The Nervousness of Flying my Drone

Every time I have flown my drone to take videos/photos of properties there are a ton of nerves and butterflies that I experience right off the bat.  I think a lot of it is driven by adrenaline as there are a lot of thoughts that go into the process. 

For example, the pre-planning involved has already prepared me to "chart out" my flights, and therefore I am thinking about ensuring that I am aware of my surroundings, ensuring that I've paid my hourly Verifly insurance (flight liability insurance), finding the appropriate take off and landing spots, positioning myself so that my visual line of sight isn't obstructed, taking into account sunlight and shadows, and so on!  Wow that does seem like a lot doesn't it?

I think what drives the nerves is that everything is happening in real-time and the importance of capturing the right shots and perspectives, and knowing that you are limited in the opportunities to capture the right shots in a given day.  Compounding all of this, is that there is typically a lot of activity going on around me, and novelty of a drone inevitably draws attention and eyeballs to where I am.

Some of the key takeaways that I implement in my flights are:

1. There is a strong need to focus on the tasks and order of operations at hand.  Try to let all outside distractions become white noise to the flight itself.

2. Have a mindset of being flexible, so that if anything in the game plan changes (sudden changes in view, wind, etc. that may impact your flight), so that I can react quickly.

3. Know the contingency plans as to where to land.

4. Break up the process into multiple flights to avoid flying fatigue.  You would be very surprised at how physically taxing it is to fly a drone for a longer period of time.

Needless to say, it's an exhilarating thrill, and a relief ultimately when the flight is successfully completed.....and I hope the butterflies never go away.  

Putting the Property in Context: Highlighting the Surrounding Neighborhood

One aspect that drone videos and photos allow for the viewer to really get a nice sense of, is the context of the property as it relates to the surrounding neighborhood.  Often times we will get a request to be able to show how close the property is to certain amenities (beach, mountain views, etc.) 

Therefore, in order to create the best sense of this context, it is very important to do the following:

1. Ask the client up front: what are the aspects that they want to highlight in the surrounding neighborhood, what amenities should not be missed in the video?

2. Plan your flights accordingly - often times a flight that "reveals" a wonderful view, has the most impact aesthetically.

3. In post production, be sure to highlight the aspects by adding special highlights or text to mae it obvious to the viewer.

Things we've learned in preparing to film: Visit your property Multiple times beforehand!

Chino Spectrum - with people walking around!

We recommend visiting your property before filming, at least a few times if possible.  There are a few reasons to do this, because often times you will run into obstacles and issues that, had you not visited, you wouldn't know existed such as:

1. Power lines!  Have you ever noticed that in urban areas especially, there are a lot of power lines and power poles surrounding buildings, along the sidewalks and curbs, and sometimes crossing streets and intersections?  No?  Neither did I until we set to film several properties in older urban areas and realized that these obstacles, along with the pedestrian and car traffic, is a really tough flight to navigate.

2. Activity and Movement - from both cars and people.  Have you ever noticed that property videos tend to be more alive and marketable when there are people utilizing the space and the parking lots are full.  Well this is great for marketing and the overall aesthetics of the video.

3. Commercial activity - property management, security, and trash services often times operate during different hours of the day, and so you want to coordinate those times with the various commercial vendors so that it doesn't ruin your shoot.

Flying with People Around - Things that I've learned

Drone shot of Abbott Kinney in Venice, CA.

Having flown around on the job throughout Southern California, some things that we have noticed when shooting property videos include the following:

• People have no issues coming up to you IN FLIGHT to ask you what you are doing, how long you have been doing this, what kind of drone you are flying, etc. etc.. What this ends up doing is a bit of a startling experience as not only do you have to pay attention to your drone in the air, but you are also now dealing with a new kind of distraction. The main thing that I've learned through this, is to maintain your cool, try to land or fly your drone to a "safe" spot in order to overcome the distraction.

• There will likely be a heightened sense of nerves once you are flying and people are around. Typically we have been filming properties with the hustle and bustle of normal urban life happening all around us. What our experiences flying now tell us, is that when you are doing the filming, there is the natural inclination for all of the people around us, the traffic - both vehicular and pedestrian to become "looky-loos", and therefore now YOU are the show. Again as in the first point, maintaining your cool and focus are the most important.

• The point of this post is to begin to illustrate that there are certainly going to be some unexpected occurrences and distractions both before, during, and after flight that are caused by other people that you need to factor in while flying.

Trust the Process

Drone Shot of Welbrook's 50 Unit Senior Complex in Santa Monica, CA.

2017 was an......interesting year to say the least.....but it is hard to deny that technology has become a major influence in our daily lives.  In the industry that I hold dear, Commercial Real Estate (or CRE for short), we are now seeing the impacts both large and small that tech will undoubtedly have on how we do business.

Seeing Real Estate from a New Perspective

What we are seeing from the CRE industry is that professionals are excited with the potential that drones can provide in order to help solve industry pain points.  At a very high level, these are:

1. Marketing your real estate from a completely new and fresh point of view.  Being able to "tell your story" and market to the Millennial Demographic.  Most importantly, making it very affordable to create this kind of marketing.

2. Providing services that are cost-efficient and don't require a large amount of manpower, such as property inspections.

This blog is going to take a deep dive (WARNING: some of these posts may fall into the TL;DR category) into how our experiences serving our clients are influencing how we do business, how we provide our services, and ultimately how we help to shape this emerging influence in CRE that is definitely here to stay!