drones

Until you figure out that it's a drone, and a prank.

Ryan Chatfield was out playing with his drone on Floreat Beach in Australia this week, when its batteries died.

The videographer then sprinted after the expensive toy (he said it cost him over $2000) and managed to catch it before it took a dive in the ocean.

“I thought, ‘That’s it, it’s gone’ but I knew I just had to have a crack at it,” he told The West Australian.

And fortunately he was successful in his rescue attempt and just got a little wet in the process. He also chose the perfect song to edit into the clip using Enya’s “Orinoco Flow (Sail Away).”

We’ve seen lots of consumer drone fails over the past few years, including a guy who saved his DJI Phantom 2 from crashing into a pond at the last second.

A robotics company has unveiled a new drone that flies by itself and acts as your personal videographer.

“Lily” is described on the company’s website as the “world’s first throw-and-shoot camera.”

You place a tracking device on whatever you want the drone to follow, throw it up into the air when you’re ready to starting filming, and Lily will take it from there.

The camera shoots 1080p HD video, can snap pictures and also uses “computer vision” to monitor you. And unlike other drones, Lily will also record and sync audio through the tracking device.

The promotional video above shows the device in action, which looks pretty cool, although it probably takes a while to build up the courage to throw your expensive new gadget off a bridge.

The drone is waterproof and also floats, however, so if the 20 minute battery time expires while over a body of water, you won’t have to go sprinting after it like these guys did.

Lily was invented back in 2013 by two students at UC Berkeley, Antoine Balaresque and Henry Bradlow, but was officially launched Tuesday.

“It’s not the future of drones,” writes Wired, who got to test out the device. “It’s more like the future of the point-and-shoot.”

It’s currently $499 during the pre-sale, but the price will eventually go up to $999.

Two Months ago my roommate drunkenly lost my small drone on a neighbors roof. Two months later after upgrading to a larger drone I attempted a rescue of the smaller drone using hooks I made from coat hangers. Here is the result.

Drones are pretty cool but in the wrong hands they can do some pretty scary things, like spy on people or drop any number of harmful things on an unsuspecting public. Or this:



The point is, it's important to have a defense against drones. That's why the Dutch National Police force have started training eagles to take down drones and look awesome doing it. These birds of prey are the perfect weapon to take down a drone because of their super strong talons and the fact that they can fly.

The only problem so far is that the drone blades could still injure the eagles which means someday our future may include armored eagles.

These spectacular birds-eye views of Uluru, offering a never before seen perspective of the 600 million year old monolith, were captured by the first drone to ever operate under permit inside Uluru-Kata Tjuta National Park.
Uluru is the tip of a huge rock that continues below the ground for possibly 5-6km. Uluru is 3.6km long and 348m at its tallest point. That is 43m higher than Sydney's Centrepoint Tower, 24m higher than the Eiffel Tower and just 33m lower than the Empire State Building.
The colour changes of Uluru result from the filtering effect of the earth's atmosphere on the sun's rays.