Tuesday, September 15, 2015

Hello World!

Hi, I'm Uncle Jas from the Lone Star State.  I've recently started a new hobby.  It's not often I do, but this one is exciting for me.  It caters to my desire to travel, dabble in videography & photography, to expand my gadget collection, and to FLY.  I've always wondered what it'd be like to fly a plane, or just skim across the sky in a vehicle that was safe.  I have a friend who got into paramotoring a few years ago.  I entertained the idea of joining him in the skies for about one microsecond before my acrophobia overwhelmed my critical thinking.  Also, an in-law brought his DJI Phantom 2 to a holiday gathering one day and showed us all how it worked.  I was amazed, but hesitant to jump on the bandwagon.  Call me a late bloomer.  Call me a pessimist.  Call me a doctor, I've got the bug.


I wanted a new hobby too.  I wanted a hobby that involved flying.  I decided since *I* can't bring myself to get on a paramotor much less a 30' ladder, I'd do the next best thing.  I'd become a 'drone pilot'.  Me?  A pilot?  Yes!  Sounds fancy, right?  I think so, but the details are much less romantic.

So began my journey.  I started reading up about 'hobbyist drones'.  Up to that point all I knew about drones was that the US government used them to shoot the bad guys, the police were using them to spy on the bad guys, and that if my neighbor had one, then he could only be using it to spy on me.  Of course, I don't believe everything I see and hear in the media much less in life. 

I quickly learned that 'drone' is a bad word even in the drone community.  The community likes to refer to them as UAVs unmanned aerial vehicles or 'copters' short for quad-copters.  Since the media has spun every drone incident as a terrible invasion of privacy, the public has seemed to agree.  Of course.  Anything 'negative' sells.  It sells ads.  It increases ratings.  It's entertainment.  Just know that your house is available for me to virtually drive by on Google Maps among others.  Your right to privacy ends when you exit your front door and the FAA owns the airspace above your property beginning at the edge of your grass leaves.

I read everything I could about UAVs.  I studied copters and 'birds' of all kinds.  Yuneec, DJI, 3D Robotics, Walkera, even GoPro and Sony will be releasing models in the near future, you name it, everyone has a bird now.  It appeared there were currently two main competitors though; 3DR & DJI.  Fanboys were aligning themselves with each of these two companies in droves.  Apple vs. Android all over again!  Really?  I couldn't believe this.  Sounds like fun!

I toiled even more.  I registered my screenname on 3drpilots.com and phantompilots.com.  I wanted to converse with these communities and read about what was going on.  I even bought a trial membership to AMA; more on this later.  3DR - they were kings of customer service, citizens of the USA, and were the bleeding edge of droning.  DJI - they were the kings of stability, citizens of China, and had a proven product.  I wanted them both!  My wallet said no.  I won't get into a review of both companies and their models, but it came down to the 3DR Solo and the DJI Phantom 3 Professional for me.  My in-law had a Phantom 2.  I had seen it operate smoothly.  I watched countless videos on YouTube about hobbyist drones.  3DR looked cool, but it had no gimbal and I had to buy a GoPro camera to get started.  The cost to entry was higher with 3DR for me.  DJI, being a stable platform and lesser cost was becoming more attractive.

I bought a DJI Phantom 3 Professional on 7/3/2015 at Fry's.  Since then I have 64 flights comprising 150,749' over exactly 7 hours flight time.  I'm still an amateur, but I've learned so much.  Currently, my UAV arsenal includes:


My next additions will hopefully be a copy of CloudlightFPV (still in beta) and some Zeiss VROne Goggles.


I hope to use this blog to chronicle my adventures in 'droning'.

Drone on...
Posted by at
Labels: , , , ,

3 comments:

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)