Happy Monday!  I’m enjoying a day off from work in honor of Dr. Martin L King’s Day.  The weather yesterday cooperated (sort of) and I got to do some more flying.  It is clear to me that I still have lots to learn.  I’ve watched a lot of videos on flying, read the instructions, and spent a fair amount of time on the Phantom Forums, however there is no substitute for actually getting out and learning first hand.

So yesterday I decided to fly from my back yard for two reasons.  One I only had half a battery and I wanted to make sure I could land safely when the battery was low.  The app on my iPhone makes a loud warning sound that repeats when you get to 20% battery left.  Anyway I had a misstep on my first attempt at getting airborne and bounced the Phantom into the snow, which meant that the camera was buried in snow.  😦  So I cleaned it up and dried it out  before trying again.  (Lesson #1)

I got brave enough to fly to 358 feet in altitude.  I actually couldn’t see it from the ground and of course that made me very nervous.  I had the point of view live image on my iPhone but in the bright sunlight it was hard to see where I was.  I still do not have the camera configured properly.  I’ve got some more work to do on that and learning what the best setting for the camera is.  Anyway I flew it over the house and wanted to take an aerial shot of my neighbor’s home to make a nice framed image to give him for helping with my snow removal.  I need a lot more work on composition and positioning of the Phantom.  (Lesson #2)

By the way that little green spot in the middle of the patio is me.  🙂

I got a little braver and drove out to the industrial park.  There is a nice fishing pond and walking path there and I wanted to practice flying around a given area.  As you can see from the video below there is an old bridge that they have set across part of the pond, however it is not yet open to the public.

So I flew around the pond and just where the video stops I took a couple of images of the ice fishermen.  I wanted to get closer but again my motto is that I don’t want to spoil anyone’s day so until I learn how to control the Phantom I’m keeping it very far away from people.  When you take a still image you have to shut the video off and take the images.  Then you have to remember to turn the video back on.  (Lesson #3) So I missed the coming back to the parking lot and a great landing because I forgot to turn the video recording back on.  I still see live point of view images while flying but just not recording what I see.

After landing and checking everything out I decided to get a little bolder.  So I did a low flyover of the bridge (it was pretty cool if I do say so myself) and then went up and around the pond again only at a lower altitude.  This time when I came back to the parking lot I let the Phantom hover and I walked over to it and looked into the camera and waved (I thought that would be cool.)    I took the first image on this post and then landed the Phantom.

When I got home none of that video nor some of the other video that I wanted to show was retrievable.  I kept getting the files are corrupt.  😦  Damn camera!  Then I thought it has to be something I’ve done so I went to the Phantom Forums.  Sure enough after about 20 minutes of searching and reading I found the problem.  When you land and are ready to shut down you have to shut the video capture off and power the flying app off.  Then turn the Phantom off and then your video will not get corrupted.  (Lesson #4)

So much to learn and such a little brain to learn it with.  Doesn’t look like very good flying weather today.  I’ll have to see this afternoon.  I was standing in the shade (so I could see the video) at the industrial park and without the sun shining on me I froze like a Popsicle.  Found it hard to land the Phantom because my fingers were so numb.

That’s it for today.  Hope you enjoy your Monday.  Thanks for stopping by the blog and be careful.