has anyone ever used a drone to scout locations / entrances before visiting the site? i'm picking up a DJI Phanton Vision 2 today with the FPV camera (for other purposes) and interested in seeing how this could work for urbex..

I think a similar thread was on the Main Forum at some point. The potential usefulness for scouting more serious, difficult access, locations is there. Never tried it but sure would like to get killer video footage with it!

Can you fly it next to a crane I'm climbing and shoot me on the way up? Or, take a peek at a roof to see if it's interesting? How high will that thing go?
-free

yeah, i'd love to do that actually. was going to get it for some moving shots while i'm riding the motorcycle(s).

supposedly the range is 500m, but people have gotten them 3k feet up... i'm willing to try whatever, if it crashes, it's only money, right?

If the carrying capacity of the drone is decent, it would also seem possible that it can carry a chopped-and-modified stick clip:

http://shop.dansde...o7sCFcJ0Qgod9QQApA

...to deploy a carabiner strung with something like fishing line onto something anchorable, like rebar. Of course, the fishing line is only for minimal weight, and enables progressive (3 steps?) threading to go up to 10mm static line.

Obviously, very high risk of crashing the drone not just with the external forces placed upon it in the course of clip placement, but also with the line it's towing.

But I'm sure you can see the practical applications.

that would be pretty awesome too. i was thinking of more of the photography aspect and scouting over/around things to prevent getting into a mess/caught, etc.

however, flying around freeside at the top of a crane with the city view in the background would be pretty awesome....

There's sites we do that requires miles of walking that we return to multiple times. It would be great to send a drone over to see what building are demolished ahead of time so u don't walk there for nothing. This is an extreme case though. Checking for holes in fences could be a use, but in every example I'm thinking of, walking there in person would suffice.

Fly over of somewhere like mare island, hunters point etc and flying up to yourself standing at the top of an abandoned build would make for some amazing video though. Flying through the streets of SF then up to the top of a crane with us chilling would be super ridiculously good.

How's the light sensitivity of the built in camera? Does it take decent night footage? We used a gopro hero 3+ on the recent video posted and the night quality is pretty good.

We should collaborate if you are down to put in the work and let us use the footage in Jaeger's UE show. This all takes lots of planning coordination and effort, but not much more than we already invest.
-free

Any legality issues around flying these over or through the city? Not that in concerned about legality... ;)
Seen this?
http://arstechnica...y-with-no-arrests/
-free

That's an ingenious idea. I had the idea of maybe using an Arduino (Google it) with a camera to transmit video imaging to a remote controller (a generic 240p LCD screen or something installed on the side of it) using a WiFi signal to explore potential areas, but that was for an RC car, and the idea was to have a cheap, disposable scouting device in case I had to make a quick getaway and you're kind of limited to 100 meters in the most ideal conditions. Maybe a similar application could work for a Drone? For peaking around corners and checking to see if the coast is clear that is, and to hunt any POE.

http://www.youtube...atch?v=4wUZ87Q0Qfg

Not sure re: legality, but I just got the DJI Phantom 2 Vision kit. Will grab some night footage tonight and post a video. Id be happy to collaborate on some work with y'all and the video (and video of general cool urbex/cranes/buildings). PM me and we can discuss getting together to try it out!

Urban buck: the range of 500m is awesome, but it's somewhat noisy in a quiet area. However, it should be fine in a city environment with traffic, as long as I don't crash it into a car

I've flown real aircraft but never a drone, I reckon it's time to put my play station skillz to use!

Posted by freeside There's sites we do that requires miles of walking that we return to multiple times. It would be great to send a drone over to see what building are demolished ahead of time so u don't walk there for nothing. This is an extreme case though. Checking for holes in fences could be a use, but in every example I'm thinking of, walking there in person would suffice. Fly over of somewhere like mare island, hunters point etc and flying up to yourself standing at the top of an abandoned build would make for some amazing video though. Flying through the streets of SF then up to the top of a crane with us chilling would be super ridiculously good. How's the light sensitivity of the built in camera? Does it take decent night footage? We used a gopro hero 3+ on the recent video posted and the night quality is pretty good. We should collaborate if you are down to put in the work and let us use the footage in Jaeger's UE show. This all takes lots of planning coordination and effort, but not much more than we already invest. -free

i'm kinda sick today but that didn't stop me from going and testing this thing out. just after sunset i threw it up and got some photos/video. night photos are good and the website said that RAW will be enabled in a few weeks (!!!) capturing in DNG format.

video was a bit less than i expected it to be, but is somewhat comparable to the gopro hero 3 black while i'm the motorcycle going a tad over 100 with the wind, so not bad.

as for legality, according to the FAA, i can't exceed 400ft, but we shall see....

location: redwood city on top of my apartment building.

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For longer aerial explores you'd want the drone to be able to follow a GPS track instead of being controlled from the ground.

Best would be a drone that could carry a GoPro for quality video plus an iPhone for GSM-based return video.

This tech is completely doable now for a reasonable cost (~$2k?). The off-the-shelf stuff isn't quite there yet for autonomous operation, but it's coming very quickly.

Posted by FastEddy For longer aerial explores you'd want the drone to be able to follow a GPS track instead of being controlled from the ground. Best would be a drone that could carry a GoPro for quality video plus an iPhone for GSM-based return video. This tech is completely doable now for a reasonable cost (~$2k?). The off-the-shelf stuff isn't quite there yet for autonomous operation, but it's coming very quickly.

i've seen a way to do GPS track with the Phantom, and it streams live video to the iphone to see where i'm at. i actually flew it from my roof to the roof of the car dealership yesterday and back (landed and everything). is this what you're referring to?

An electric powered glider type of drone would be awesome to scout the location we have down here. Would be nice to have some sort of FLIR with image recognition to ping us when the guard is out moving around. It's kind of difficult sometimes due to the immensity of the site ~75+ acres. An electric glider would be far more efficient, nearly silent and be able to stay up a lot longer, fly the entire site autonomously via GPS.

Posted by Vectored Approach An electric powered glider type of drone would be awesome to scout the location we have down here. Would be nice to have some sort of FLIR with image recognition to ping us when the guard is out moving around. It's kind of difficult sometimes due to the immensity of the site ~75+ acres. An electric glider would be far more efficient, nearly silent and be able to stay up a lot longer, fly the entire site autonomously via GPS.

that would be awesome to try. i just found some stuff online that uses a solar electric powered glider (no FLIR imaging) but it can circle a GPS point for a very long time. you launch, it navigates on autopilot and you can control the cam.

Posted by spitcool i actually flew it from my roof to the roof of the car dealership yesterday and back (landed and everything). is this what you're referring to?

Very cool. Pretty ballsy to land it remotely and hope to get it back. I guess the off-the-self tech is further than I was supposing.

Sweet pics! Some time back I checked out the RCGroups forum with the same idea though I've not followed up on it. It would be ideal when we are out trying to find old mines since the operations are often scatters over large areas. There are often air shafts or manways away from the main shaft so having an aerial look would be helpful. I had seen some guys flying motor-gliders or standard RC places with a camera attached. It would probably work out in rural areas where we are, but certainly not as good in the city as a copter.

UER in the 21 century.

Abby Normal

I have seen people mod their phantoms to live stream gopro footage from it and increase the range the mods I have seen are awesome.