Drones
June 5, 2015Drones have been interesting the past few years. They’ve gotten even more interesting recently as the price has come down and the quality has gone up.
People can call them drones, or quadcopters, or RC copters, that’s fine. I think drones is the easiest to understand. Everyone knows what you’re talking about.
I recently bought a Hubsan X4. I did some research online and it seemed like the best “beginner” drone. It’s cheap (only $40 on Amazon right now), simple, durable, and comes with a basic camera. I wanted to test the waters a bit before potentially getting something more intense or expensive. I also wanted to try it out with something I wasn’t worried about breaking. Here’s a video of one of my first flights. The video isn’t great. It’s a small drone, so the wind was a big factor. The brightness and somewhat low camera quality also gives less than ideal results. That said, it was fun to get out there and play with and get some experience, just what I was looking for.
While walking around Boston, I’ve occasionally seen drones as well. This was a particularly impressive flight over the Charles. The drone was both speedy, well-controlled, and went far away.
There are some amazing stunts people can pull off with these machines. It’s incredible how fast and agile they are.
These machines will only get smarter, more automated and programmable. We’re in for some pretty interesting times. People often talk about Amazon’s interest in drones and their potential for deliveries. That could be something that’s in our future, even with all the legal hurdles.
But, I often get excited about the incredible aerial shots we’ll see. The could replace helicopter or crane shots in movies, making those shots cheaper. Smaller, lower-budget films could use them with impressive results. Like 3d printing, we’re at the beginning of an industry and technology that’s going to get bigger and it’s hard to know quite where it’s going to go.
