Wildlife biologists often work under harsh conditions in unforgivable environments to observe dangerous animals, but if you think that this would pose the biggest risk to a biologists life, you’d be wrong. The number one cause of death for wildlife biologists are light-aircraft crashes.
Dan Nystedt from Sault Ste. Marie in Ontario, Canada was flying his drone to capture some beautiful fall scenics in 4K when his eye caught a moose standing in a lake. As Nystedt moved his Phantom 4 Pro in for a closer look at this majestic animal, a wolf comes charging out of the bushes and a battle for life and death ensues.
Is New England ever more beautiful than during the fall season? After watching this video, you may be hard-pressed to…
Scientists have believed that the narwhal’s tusk was mainly for sexual selection, however, new drone footage shows that the tusk…
Last week we reported about a drone patrol program being started in Perth, Australia. Today we learn that drones will be used to patrol the beaches in the far north of Queensland after a series of crocodile attacks.
Hunting Burmese pythons in the Floridian Everglades is no easy task. The camouflage of these snakes works so well that they are almost impossible to spot in amid the sawgrass and other swamp vegetation. However, there is a new guy in town that makes spotting pythons much easier and faster and it is a drone outfitted with an infrared thermal camera.
Drones are taking the fight against malaria to the disease-carrying mosquitoes in Zanzibar, Tanzania. Malaria affects over 200 million people per…
NOAA reports that drones help improve the scientific research on Antarctic species such as leopard seal by taking photos from…
Drinking and drone flying at the same time could become illegal in the Garden State as lawmakers are moving ahead with legislation.
We knew this was coming but now it is official. Drunk drone flying is now illegal in the state of New Jersey. This past Monday, Gov. Chris Christie signed the bill into law on his last day in office, making it officially illegal to fly a drone while being under the influence of alcohol.
Good morning. Today we’re getting snow in NYC so that means probably no drone flying outside unless we’re going to a snow test for the DJI Mavic Air. We are busy creating a new and better studio for our videos on YouTube, so expect to see improvement in that area soon. And with that let’s take a look at the latest news.
Last year DJI announced a special contest together with SkyPixel and a few days ago they announced the winners. There are some truly amazing photos among the final picks. The Grand Prize, The 2017 SkyPixel Photo of the Year was awarded to the “Above the Polar Bear” photo taken with a Phantom 4 Pro by Florian Ledoux.
Good morning, yesterday the Commercial Drone Alliance asked Congress to revoke section 336, which would require all hobbyist and recreational drone pilots to get their drone license in order to fly. We will be following developments in this area closely. Further more we have an amazing drone video showing the beauty of Namibia, so grab your coffee and jump in.
The use of drones is becoming more prevalent in the study and observation of wildlife. In almost all cases, drones are better suited for the job than traditional airplanes and helicopters. In this example, a team of people who research whales used the very small and affordable DJI Mavic Air to capture photo and video footage of a humpback whale mother and her newborn in the Cabo Verde archipelago.
Two neighbors, an ecologist and an astronomer struck up a conversation in their backyard, which led to an unusual but fruitful collaboration that used star-detecting tools to count endangered animals in South Africa. The scientists used drones with infrared cameras combined with computer-vision and machine-learning techniques to find and count the animals.
More and more wildlife researchers and scientists are turning to drones to observe animals. Drones are in almost all cases a safer and more affordable option to observe wildlife. Ecologist and FAA certified drone pilot from Fort Myers, Church Roberts recently used his drone to study the rookery on little Lenore Island, on the Caloosahatchee River in Florida.
For the second year in a row, Intel brought their drones to the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival. This time it was a live drone show instead of a pre-recorded one. The 420 Shooting Star drones were part of ODESZA’s act last Sunday and flew in a synchronized fashion to create ODESZA’s geometric logo in the sky in a spectacular fashion.
The commercial drone industry is heating up with various drone manufacturers entering the space. DJI recently announced the XT2 and Skyport during a special commercial drone event in Menlo Park. Parrot had been active in this space already, but are now launching the Parrot Bluegrass drone specifically aimed at the farming community.
Crater Lake is simply breathtaking. I had the chance to visit Oregon’s only National Park last summer. We arrived very early in the morning and witnessed the sun rising over the rim on the other side of the crater. It was a sight I will never forget. As the sun kept rising the water slowly got its hallmark deep blue color. I resisted the urge to fly my drone at the time, but it comes as no surprise that many pilots do reach for their unmanned aerial devices, once they see the spectacular views Crater Lake offers. Unfortunately, but understandably so, you are not allowed to fly your drone in any of the National Parks since 2014, including this one. It seems though that not everybody is adhering to this rule and as a result, the park is going to step up the enforcement of the no-drone zone.
In April 2017 a cow and calf moose were illegally shot near Alvena, Saskatchewan in Canada. To assist in the prosecution, Draganfly Innovations, and Saskatchewan Polytechnic were asked to create a 3D map of the conservation-related crime scene. With an Engage Grant from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada, the work was started the same month. The team used a fixed-wing drone to create a detailed visual story that would help the prosecution of the illegal moose poacher.
A great white shark attacked a Trident beta unit submarine drone at Isla de Guadalupe, Mexico late last year. Dominik Fretz took a Trident beta unit out to for testing in the shark-infested waters. The underwater drone captured the scary-looking footage and lived to tell the tale.
A research team used an off-the-shelf DJI Phantom 4 and AI software to identify 7 different tree species in a forest in Kyoto, Japan. After some tweaking of the algorithm, the drone and software were able to identify the tree in the forest with an 89% accuracy. This is notable because the team was able to achieve these results with a consumer drone and regular RGB images instead of expensive hardware, such as multispectral imagers and thus represents a significant cost-savings for forest researchers and managers.
Australian aviation authority, CASA launches a new campaign, that seems mostly aimed at children who might receive a drone as a present, to increase the awareness of the rules for new drone pilots. The campaign is called: “Rules apply when you fly!” and consists of a one-minute video animation that quickly explains the most important rules a drone pilot should be aware of.
Check out this spectacular drone footage of a blue whale mother and her calf. The footage was shot by Domenic Biagini near San Diego on June 26. Reportedly the whales were circling their boat and according to the San Diego Whale Watch, the calf might have been nursing.
