Flyover

There's something about flying my drone that gets my heart pumping.

Years ago, I bought my first-ever drone that turned out to be a waste of money. It was super-lightweight (136 grams, though it felt lighter) and was more of a toy than anything else. The remote controller was flimsy—there was no spring to the joysticks, which were too sensitive and wouldn't make the drone stop if you let go of them.

Almost any time I flew that drone, the lightest of breezes wind would either send it into nearby trees or would make me fight to maintain control of it. I would never feel inclined to fly it, and after only a couple of short flights, I gave up on it.

The camera sucked on it, too. It was low-res (720p), wobbled from the spinning propellers, and had serious sound issues, playing the first few seconds of the obnoxious drone engines and repeating a lot of it, or cutting out sound altogether (which was preferable, actually).

I recorded my first flight, in January 2017, which you can see here, if you like. I spent most of the time just taking it above my house, trying to understand the controls. It mostly fought the wind, at one point being blown toward a neighbour's tree (I cut the engines before I lost total control).

I hated that Dromeda VISTA so much that I didn't want another drone. I flew it one more time, at the Experimental Farm, a week later, but was unimpressed and left the drone on a shelf in our basement, where it gathered dust.

I didn't touch it again until the summer of 2020. In fact, that flight, which I'll get to in a minute, made me reconsider whether I wanted to own a drone or not.

Of course, I finally got around to buying a better drone—a DJI Neo—last fall, though I didn't start using it until early this year.

I haven't flown the drone as much as I've wanted to. Looking at videos on my YouTube channel, before this past weekend, I only had six videos that used my drone and only two of those were exclusively with the drone. The other four videos had only a few seconds of footage that was captured with the Neo.

This past weekend, DW and I went to our friend Alex's house to celebrate his recent birthday. Alex owns a farm near Plantagenet, along the South Nation River, and I've photographed it a few times, sharing some of my photos in past Wordless Wednesday posts, among others.

It was actually at this farm, in 2020, where I last flew the Dromeda VISTA drone. I was trying to capture some above shots of Alex's property, even though I knew the camera quality sucked. It was better than nothing.

Yet, within a minute of getting the drone above the farmhouse, the wind sent it into a nearby tree. The drone hit the tree so hard that it knocked out the microSD card that was sticking in a slot to the side of the drone.

I never found the card but didn't care: I was never going to fly that drone again.

Fast-forward five years. Here I was, again, at Alex's farm, with a drone, looking to get a flight in. Though we were there to celebrate our friend, I thought he would appreciate some aerial shots of his property.

We never achieved that task in 2020.

There was a torrential storm that hit shortly after we arrived and it rained off and on throughout the afternoon, keeping us indoors. But just before DW and I had planned to head back home, the rain stopped and I got the Neo in the air for just a few minutes.

Though the Neo weighs a gram less than the VISTA, it feels more solid. And because the remote control for the Neo is more responsive and the technology in the drone far superior, I wasn't as worried about it being blown into a tree.

The Neo will drain its battery to hold itself in place, rather than risk being swept away.

I wasn't planning on making a video with the footage I captured. Some curious friends wanted to see demos of the Neo, so I used the automatic settings and the controls with my smartphone before connecting to the dedicated remote controller.

From Alex's back porch, I flew the Neo over the South Nation River, trying to see one of his guests, who took a canoe downstream. I hadn't engaged the recorder until I was halfway over the river, by which time the canoeist was almost out of sight, just a dot on the water.

As soon as I pressed Record, I noticed some birds were annoyed by the Neo's presence and started flying around the drone. Being terrified flying over water, at the best of times, my heart rate increased. I turned the drone toward the farm and brought it over land.

Despite a bit of wind, the Neo held its own, with very few corrections needed by me. I flew it over the barns, over the farmhouse, and over his vast field before brining it in. The recordings I made seemed to be in haste, as I'm aware of the 15-minute or so limit on the battery and as I said, I wasn't planning to make a video.

But I did want to show Alex the aerial shots, so I took parts of some of the video clips and made a 104-second montage. Have a look.

The Neo's 4K, 30fps camera is way better than that of the old drone.

I still need to slow down when I'm making a recording and actually think about a shot before recording it. After all, I bought this drone to supplement footage that I take on vacations and while kayaking, and I need to master both the control of the drone and how to best compose a shot.

There's so much to think about when using a drone. And so far, flying gets my heart pumping: sometimes, out of fear of losing the drone; other times, from the excitement of flying a camera in the air.

Happy Thursday!