Menzies,
That's fine, but I'll wait til the dust settles. It ain't over, yet. Registration does no good for anyone except the govt. It will be challenged.
Drones!
- Thread starter Arthurc
- Start date
The friendliest place on the web for anyone who enjoys boating.
If you have answers, please help by responding to the unanswered posts.
If you have answers, please help by responding to the unanswered posts.
Menzies,
That's fine, but I'll wait til the dust settles. It ain't over, yet. Registration does no good for anyone except the govt. It will be challenged.
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If you've got a drone locked for being unregistered, it's good for you.
OP
OP
Arthurc
Guru
Well this whole thread escalated quickly 
Mavic Pro arrives tomorrow, found some water landing options on eBay I’ll try out as well. Have a few months to practice on dry land... and yes, I’ll register it, and no I wont spy on you.... you are not that interesting anyways
AC
Mavic Pro arrives tomorrow, found some water landing options on eBay I’ll try out as well. Have a few months to practice on dry land... and yes, I’ll register it, and no I wont spy on you.... you are not that interesting anyways
AC
Yup, made me look too. Just went in. Anyhow, I do everything I can to fly my mavic without being noticed or a nuisance. I actually think the new propellers have made a significant difference. Once I'm over 100 feet in the air, people really don't notice and unless really windy, you never hear it. I find drones to be best unseen.
I just flew over my parents place on Mt. Hood. As many years as we have been up there, I've never been able to visualize the valley and hillsides in the same way. Over the water, it's always another great perspective. The drone has made me much more interested in photography in general, now I'm shooting more stills at wide angle with a new Fuji camera. It's been a lot of fun. I need to learn to do more editing in final cut for view, but more time spent overhauling my wordpress blog to host better pictures and vids, seems never ending. Fun though. Wish I was better/quicker at maintaining those things. It's as much work as a job!
I just flew over my parents place on Mt. Hood. As many years as we have been up there, I've never been able to visualize the valley and hillsides in the same way. Over the water, it's always another great perspective. The drone has made me much more interested in photography in general, now I'm shooting more stills at wide angle with a new Fuji camera. It's been a lot of fun. I need to learn to do more editing in final cut for view, but more time spent overhauling my wordpress blog to host better pictures and vids, seems never ending. Fun though. Wish I was better/quicker at maintaining those things. It's as much work as a job!
Simi 60
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As a full time liveaboard on the hook out here is my world - I try not to follow the goings on of the dirt dwellers or things I have no control over.
Its not necesarilly me I was concerned about
Give me your address and I'll send someone over with a camera and look at your wife and children through the bedroom/bathroom windows, who knows what state of undress they'll be in or what website they'll end up on.
But hey, nothing to worry about right?
menzies
Guru
Good grief. I would strongly advise both your wife and daughter to either close the drapes or be in an appropriate state of dress if they can be seen through a window.
Maybe that is just common sense though.
psneeld
Guru
When anchored out, I dont mind a drone circling my boat at a few hunred feet to get a few "public" looks and pics, but when it starts "staring at my vessel" close up or peering in windows, all bets are off for the life expectancy of that drone.
Its like being at a marina and the non boaters that lean over to your boat and start peering in windows. I ask them to move along as they wouldnt want me doing it at their house. That is just etiquette they dont understand and need to he educated on.
Sure I have drapes and blinds, but there are always some angles you dont expect snoopers to be able to see into unless you are under surveillance.
Are drones like binocs and telescopes, sure, but you have to know creeps will use them incorrectly, no different with drones.
Its like being at a marina and the non boaters that lean over to your boat and start peering in windows. I ask them to move along as they wouldnt want me doing it at their house. That is just etiquette they dont understand and need to he educated on.
Sure I have drapes and blinds, but there are always some angles you dont expect snoopers to be able to see into unless you are under surveillance.
Are drones like binocs and telescopes, sure, but you have to know creeps will use them incorrectly, no different with drones.
Alaskan Sea-Duction
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jleonard
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Carbon fiber props are supposed to be quieter.
I hope I never get paranoid enough to think that anyone with a camera or a new hobby is spying on me.
I also hope I can resist the urge to shoot down an FAA registered aircraft.
I hope I never get paranoid enough to think that anyone with a camera or a new hobby is spying on me.
I also hope I can resist the urge to shoot down an FAA registered aircraft.
Simi 60
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You can't see into our top deck bedroom/bathroom area from water level, especially from a boat on water level a few hundred metres away - when lying in bed we can't see the water.
I don't expect perverts to do the equivelant of climbing a ladder with a camera to look in - you might find it acceptable, most do not.
Common sense would be don't do it.
angus99
Guru
I like the possibilities that drones, used with restraint, offer but I think regulation is inevitable . . . so I tend to split the baby on this issue. I don’t think anyone sunning themselves nude anywhere has a reasonable expectation of privacy. Airspace, after all, belongs to the public and before there were drones there were helicopters and hot air balloons. But I believe a reasonable right to privacy should exist within someone’s home. If someone has to cross my property line to see inside my windows (whether my shades are open or not) I’d consider it an invasion of privacy and would likely respond proportionally.
I think there should be neither an absolute expectation to privacy nor a right to infringe on others’ reasonable expectations of privacy. I wonder how many proponents of zero regulations on drones would feel about government spying on them . . . either via drones or other physical or cyber technologies? Anyway, drones are yet another challenge to our laws and institutions by technologies unimaginable to the Founding Fathers.
I wish some of our eloquent attorneys would weigh in. In the meantime, here’s a slightly dated discussion on the subject: https://www.economist.com/blogs/democracyinamerica/2015/03/drones-and-privacy
I think there should be neither an absolute expectation to privacy nor a right to infringe on others’ reasonable expectations of privacy. I wonder how many proponents of zero regulations on drones would feel about government spying on them . . . either via drones or other physical or cyber technologies? Anyway, drones are yet another challenge to our laws and institutions by technologies unimaginable to the Founding Fathers.
I wish some of our eloquent attorneys would weigh in. In the meantime, here’s a slightly dated discussion on the subject: https://www.economist.com/blogs/democracyinamerica/2015/03/drones-and-privacy
Fletcher500
Guru
I see your point. Sounds like a dirt dwellers conspiracy to me.
thekiltedwonder
Veteran Member
Maybe FlyWright is replying to my comment about DJI? My Phantom is completely legal. DJI is just a horrible company that cripples their old products
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If you google the term, you see hundreds of discussions about the locked drones. I believe it has to do with geo-fencing and software updates to prevent anonymous flights in restricted flight areas.
thekiltedwonder
Veteran Member
That may happen as well, but that is not the case for me or the problem Ior hudreds of other people have. My Phantom flies fine, but they nuked the camera. There are threads all over the place about that including the one I linked
This has been an ongoing issue for years. Their final few updates to the camera firmware and DJI-Vision app resulted in a blank screen for fpv. You could still fly and the snapshot and video recording functions still work, you just couldn't see what was going on. The last update made it so you couldn't even connect to the camera.
Search Results for “drone” – Slowboat
The Slowboat site has some video from PNW-Alaska drone flights
The Slowboat site has some video from PNW-Alaska drone flights
ssobol
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In this day and age, personal privacy is a just a distant memory from a simpler time.
If you use any electronic communication device, your location is being tracked and the content transmitted and received recorded (e.g. Google admitted to tracking phone locations even when you had the location services set to off, the police can ping your phone location at anytime and you can't do anything about it except by turning the phone completely off).
If you drive in any built up area, your location is likely tracked and recorded e.g so you pay your tolls electronically via a transponder or toll by plate, police licence plate readers).
If you walk the streets of a modern city, your location can be tracked and recorded (UK cities generally have the highest concentration of cameras for monitoring the public in the world).
If you walk the streets in most residential neighborhoods, your location can be tracked and recorded (by your neighbor's home security system)
Quite a lot of what happens in your house can be monitored via the internet (e.g. hacking the IP cameras in your home security system, or by the internet apps that let you see what your dog is doing).
Anywhere you go in your boat can be monitored and tracked.
Some of this occurs because people want their modern conveniences (like their phone telling them how to get to the closest McDonald's). A lot of it comes from the Patriot Act.
So people who get their knickers in a twist because somebody's multirotor device is near by and might or might not be looking in their direction and could be infringing on their privacy is missing the bigger picture.
If you use any electronic communication device, your location is being tracked and the content transmitted and received recorded (e.g. Google admitted to tracking phone locations even when you had the location services set to off, the police can ping your phone location at anytime and you can't do anything about it except by turning the phone completely off).
If you drive in any built up area, your location is likely tracked and recorded e.g so you pay your tolls electronically via a transponder or toll by plate, police licence plate readers).
If you walk the streets of a modern city, your location can be tracked and recorded (UK cities generally have the highest concentration of cameras for monitoring the public in the world).
If you walk the streets in most residential neighborhoods, your location can be tracked and recorded (by your neighbor's home security system)
Quite a lot of what happens in your house can be monitored via the internet (e.g. hacking the IP cameras in your home security system, or by the internet apps that let you see what your dog is doing).
Anywhere you go in your boat can be monitored and tracked.
Some of this occurs because people want their modern conveniences (like their phone telling them how to get to the closest McDonald's). A lot of it comes from the Patriot Act.
So people who get their knickers in a twist because somebody's multirotor device is near by and might or might not be looking in their direction and could be infringing on their privacy is missing the bigger picture.
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menzies
Guru
DJI continually update their aircraft firmware with restricted locations. If you begin to fly into a restricted airspace such as an airfield or stadium you will meet the cone effect. The closer you get to the field or stadium the aircraft wil automatically lose height until the closest allowable point is reached at which time the aircraft will land.
Since unplanned loss of height and landings are not in the best interest of the owner, best to know your flight area.
I am withtin 5 miles of Naval Station Mayport which has an airport. I keep my drone under 400 feet. As far as I am concerned, no matter where I happen to be flying, 400 feet is plenty anyway. Going to 1000 feet does not give you much in the way of video or photography, though interesting for the horizon!
BTW, here is an October Sunday sunrise I was able to capture! Mayport Naval Station is on the left across the ICW (looking East).
For this video I was under 200 feet. So clearly 400 feet is more than plenty for most uses.
psneeld
Guru
As far as privacy I got the big picture plenty.....just like most things in life.....I cant do much about long range cameras or electronic hacking (sorta), but I CAN AND WILL do something about the drone violating my space (within reason of course as I posted, public land and not peering in at me).....
As far as 200 feet....I spent thousands of helicopter hours flying up and down waterways at less than 200 feet.
As far as 200 feet....I spent thousands of helicopter hours flying up and down waterways at less than 200 feet.
menzies
Guru
Your point(s)?
BruceK
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A paramedic with a boat on our marina says he uses a drone with camera to assess difficult remote areas where he is tasked with extracting a casualty.
As Bronwyn Bishop`s brother, he is familiar with helicopters.
As Bronwyn Bishop`s brother, he is familiar with helicopters
.
Simi 60
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Just because you have given away, given up on and are hopeless at maintaining personal privacy doesn't mean others are.
Burner phones, fake persona's, VPN's and tin foil hats are things some of us have been using since the beginning.
Terminator, Elysium, Idiocracy, Person of Interest etc are not just movies and TV shows - they are guidebooks to our survival.
HopCar
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Simi, aluminum foil is not acceptable for hats. Their rays go right through it. I switched to lead foil for my hats many years ago.
The Mavic pro platinum came out with upgraded props. Look at the 8331 props. It's only like a 15 pct change, but I found it muted a lot of the noticeable tones, especially at a distance. Not at all like the older phantoms that are easy to hear and then notice.
My buddy who has a phantom got a spark. Honestly at 100 feet, I could spy on the Russians from Sarah Palins backyard.
The village marina where we used to slip our boat is a long line of slips along a sea wall, which abuts a public park. The park has a walking and bike path that meanders along the sea wall. A couple of years ago a sailboat pulled into a slip in the marina, unloaded his drone and launched it from the paved pathway in the park. Citizens, including moms with kids in strollers had to walk around the operator and his commandeered launch area. He had his wife directing traffic. He launched the cheap four poster drone out over the water and proceeded to fly it up and down the line of boats. I walked out on the back deck and flipped a bird to the camera,, which was buzzing its obnoxious "drone" directly over our boat at the time. He moved it down the line directly over the fuel dock, then took it back down the line and hovered over an empty slip. His spouse shooed pedestrians away, and then they posed and waved for the camera. At that moment I walked over to his landing area and sat down on a park bench that was directly under his flight path to the "cleared" landing area. The wife, and then the operator tried to shoo me off. I wouldn't budge and explained that he couldn't fly over people, and didn't have the right to commandeer the park for his exclusive use.
Long story short, I got the local police involved....and then the Village Manager, then the FAA. An ordnance is now in place that prohibits takeoff and landing from city parks and beaches without prior approval from the village government. The drones in parks problem, which was escalating, has abated somewhat, although I have subsequently noticed owners launching from their boats (in the marina).
There are two aspects to the operational problem. Air space and ground space. Local government can currently control (to an extent) the takeoff and landing phase. Once it leaves the ground, authority transfers to the entity that controls the airspace. In any case, a small town with three cops, and the FAA (nearest office 50 miles away) cannot police the idiots. And that community is well populated by idiots. The subject of airspace control is currently under review and one proposal would allocated 0-100 feet (I believe) to control of communities...outside airport areas, of course.
A problem that I consider more important than noise and privacy is safety of the simple, inexpensive, hobbyist, four poster designs. They are virtually uncontrollable following failure of a single motor or propeller/rotor. There are many videos on you tube illustrating the issue. A manned helicopter (or airplane) is certificated to a safety level where controllability is assured in the event of a power failure. The hobbyist drone industry convinced the FAA (U.S.) that a drone under a given weight and speed probably wouldn't kill a pedestrian following loss of control for any reason. Then they compensated by saying the operator must follow a community based criteria from a model airplane organization. The actual reliability of the control system and the controllability of the vehicle after an engine/prop failure was brushed under the rug. It will reemerge when one of these hobbyist type machines slices up some kid's face.
All of this is still in flux from a regulatory perspective, and the community based model aircraft groups are not pleased about how they have been coopted to enabled a crowd of users who know zero about appropriate usage guidelines.
As an aside, larger commercial drones will almost certainly have at least five prop/rotors in order to address the issue of controllability following a single failure. I would urge all of you with four poster hobbyist machines to attempt a takeoff or landing with one motor disabled to satisfy yourself that you are capable of controlling your device in the event of a fairly common failure. Then think about operating the device in marinas and around fellow citizens. If you operate your machine anywhere near my boat, I will call the police and the nearest FAA office. You might not be cited, but I will make your life miserable to the maximum extent that I can.
Long story short, I got the local police involved....and then the Village Manager, then the FAA. An ordnance is now in place that prohibits takeoff and landing from city parks and beaches without prior approval from the village government. The drones in parks problem, which was escalating, has abated somewhat, although I have subsequently noticed owners launching from their boats (in the marina).
There are two aspects to the operational problem. Air space and ground space. Local government can currently control (to an extent) the takeoff and landing phase. Once it leaves the ground, authority transfers to the entity that controls the airspace. In any case, a small town with three cops, and the FAA (nearest office 50 miles away) cannot police the idiots. And that community is well populated by idiots. The subject of airspace control is currently under review and one proposal would allocated 0-100 feet (I believe) to control of communities...outside airport areas, of course.
A problem that I consider more important than noise and privacy is safety of the simple, inexpensive, hobbyist, four poster designs. They are virtually uncontrollable following failure of a single motor or propeller/rotor. There are many videos on you tube illustrating the issue. A manned helicopter (or airplane) is certificated to a safety level where controllability is assured in the event of a power failure. The hobbyist drone industry convinced the FAA (U.S.) that a drone under a given weight and speed probably wouldn't kill a pedestrian following loss of control for any reason. Then they compensated by saying the operator must follow a community based criteria from a model airplane organization. The actual reliability of the control system and the controllability of the vehicle after an engine/prop failure was brushed under the rug. It will reemerge when one of these hobbyist type machines slices up some kid's face.
All of this is still in flux from a regulatory perspective, and the community based model aircraft groups are not pleased about how they have been coopted to enabled a crowd of users who know zero about appropriate usage guidelines.
As an aside, larger commercial drones will almost certainly have at least five prop/rotors in order to address the issue of controllability following a single failure. I would urge all of you with four poster hobbyist machines to attempt a takeoff or landing with one motor disabled to satisfy yourself that you are capable of controlling your device in the event of a fairly common failure. Then think about operating the device in marinas and around fellow citizens. If you operate your machine anywhere near my boat, I will call the police and the nearest FAA office. You might not be cited, but I will make your life miserable to the maximum extent that I can.
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If the machines are properly certificated to the same engineering safety standards as manned aircraft, and are operated by trained and certificated "pilots" in specifically approved airspace, I have no problem with them. FAA Aircraft Engineering fought the hobbyist drone intrusion into the national airspace system tooth and nail. The drone lobby politicked their way around a proper engineering approval and forced the current political hobbyist operating scheme down the FAA's throat. The politics of it are slowly swinging back the other way....thanks to many safety minded people like me and idiot hobbyist operators who regularly make the evening news.
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