The Drone Trainer Podcast

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135. Residential Construction Progress, YouTube Specials, & other Drone Work with Don Wiley Jan 21, 2021

Show notes

Don Wiley is a drone pilot from Florida, who has created a very successful niche drone business. Rather than focusing on massive construction progress jobs, he is working on individual residential home builds.

In addition to residential construction progress, he's also creating YouTube videos that cover a specific topic (such as golf cart parades for the recent US Election featuring Donald Trump and Joe Biden). Through those videos and simply via the power of the YouTube algorithm, he adds several hundred dollars a month to his bottom line.

Don is also a member of The Drone Trainer Pro. If you're looking to make the jump from sporadic revenue to scalable and consistent growth, TDT Pro is for you!

Check out The Drone Trainer Pro right here!

Where to find Don:

Mentions in this episode:

Going 4ward with DJI Go 4: The complete guide to configuring and using the DJI Go 4 flying app. (Don's Book!)
CyberLink PowerDirector
Availability of the DJI Phantom 4 Chinese New Year Edition.

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134. Drone Lawyer Q&A with Grant Guillot Dec 28, 2020

Show notes

If you're looking to make the jump from sporadic revenue to scalable and consistent growth in your drone business, TDT Pro is for you!

Check out The Drone Trainer Pro right here!

Grant Guillot, a drone lawyer practicing with Adams and Reese LLP in Louisiana, joins us this week for some legal Q&A. Here is the list of questions that we initially went through, and then there are a couple of bonus questions near the end from live attendees:

Intellectual Property Related Questions

When working with clients how important is it to have a contract that assigns a license for imagery versus assigning rights, and can you share some examples of typical licensing language for drone services contracts? - Steve Diddle
Is it possible / typical to have a contract or license that gives a client certain rights for a specified period of time or purpose and then have the rights revert back to the photographer / videographer / creator of the images/content? - Mark Allen
If working without a contract, can it be expected that both parties have full rights to freely use the captured materials? - Chris Anderson
When flying and capturing videos and pictures of a field, construction site, farming area or area in the woods, ie not taking videos of structures like buildings, are you able to use the footage without getting permission from the owner of the property? - Peter Matt

Non IP Related Questions

So, I pay for legal shield program which is pre-paid legal services. Is there such a program for drone work? One reason for having it was to hopefully protect me if I were to need an attorney for anything in life but the drone issues is an uncertain area for protection. - Ken Elrich
I mainly fly in urban or suburban environments. There are always non-subject people and properties in my shots. I haven't used waivers or permission requests so far.

A. Privacy: Do I always need to blur faces, license plates, addresses? Are there situations where I absolutely do need to? What are reasonable precautions to take to avoid violations of privacy? - John Brainerd

B. Rights/Waivers: If I'm shooting in public, do I ever owe someone the right to request I delete footage that they are included in, or of footage that includes imagery of a corporate entity's property, etc.? - John Brainerd

I'm interested in hearing some feedback on cases you've worked on that may seem obvious to some, but have caught drone pilots off guard with associated legal ramifications. In general terms, if you thought it was OK to do… you'd better think again and here's why. - Bob W

Is there access to the “tribunal” to argue a drone fine and it’s applicability to the situation under which it was given. Perhaps the situation was an accident and the operator was trying to correct it at the moment (say a brief link drop that briefly put the drone over people) operator fixed it and landed but then issued a ticket. - Nick Seemel

If using random music on my personal videos “was/is” ok would I then have to do something to my old posts if my YouTube channel gained some audience and could be argued to now be somehow commercial. Same question for flying without a Part 107 in the past, but now monetizing my channel. - Nick Seemel
I am a Colombian citizen with living in France with the equivalent of a green card. I want to pass the 107 test and I would love to have the opportunity to fly in America, I mean, commercially. The question goes like this: Can I get my 107 licence as a Colombian citizen? If yes, am I able to fly commercially in the US? What are my options? - Antonio Gonima
How do you see the laws changing in the future? Will we be able to fly drones indefinitely? Will there be further restrictions once Amazon starts using their drone service, or others? - Steve Martin
Do you have a recommendation for minimum aviation liability insurance? - Ryan Beston
How far do you think remote ID will go? I don’t have a problem with police officials the FAA knowing who I am and where I am at. I am however concerned about other people knowing. Also, how do you think they will address the issue of drones that do not have the capability of transmitting ID information. - Henry French

Where to find Grant:

LinkedIn
Twitter
MarketScale: Drones in America
Email: grant.guillot@arlaw.com

Shoutout to:

133. Spraying Drones for Agriculture & Covid-19 Response in Botswana with Fanie Kooij Dec 16, 2020

Show notes

If you're looking to make the jump from sporadic revenue to scalable and consistent growth in your drone business, TDT Pro is for you!

Check out The Drone Trainer Pro right here!

Fanie Kooij is a drone pilot from Botswana, who brings an extensive agricultural background to drones. He recently acquired a DJI Agras T16 aerial application (spraying) drone, and has been utilizing it in agriculture. Listen in as he describes how he plans his missions, chemical considerations, water transport, solar charging, and more!

In addition to agricultural work, Fanie is also utilizing the spraying drone to combat the Covid-19 pandemic. I won't go into too many details here, as he can describe the process far better than I can.

We too look forward to working with aerial application drones (sprayer or spraying drones) as they become more prevalent and can cover massive areas of farmland.

Where to find Fanie:

Facebook
WhatsApp: +267 72 520 814

132. Pro Video Production and Drones with Joe Serkoch Dec 09, 2020

Show notes

If you're looking to make the jump from sporadic revenue to scalable and consistent growth in your drone business, TDT Pro is for you!

Check out The Drone Trainer Pro right here!

Joe is a two time Emmy award-winning Producer and Founder of Orionvega, Pittsburgh video production company. He has produced highly-visible projects for a variety of clients including Dove, Calvin Klein, Olympic Paints, and AOL. Networks that have featured Joe’s work include ChannelNews Asia, PBS, SPIKE, HGTV, DISCOVERY, and Comedy Central.

Over the years, Joe has hired drone pilots to work with him on his video productions. In this episode he discusses what he was looking for when hiring a drone pilot, and also the greater knowledge that he has now since obtaining his FAA Part 107 license.

The plugin that Joe mentions is Neat Video Plugin.

Where to find Joe:

Orionvega (video production website)
Eyes From The Skies (drone website)
Twitter
Instagram
Facebook
Vimeo

131. Journalism and Commercial Flight with The Drone Girl, Sally French Dec 02, 2020

Show notes

If you're looking to make the jump from sporadic revenue to scalable and consistent growth in your drone business, TDT Pro is for you!

Check out The Drone Trainer Pro right here!

Sally French has been a drone journalist and commercial drone pilot for 7 years, and shares her industry insight and more in this week's chat!

We cover off how drones got into journalism, what works and what doesn't work, as well as her non journalism related commercial drone flight!

Where to find Sally:

130. Drone Search & Rescue, Training, Mapping, NASCAR and more with Michael Hill Nov 11, 2020

Show notes

If you're looking to make the jump from sporadic revenue to scalable and consistent growth in your drone business, TDT Pro is for you!

Check out The Drone Trainer Pro right here!

Michael Hill is a drone pilot from Dallas, TX, who is working in a wide range of industries with his drone. He's working in search and rescue, wind turbine and cell tower inspections, NASCAR, education, training, consultancy and more.

Listen in as we dig into SAR missions, including planning and search techniques, as well as infrared technology utilizing the FLIR XT camera on his DJI M210.

Where to find Michael:

129. Selling Stock Drone Footage via Getty Images, Shutterstock, and more with Steve Diddle Oct 29, 2020

Show notes

If you're looking to make the jump from sporadic revenue to scalable and consistent growth in your drone business, TDT Pro is for you!

Check out The Drone Trainer Pro right here!

Steve Diddle has been flying drones for 10 years now, and was one of the early drone ambassadors for the Parrot Bebop.

Over the years he has been contributing stock footage to companies such as Getty Images, Shutterstock, and more. In this episode, Steve shares with us what works and what doesn't in the stock footage game. You're going to hear everything from how much you get paid, and what formats work the best.

In addition to stock, we also discuss camera settings to help capture the best photos and videos that you can. Everything from exposure and composition, to rule of thirds and panoramas.

Speaking of Panoramas, here is a preview of the one that I discussed during this episode:

Where to find Steve:

Looking for drone insurance?

Check out Skywatch!

127. Drones in Real Estate and YouTube Success with OriginaldoBo (Ken Dono) Oct 07, 2020

Show notes

If you're looking to make the jump from sporadic revenue to scalable and consistent growth in your drone business, TDT Pro is for you!

Check out The Drone Trainer Pro right here!

You probably know Ken Dono as OriginaldoBo, right? Ken joins us on this week's episode to discuss drones in real estate, and his successful YouTube channel.

The real estate discussion doesn't just stop with drones, as Ken also gives us insight into how he shoots interiors and exteriors with his ground based cameras. Yep, we get into aperture, ISO and shutter speed, shooting wide, and more!

You can find Ken on YouTube, Twitter, & Instagram.

126. Coastal Shoreline Mapping with Benjamin Ritt Sep 23, 2020

Show notes

If you're looking to make the jump from sporadic revenue to scalable and consistent growth in your drone business, TDT Pro is for you!

Check out The Drone Trainer Pro right here!

Benjamin Ritt is a drone pilot from Texas, who has been utilizing a variety of drone technology to survey beaches and coastlines.

During our chat, Benjamin offered up a dataset for us to download and try our hand at coastal mapping. If you’d like to download that dataset for free, simply drop your name and email below, and we’ll send it to you ASAP!

https://thedronetrainer.com/map/

We’ve been drone mapping for a long time now, however since we are landlocked we don’t often have the opportunity to map shorelines or really anything to do with water. That’s where Benjamin Ritt comes in!

As we chat with Ben, he reveals his workflow, and how he overcomes the obstacle of mapping a moving body such as water. When everything sits still it’s far easier than when it’s moving, is reflective, sometimes lets you see through it depending on the angle, etc.

Some of the drones that Benjamin has used for this include the DJI Phantom 4 Pro, Phantom 4 Pro RTK, as well as the Wingtra VTOL fixed wing drone. Listen in as he describes the benefits of each when it comes to mapping.

Mapping anywhere from 1 to 10 miles of coastal beach is no easy task, and in this episode, Ben describes exactly how he does it. You’ll learn everything from planning and flight, to post processing technique. FYI, he is processing his maps with Agisoft Metashape and Pix4D, while capturing data with GSPro.

You can find Benjamin on his website, Unmanned Coastal Solutions.

125. A commercial drone business journey with Sydney Lisignoli Sep 03, 2020

Show notes

If you're looking to make the jump from sporadic revenue to scalable and consistent growth in your drone business, TDT Pro is for you!

Check out The Drone Trainer Pro right here!

Sydney Lisignoli is an Oregon based drone pilot, who working on growing her commercial drone business. She obtained her Part 107 in 2019, and is currently flying the DJI Mavic Pro.

She's been keeping busy flying for automobile dealerships, real estate, agriculture, mapping, construction progress, and more. Shes editing in Adobe Premiere Pro, and mentioned that Peter McKinnon's video editing tutorials have been a great help.

You can find Sydney on her website, Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube.

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