Rapid Increase in Taking Photos, Videos by UAVs

The FAA (Federal Aviation Administration) is now under considerable pressure to announce regulations of UAVs (Unmanned Aerial Vehicles)—AKA drones—used for taking photos and videos, and similar applications. Most recently (June 2) it announced it is considering giving permission to seven movie and TV studios. This may be little more than saying it will not object to the many individuals and companies that are already doing such things. Apparently the new attitude does not include rescinding the $10,000 fine levied against Texas Equusearch, a volunteer search-and-rescue organization that uses FLIR (forward looking infrared) cameras to attempt to find missing persons. Meanwhile, hobbyist usage continues to burgeon, with a new model called the Blade 350 QX RTF Quadcopter (www.bladequad.com) and a two-page spread in a recent Wall Street Journal.

Don’t Call them Drones

On December 13, 2013 we opined in our blog post that Drones—which we will subsequently call UAVs (Unmanned Aerial Vehicles) because of the negative image of military aircraft used to seek and kill enemy soldiers (especially terrorists)—could be used productively to record videos of dancers moving around the floor. Although we have yet to see any dance studios use one, the venerable Parrot AR Drone 2.0 (it would be a good idea for Parrot to stop using the emotionally-charged name for this mostly-toy model) in the right hands could give serious dancers and dance teachers some great camera angles not previously possible. In fact, during the UCWDC championships Wilddancer spoke with professional videographer who was taking videos of the whole floor with a fixed camera, but who had used a much larger professional model for other applications. However, in the meantime a bunch of companies—including Always Innovating (which may not yet have commercialized their MeCam), Transition Robotics (with their Quadshot), and Rotor Concept (with models HPQ-1 and HPQ-2)—have started offering alternatives to the Parrot model.