5 Drone Tips & Intro to FPV

Creative & Safety Tips for Anyone wanting to get into Professional Drone Work. I also talk about how to learn FPV Fast!

DRONEDRONE TIPS

Ben Illingsworth

6/8/20239 min read

Introduction

Drones are still very much a new and exciting way for capturing footage in a way that until a decade ago was only possible by helicopter. It can be quite scary to think that in such a short period of time both the cameraman and helicopter pilot were replaced.

But if not carefully used they can cause a great deal of problems and a great deal of accidents. The video linked below is a funny DJI Parody showing the problems of using a drone indoors at a wedding.

1. Safety first

The Quick Shot modes which DJI offer are amazing and allow for many possibilities for unique perspectives of locations to be captured. However in these modes obstacle avoidance sensors are limited so make sure you are in a clear area. For most situations it's better to manually fly the drone to maintain complete control. This also applies to the sport mode on DJI drones which on the Mavic 2 Pro allows the drone to fly up to 45 mph (72 km/h).

The return to home option I feel should only be used as a last resort option. It is possible that the drone can auto hover up in this mode and will not detect obstacles such as trees. Allow for enough battery to fly back to safety land to avoid this. The drone will also auto land if low on battery and if there is a lake nearby you are in tough luck. You should also take off in a none confined space and always keep line of sight for many reasons with one of the main ones being in case of signal interference. It is illegal to fly over 400 feet or 120 metres (unless special permissions are received) to keep the drone away from flight paths.

Drone Batteries

Drones batteries can be very expensive and sometimes be over £100 each, so it is important they are properly maintained for safety and to get the most life out of them. It is best to store batteries at 40 to 60% and DJI batteries automatically discharge after use for safety which is important to remember if you don't use your drone for a few weeks. It is important moisture doesn't get into the batteries as well as water. The idea room temperature for charging drone batteries is between 22°C (71°F) to 28°C (82°F).

Weather

Checking the weather before every flight is critical for the safety of the aircraft. Flight should not take place when raining and under strong wind. Certain types of fog and clouds can be problematic as it can limit your visual line of sight. The best way to check the weather for your drone is to use the Met Office app which is available for both Android and IOS.

https://www.metoffice.gov.uk/about-us/what/met-office-weather-app

2. ND Filters

An often overlooked accessory for new drone owners are ND Filters, which are important for the same reason as they are for normal video, for shooting at a shutter speed which is double the frame rate so for 25fps the shutter speed would be 1/50. The vast majority of drone's do not have adjustable apertures (other than the Mavic 2 Pro and Inspire series with DJI) making them important. The official DJI ND filters can be found used for every DJI drone for a great price. Even with drones such as the Mavic 2 Pro they will have a sharpness aperture which for the Mavic 2 Pro is f4 which makes the filters still important.

3. Having the correct License and Permission

This is very important but it depends on the type of drone filming you want to undertake which license is best suited to you.

Getting into Drone filming is quite difficult and there is much to learn, so I have tried to make this blog simple and to the point. The first step was to get certified to be seen as a professional to help stay clear of legal problems.

During lockdown I picked my Flyer ID and Operator ID which allowed me to fly your drone in areas far away from people. If you wish to fly in more urban areas near towns and cities you need the A2 or GVC Drone Course.

I got my A2 Drone certification from AV8 Flight School . The process was reasonably straight forward and I managed to pass the online exam.

I have since completed my GVC with UAV HUB. However, for flying in Europe you need a different qualification. All these training schools have great customer service and are easy to use.

I have included a table created by https://www.heliguy.com/blog/2020/02/24/uk-drone-laws-a2-cofc-vs-gvc/ which shows a quick comparison between the two courses of the pros and cons. Overall if you are flying smaller drones the A2 CofC could be the better choice.

Some further notes are that you need to have the relevant insurance and complete risk assessments before commercial flights. For the GVC course as well flight logs need to be maintained. Landowner permission should also be acquired.

I have used AV8 before and have had a great experience. You can use the link below for a discount.

https://www.av8-group.com/referrals

AV8-1328

4. Camera settings, Frame Rates and Picture Profiles

When buying a drone I recommend getting a drone that can record in 4k as even if you are downscaling to 1080p it allows for better quality 1080 and for better digital noise performance. White Balance should be set to manual as auto can cause shifting problems. For film work that needs to be real time 24fps is the best frame rate but 30fps should be considered as in post-production the footage can be slowed down for extra smoothness. 60 fps is a good frame rate for slow motion.

Mainly drones user smaller sensors that traditional video and still cameras so using a low ISO is even more important to avoid noise.

The Mavic 2 Pro and Inspire series of drones are great drones as they have LOG recording modes. Shooting in LOG on the Mavic 2 unlocks 14 stops of dynamic range allowing the highlights and shadows to be captured. if your drone does not have a log profile try to use a profile with a low contrast as this helps with dynamic range. If the footage requires a heavy colour grade a 10 bit codec is preferred as it provides more control for sunsets and high contrast scenes.10 bit can display 1.07 billion colours, while an 8-bit photo only displays 16.7 million.

5. Using the right tool for the job

Overall the goal should be to use the right piece of equipment that best helps to serve the story and the particular mood you are wanting to convey.

As much as drones are amazing tools, they aren't the best tool for capturing close ups of people due to safety, unless you are using the Inspire 2 which can actually be used as a ground camera. Drone shots and gimbal shots can often be overused in videos so it is important to consider what is the right tool.

5 Drone Tips

(YouTube)

Flying in Europe

The UK is no longer a member of EASA (European Union Aviation Safety Agency) due to leaving the EU so you have to get a qualification from an EASA member state. Dronelicense.eu is what I used and the test questions are very similar to the UK A2 course. After passing this course you just need to ensure you have a flyer ID for the country you are travelling to and that you are registered with them and have checked the airline rules for bringing drones onboard. For Italy you can get your Flyer ID from D Flight. Linked here is some helpful information from EASA.

Introduction To FPV, How to Get Started and The Best FPV Simulators

Intro

The main goal for the future is to get involved in more FPV Drone Projects chasing cars, boats, planes or basically tracking anything that moves. The first person point of view delivers a more engaging experience and you can take full control of the drones movements and do flips and tricks. When shooting FPV it is important to have a spotter due to having to wear the FPV Googles as you cannot maintain Visual Line of Site with them on. Make sure you fly with a clear line of visibility to reduce the possibility of signal loss (Sometimes flying straight down a mountain with a block of signal can cause a loss of signal - I have unfortunately had to learn the hard way with regard to this )

Getting Started

To get started you need to understand that it is a steep learning curve from drone use. You are basically controlling every axis of the drone (Roll, Pitch, and Yaw). You need to understand voltage and current when charging batteries and ensure that you only charge the same type of batteries together when charging in parallel unless you want a house fire! I recommend the iFlight FPV Backpack as it comes with Battery protector bags, plenty of slots to organise your drones and it lights up which is pretty cool. I much prefer DJI New Googles 2 as they are much smaller and are easier to travel with and I recommend going with the new 04 Air Unit as it has a much better built in camera. I suggest going with the DJI Avata which is a Cinewhoop Drone (For flying close to things as it has prop guards) and the DJI FPV Drone 2 (When released). These will be much easier to use and are almost ready to go out of the box. I suggest getting DJI Care for these in case you have a fly away. When you get more advanced and have learnt how to use Beta Flight I recommend looking at iFlights FPV Drones if you want drones with more customization and the option to repair it yourself.

The Best FPV Simulators

Every aspiring FPV Flight should practice for at least 10 hour on a flight sim before flying for real. This means that they can protect their investment and avoid an instant crash.

Free Rider

For your android phone there is a simulator called Free Rider that works great as you can connect your controller via USB C to your phone and start flying after binding the controls. It has a few maps to select from, however It is limiting compared to the sims available on Steam.

Uncrashed

Uncrashed is the fastest FPV simulator to navigate through the menus and to switch between the different maps. You can chase cars in this simulator but that is the only thing you can chase. It is a very good simulator but I feel overall that there is nothing special about it. The only challenge you can do is flying through some hoops.

TRYP FPV

This flight simulator in my opinion has the most potential, as it is still in development stage, but stills looks amazing. The sim can crash sometimes, but the locations : The Alps Mountains, Desserts and snowy resorts look amazing. There are physical moving things to follow in this sim such as cars, paragliders and balloons. Setting it up took a while but other than that I don't really have any complaints. You can also play in lots of different challenges.

Lift Off

Lift Off is the best option if you have the DJI FPV Drone (The one that is made of glass and will shatter if you crash it) This is the most ready out of the box drone if you have this drone as you can just connect your controller and you are ready to go. The graphics are fantastic and it is the most stable out of all the available drones in terms of the main of crashes (computer crashes) It doesn't have many physical objects to follow like Uncrashed and TRYP FPV have, which can make it a little boring a times, but a great flight simulator.