

I wanna be able to get good aerial photos and do some filming aswell, reason I was looking to start with the DSLR route was cos I have one plus my lens have vibration reduction in them on a high shutter speed should get decent stills, it also films in 1080HD as well so would have been decent for filming.

But as mentioned before to lift it plus the weight of a gimbal its gonna have to be a monster sized and along with a monster price tag.

The hexacopters defo seem like the route to go instead of the helicopter route, with a small action camera instead of a heavy DSLR

Ive not really looked at the Go Pro style of cameras or the different models and features as I was hoping to use what I already had.

At 1st looks id prob get something online the lines of the Go Pro Hero3+ Black edition, has upto 180m wifi connection its the lightest and smallest one yet. with a DJI phantom

[Ridg]

have a look at this forum;

http://www.rcgroups.com/aerial-photography-128/

[Diamond Hell]

Don't discount high-end compacts instead of DSLRs.

Biggest issue is licenses and not getting nicked and fined for flying it where you shouldn't.  You'd really need public liability insurance... unless you fancy paying out potentially big cash to someone who it crashes into if you lose control of it?

It's an absolute minefield - I spent a bit of time looking into it.