Aerial Video of our trip from Port Solent to Bembridge of our Sealine F37

Ok, to be clear. Yes anyone with a lot of practice could fly a quadcopter HOWEVER being able to fly it steady and accurate along with trying to achieve a good level of video footage is another thing. I have been flying model planes for a very long time so I have built up a natural ability to be able to fly very smoothly - with the model aeroplanes I would practice for absolutely hours upon hours on a simulator as well as flying for real. The best advice I can give anyone who is interested is to buy a simulator such as this http://www.modellbauuk.com/phoenix-rc-pro-simulator-v50-with-dx4e-transmitter-270-p.asp - this will allow you to make all the mistakes without damaging your bank balance - the phantom is defiantly easier than most quadcopters to fly however to fly it well will take months/years and to fly it over water and land it on a moving boat is not for the faint hearted - the trick with the landing is to get it as close to the boat as possible then get a member of the crew to grab both the legs - sounds easy but when you are dealing with the quad being blown around plus the boat moving this needs the highest level of concentration to achieve and also a cool head as the quad all up is £1400 with the camera!!! If you buy from quadcopters.co.uk make sure you get them to build it for piece of mind
 
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lisilou said:
Thanks F33man. Like others on here, this post has got me thinking about buying one so...I mentioned to Chris that I'd like to buy two things. One being this quadcopter and the other, a fear of flying course. His reply?: 'Let's do a cost reducing exercise here and buy a big quadcopter and strap you to it!'
Funny guy! lol
L
:)
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:encouragement:
 
Andrew M said:
Terrific video, thanks for putting it up. We are sitting here saying "cor, wouldn't that be great to have a vid of us like that ?".

I guess we'll be seeing some fab developments in this type of thing over the next months/years. As each manufacturer launches something another will make a progression with their next new model, you can just tell that auto follow and auto land are so going to be completely standard features before too long.

Thanks,

Andy
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The Thames would be easier as you could take off from the side of the river allowing you to have a good return to home position in the event of a radio signal loss. I am based near amersham :) I was doing some filming a couple of weeks ago close to you in Great Missenden
 
F33Man said:
the trick with the landing is to get it as close to the boat as possible then get a member of the crew to grab both the legs - sounds easy but when you are dealing with the quad being blown around plus the boat moving this needs the highest level of concentration to achieve and also a cool head as the quad all up is £1400 with the camera!!!
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And all whilst adhering to Rule 5!!!

A truly impressive film... I REALLY WANT ONE!

Pete
 
powerskipper said:
Why don't you approach the marinas and some of the manufactures and show them what you can do, as an advertising tool for them this would be brilliant.
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I have already helped out premier marinas as I allowed them to post the video I completed of port solent on their Facebook page, yes I agree marinas and manufactures are missing a trick here - by using this type of photography it shows what boating is all about
 
jfm said:
Zippy, with the hardware specified by F33 man above, the csmera aboard the copter wifis its image back to you on the ground, either to your phone, fpv goggles, or an fpv screen, almost in real time

It can fly about 800m from the transmitter

The left stick is height (up down) and yaw (left right). The right stick is roll/pitch, ie it moves the thing NSE orW and all points in between, and it achieves that by rolling or pitching like a normal copter

The phantom has an intelligent orientation mode whereby it controls yaw automatically so it is always pointing "front away from you". Then the movement of the right stick makes it behave logically relative to you on the ground. I mean, moving the stick towards you brings the copter towards you; moving the stick left/right moves the copter move left/ right in an arc around you. In this mode, if the camera is attached "pointing backwards" on the copter, it will always be filming the controller, which is good for boat work (obviously you have to use the gimbal to tilt the camera up/down so the boat is in centre of shot). All that said, I do not know how the intell orientation works if the controller itself is moving, as it would be on a boat... I have suspicion that I-O mode works relative to a lat long for the controller that is fixed in the copter's memory at the start of the flight, and isn't dynamically updated, alas.
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Some models have a "follow me" transmitter that could be placed on your boat, the copter follows its direction and the camera points at it, height can also be set. You can take control when you stop the boat or at any time. You can also set GPS waypoints to match your boats waypoints and film the whole thing although camera then has to be set up as well. As a failsafe you can set a waypoint for where you intend to stop the boat and get the copter to fly to it then land or you can adjust the "normal" failsafe parameters where the copter flies back to its starting position hovers then lands, adjusting its speed to allow you to get back 1st!
 
mahargon said:
Some models have a "follow me" transmitter that could be placed on your boat, the copter follows its direction and the camera points at it, height can also be set. You can take control when you stop the boat or at any time. You can also set GPS waypoints to match your boats waypoints and film the whole thing although camera then has to be set up as well. As a failsafe you can set a waypoint for where you intend to stop the boat and get the copter to fly to it then land or you can adjust the "normal" failsafe parameters where the copter flies back to its starting position hovers then lands, adjusting its speed to allow you to get back 1st!
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Have you got any links for the system you are explaining?
 
F33Man said:
The Thames would be easier as you could take off from the side of the river allowing you to have a good return to home position in the event of a radio signal loss. I am based near amersham :) I was doing some filming a couple of weeks ago close to you in Great Missenden
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Fancy a ride on the Thames at the Regatta and Festival next year? It wasn't you flying a quadcopter into the fireworks at the regatta this year was it?
 
mlines said:
Fancy a ride on the Thames at the Regatta and Festival next year? It wasn't you flying a quadcopter into the fireworks at the regatta this year was it?
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No it wasnt myself, I dont think I would be brave enough to fly a quadcopter near fireworks. The regatta sounds good.
 
Mikrokopter was the pioneer. You needed to be an uber geek to set it up and even then it didn't always work.
Then the Chinese (DJI) came on the scene with a plug 'n' play product. Their system is light years ahead now, with gimbals that actually work.
Can't really see a future for Mikrokopter....all IMHO
 
Excellent video F33Man, I tried the same with my phantom 1, but it hit the guard rail on takeoff and now resides at the bottom on Alum Bay :ambivalence:
 
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