How to use Drone

If you fly as a hobby, you don’t need any special training or certification before putting a Drone in the air. But that doesn’t mean you should take your new quadcopter out of the box and start flying it right away. Instead, learn how to use it safely and effectively to get the best photos and videos without sacrificing the safety of yourself and others.

Learn the rules

While you don’t have to take a class to fly a Drone to have fun in the US, you still have to register with the government. The FAA charges $5 for a two-year hobby license. Licensing is done on a per-person basis, so you can pay once and fly as many Drones as you own.

There are some very basic rules of the sky to follow. We have a separate article going into them in detail. But the basics are simple:

• Keep your drone at least five miles from the airport.
• Keep it at or below 400 feet of altitude.
• Don’t fly over crowds of people.
• Keep it within range visual look.

Learn Your Drone

Maybe you did some research before spending a few hundred dollars (or more) on a quadcopter. But if you’re not sure what your drone can do, it’s time to figure it out.

The latest flagship models are packed with useful safety features, but you need to understand what they do and how they work to take advantage of them. Obstacle avoidance is a big one. A lot of drones have it, but it doesn’t always work the same way. Is it always in your model? Will it automatically navigate around obstacles, or will it simply freeze in place when it detects something blocking its path? Are the sensors on the front or multiple sides of the plane?

It would help if you also understood how the automatic return home function works. Pretty much every Drone with GPS will fly back to its take-off point in case the control signal is lost or on-demand. You can usually set the altitude for the flight home. That is especially important if you’re flying in an area with trees or other low-altitude obstacles, you’ll want to make sure the drone is set to a safe height before returning to autopilot.

You should be familiar with the location of the home command, whether it’s the physical button on your drone’s remote or the icon in an app that adjusts the settings. You should also see if your remote has a Pause button to stop and hover in place with the push of a button.

While it’s a last resort, you should also learn how to cut off power to a drone’s engine in an emergency. I’ve seen some models fly away by surprise, and I’d rather pick up the pieces of a crashed drone and retrieve the memory card than let the plane fly away, never to be seen again.

One of the FAA’s rules for recreational flight is putting a sticker with a registration number on your drone. If you lose a drone in the wild, there’s a chance someone can look up your registration details and get the plane back to you, though I wouldn’t hold my breath about that happening.

In addition to the controls, you should know how long your drone can fly on a full battery charge. Usually, there are on-screen indicators of battery life in the app, and it will help you plan your flights. Most consumer models fly for 20 to 30 minutes with a fully charged battery.

You will also want to make a note of where your drone control app displays telemetry data. Typically, you’ll get a real-time feed of airspeed, altitude, orientation, and location on a world map, in addition to a live feed from the camera. It is important to be able to recognize and process this information in flight.

Learn to fly

So you know how your drone works, how to activate its emergency safety features, and how long it can fly on a single battery charge. All settings? Not yet.

The next step is to learn how to fly things. You can get started in a few different ways. If you are cautious, consider working with flight simulation software first. DJI built this feature into its app, allowing you to use the drone’s remote control to fly through a virtual world. But if you choose a different brand, or require more discipline and structure, consider a training program.

There are several ways to go for training. With Zephyr’s simulation software, you can try Real Drone Simulator for free or pay for a more polished experience, complete with a dedicated remote for use during training.

Consider an online training course if you are more likely to do better in a classroom setting or plan to take the FAA Part 107 test to fly commercial drones. Drone Academy offers several packages, and if you are in the New Jersey area, you can take the course in person at Drone Academy.

If you want to skip the simulator, I’d recommend limiting early flights to areas with few people and keeping the drones close to you and at a reasonable altitude. The left stick will adjust the height and rotate the drone, starting with manual controls, while the right stick moves forward, backward, left, or right.

Once you have manual control, you can work with the automatic flight modes included in many modern drones. You can practice automated shots, including perfectly circular and revealing trajectories in which the drone ascends and leaves a subject to show its surroundings. Different planes will have different autopilots, so it’s a good idea to spend some time checking each option.

What about the camera?

Maybe you don’t just fly. Drones have become popular not only because of their built-in cameras, and there can be as much to learn about cameras as the drones themselves. Modern drone cameras record undistorted images and videos, a far cry from the fisheye images of early efforts.

Just like on the ground, the settings you’ll use to capture stills and video are completely different. Drone cameras are built like smartphones; most have prime lenses with bright apertures to get low-noise footage at magic hour.

But you won’t always fly in the sunset. To get the right angle for video, you’ll have to add a neutral density (ND) filter for flights in bright conditions. Keep in mind that a shutter speed of 1/48 sec is ideal for 24 fps video and 1/60 sec for 30 fps. It is necessary to cut down on the amount of light entering the lens to obtain those speeds while maintaining the proper exposure. I recommend the filters from PolarPro, as they are strong quality and available for many different drone cameras.

You don’t have to worry about ND for still images unless you’re interested in blending the look of long exposure photography with an aerial view. For most stills, you’ll want to freeze motion, using a short shutter speed to get a sharp exposure.

In addition to camera settings, you should be confident with the physical controls used to adjust the gimbal’s exposure and tilt. Some recent drone models, including the zoom function, also have a lever to set the angle of view of the lens and can recreate the famous dolly zoom effect of Alfred Hitchcock’s Vertigo.

Pre-checklist

My final piece of advice is to follow a checklist before each flight. Here is the one I use:

The day before the flight

Battery charger and remote control

Check drone firmware update.

Confirm the contents of the memory card loaded into the computer, format, and check

Check the weather forecast for the planned time and place

Planned location verification without any flight restrictions

Check drone compass calibration at a location.

Verify GPS key, battery status, and memory card before take-off

Visual inspection of aircraft and propellers; Look for any cracks in the plastic or other potential problems

Make sure your phone is fully charged before take-off

Confirm manual controls are working properly immediately after take-off

Those are the basic steps I recommend taking before each flight. You may find that you want to customize the list a bit. For example, if you use a filter, make sure you have the right filter, or if you have a drone with interchangeable lens support, make sure you have the right lens for you.

True mastery will come with time. So remember to have fun and get some great videos and pictures. But most importantly, stay safe while flying your drone.