As a Professional Aerial Photographer, lately I have been noticing a growing number of questionable drone photographs being used in the local press, and lets be honest , have probably been taken illegally and in contravention of the CAA guidelines for drone use. I am talking about photographs such as a bird’s eye views of the centre of London, or a bird’s eye view of a church in a town centre, overhead videos of Liverpool town centre, that sort of thing. You are probably wondering how the pictures where taken, in fact we as professional aerial photographers are wondering the very same thing.
In my own home town, we have had the local press publish stills from videos and links to youtube videos that have clearly been taken illegally. By Illegal I mean they have been taken by an enthusiastic amateur photographer with a drone, and then they have been published in the newspaper. there are, as I see it at least two issues with this.
1. The newspaper in printing the photograph are in some ways complicit in the taking of the illegal photograph by allowing it to be printed without checking on the photographer’s credentials.
2. This fuels the illegal uses of drones, and fires the aim to get more and more “risqué” pictures.
This sort of, turning a blind eye as to the authenticity of the photograph, by the press is at best a “little disappointing” from a professional’s aerial photographer standpoint. All too often we see Drones being flown to overlook people’s gardens, all too often they are being flown too close to airports, being flown in such a way that they scare livestock, you know the sorts of things, all to get that “special image”. With Christmas around the corner things will only get worse as the market explodes with drones being bought as the “Christmas toy to have”. Even a modestly prices UAV now is capable of being flown way out of the sight of its owner and potentially into the path of a plane. Surely the press have a duty, as well as the Drone industry, to collectively educate the public. The Drone Manufacturers put a leaflet into every purchased Drone highlighting “The Drone Code” as issued by the CAA. Perhaps they, the press and manufacturers, should also pay for some infomercials or print some informative articles in the local and national press prior to the Christmas rush highlighting the dangers of operating drones. Any intervention from the Professional aerial photographer against an over enthusiastic and miss guided amateur will, and can only be interpreted as sour grapes on the amateurs part so self regulation will not work in my opinion, although we do have a duty to report the worst offenders to the police. I say this as my experience of being known in the area as a professional drone operator, has led to people accusing me of overflying their gardens or their piece of land. Taunts of “I saw you the other day flying over that house”, when in fact it was another amateur drone operator breaking the rules.
Manufacturers also need to stop making ill guided claims that “their Drone will fly X” number of kilometres away from the base unit”, this is really unhelpful in educating the public as to what they can and cannot do with their Drones. As Professional Aerial Photographers we have all seen YouTube and its full of videos of people doing distance tests, in doing the distance test they are breaking the “Drone code” as the drone will be well out of sight during most of the test. By way of example of these cavalier claims the new Mavic drone launched this month by DJI as part of their selling points a line in their spec sheet says” New OcuSync transmission system offers up to 4.3 miles of transmission range”. Some people may see this as a challenge and not just a flight statistic.
My fear for this industry is that, unless the public are educated they will continue to ignore the rules and regulations, as this industry is predominately unregulated. It will take nothing short of a disaster for the governing bodies to wake up and pay attention, by then it will be too late for our industry. Maybe we as professional drone operators should self-police it in the interest of our businesses, but that raises all kinds of other issues as previously mentioned. The fact remains that something has to be done to safeguard the future of our businesses, after all we have made a sizeable investment to just get started as a Professional aerial photographer, and “I kinda like the job”, long may it succeed !!
Drone View Ltd
Comments
Hi AKRCGUY, yes I have seen your youtube video, some great points made in it. I believe that we all (Operators, and manufactures) alike have a responsibility to educate the public, and future drone users as to what is acceptable and what is downright dangerous. And you are right in pointing out the Casey's youtube channel does nothing to help this cause, in fact you have to ask, why are DJI sending him the drones to test in the first place... Oh yes thats it , exposure !! silly me, maybe they should send him some inspire 1's with a Zenmuse XT to see how many people would be interested in his view then.
No
As far as I know, there is no problem for an publishing photos or videos in UK as long as you didn't get paid for it, if those images show flying within the rules and no money changed hands.
Unfortunately this sounds to me all too much like an excuse by "professionals" to try to ban flying of model aircraft for their own self interest. And their interest is really in just making money, not the fascination of making some collection of plastic and wood and wire actually take flight.
The vast majority of us fly safely and within the rules and it is only due to our successes and failures that there is any drone industry at all.
I had also the same discussion with my colleagues several times and I have to say that I really agree.
In the same way, cars have been designed to pass any kind of legal speed limit. But if somebody uploads in youtube such a thing, then the police even would ask for collaboration in order to identify the guy.
I have not seen the same (yet) with drones. Where people manifestly put others in danger and upload the corresponding videos to social networks. People have not been educated yet about that a drone can be dangerous if you do not operate it under certain rules. Maybe it is just a matter of time, in particular, as always, after a "big accident" happens....
It is not the first time that I have seen "bird eye" videos from spots where helicopter traffic is usual (from hospitals for instance) in some of the cities where I have been to, or to film over highways, crowed areas, etc.
Hi Paul,
What you have illustrated is a very real problem that is unlikely to go away anytime soon.
One thing you can do is make it even more clear that you are a serious professional who does operate safely and within the regulations.
My freind Oliver Seeler is selling brightly colored safety vests which proclaim your status as a "legal" drone operator.
They are brightly colored and the text and even a logo is customizeable.
They have proven very popular here in the US, especially since 107 went into effect.
http://microaerialphoto.com/
I will also talk with him about customize-ability for other countries and the practicality of shipping them.
But at least when people see you wearing one of those, they are more likely to presume you are operating safely, professionally and within the law.
Best Regards,
Gary