I'm with Ken on this. Also, if I had money, I'd have one with a good night vision camera, so I could be nosy and see what's going on in the neighborhood at night. I wouldn't be spying on people's privacy, I'd be mainly for wildlife and also the creepers. I don't know much about drones with regard to ranges, but I'd love to be able to fly it down at the beach, scope out what's going on, and see whether there's parking available, as well as watching the waves.
I intend to. My two big plans, currently, is to get a little closer to town, at night when its really dark, and do some craziness with lights on the drone. Then I'll pay attention and see how many UFO sightings are reported. My second plan is to somehow attach a fedora and a pair of sunglasses, so it looks like a 30's era private dick, and let him hover outside someone's window. This is going to be a blast!
Oh, man! You're living the life! I wish you best of luck in your shenanigans, and I hope you will report back to us with some funny stories. This is pretty much the kind of stuff I would pull if I had one.
I myself don't want a drone. I don't know where to get one, sorry. I don't know what you'd do with a drone unless like a carrier pigeon you can drop messages to another with a drone. Drones sure come in the news time to time. There was some drone activity with the White House that got in the news. What do people do with drones? Krissttina Isobe/oahuwriter
Well, the drone is primarily for flying a camera and based on the demo of that GoPro guy, their camera is small and light since the GoPro is an action camera that is affordable at less than $500 for the high end. And when the drone flies with the camera, you can see a video by connecting your smart phone to the website of GoPro, that's where the video coverage goes directly. It is quite complex but the GoPro guy said that everything is handled by an app so it's not that complicated. Expect the drone to be the craze of the younger generation before the year ends simply because of the affordable price of the drone and also of the camera.
Pardon my ignorance, other than the still photography and video capabilities, what exactly is the difference between a "drone" and what used to just be call RC models? I admit it would be intriguing to play with one, although I haven't forgotten how badly I mangled the tethered biplane given to me as a Christmas present many moons ago. That was great fun while it lasted, though! The idea mentioned before of starting off with the less expensive mini's is a great idea. If those are small enough to have in the house, it might be very effective in teasing the dogs and cat.
You have more flyinh options with a drone. I believe it can not only fly slower, but it can hover, as well.
@Jennifer Graves is correct in that drones can hover. From what I see, that steady hovering function of a drone is what makes it popular with the attached camera for taking video footages of a vista or panorama. We watched the movie Everest and I believe drones were used to shoot about 10% of the movie. Particularly the aerial shots of the icy mountains, only a drone could do that. It looks to me that the drone is just like the toy helicopter with the remote. And the main difference is the navigation and, of course, the attached camera (I don't know if the toy helicopters were equipped with cameras). And there are 2 operators of the drone, one for navigating the drone and another for navigating the camera.