First flight over water!

Cotts100 · Sep 23, 2018

First flight over water and a very quick edit which needs more time. Not sure my nerves can handle too many over water moving shots though!

Gavieboydgi · Sep 23, 2018

Nice one.

RPL · Sep 23, 2018

I remember the first time I flew 1.5 miles out over a massive lake and had white knuckles the whole time (3 years ago). Now, flying over water makes no difference to me whatsoever. Just don’t fly too low, and you’ll be good.

Cotts100 · Sep 24, 2018

RPL said:
I remember the first time I flew 1.5 miles out over a massive lake and had white knuckles the whole time (3 years ago). Now, flying over water makes no difference to me whatsoever. Just don’t fly too low, and you’ll be good.

Thanks for your comment - Good the hear! It’s the dynamic RTH that gives me the shakes - Spark oddly lost connection when coming in to hand catch from the boat but was close enough for a jump grab before it wandered off to the last recorded homepoint somewhere out in the sea from where we had come!

Andre Levite · Sep 24, 2018

Once you get comfortable manually returning to home flying over water has a lot of advantages: no trees, no power lines, no buildings, no people below, farther line of site, less swirling wind around structures, more stable exposure and best of all the scenery is usually beautiful.

You have some great footage. Keep at it!

PascalG · Sep 24, 2018

I pretty much only fly over water from a boat. The biggest potential issue is that if you loose connection and the drone RTH it may land in the water if you can’t reconnect. Even anchored as the boat swings it may not be in the same position when the drone RTH

Drones are great to film watersports like tubing, skiing or jetsking. You can get some really spectacular footage. Problem with spark is that the gimbal doesn’t stay level in sports mode making it hard to film fast moving subjects. That’s one of the reasons I bought an Anafi (second video)

I ve had a few instances when i swept as low as 3 or 4 feet above the water and cringed watching the footage.

Cotts100 · Sep 24, 2018

PascalG said:
I pretty much only fly over water from a boat. The biggest potential issue is that if you loose connection and the drone RTH it may land in the water if you can’t reconnect. Even anchored as the boat swings it may not be in the same position when the drone RTH

Drones are great to film watersports like tubing, skiing or jetsking. You can get some really spectacular footage. Problem with spark is that the gimbal doesn’t stay level in sports mode making it hard to film fast moving subjects. That’s one of the reasons I bought an Anafi (second video)

I ve had a few instances when i swept as low as 3 or 4 feet above the water and cringed watching the footage.

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A great pair of videos - thanks for the inspiration to get more footage and look more into the editing.

Steve Kennedy · Sep 30, 2018

I certainly understand your concern about flying over water (I too, have done it). Your control of the drone and photography was stellar! I hope I get that good. These little flying machines are tools as well and you used yours VERY well. You have my respect.

Cotts100 · Sep 30, 2018

Steve Kennedy said:
I certainly understand your concern about flying over water (I too, have done it). Your control of the drone and photography was stellar! I hope I get that good. These little flying machines are tools as well and you used yours VERY well. You have my respect.

Many thanks for your kind comments - however I must admit that this video was almost entirety due to the ‘Active Track’ smart mode!! After launch and flying to the start point the Spark did the rest itself by flying backwards and panning to keep the boat in the shot. An amazing small drone!

Koala Tails · Oct 9, 2018

As long as the Spark is being driven, & not attempting a low altitude hover over water, it behaves normally. As you have learned in auto modes it is best to watch & be ready to manually avoid problems. Nice vids.