…crickets…
Yours was the first comment, which probably explains why this post was almost hidden to people who only browse BB via the BBS page. It’s a shame, because it’s an amazing project and a great application of drone technology.
The entire process was automated: We pulled back the drone on our home-made bungee launcher, and flicked on the autopilot. The motor spun up, we crossed our fingers, and let go. We watched nervously as it gained altitude, our eyes on the live video and flight path as it flew back and forth over the village. Incredibly, it worked! After 20 minutes it finished its flightpath and came back and flew in circles overhead, waiting for us to bring it in to land manually.
It looks like the map comes from the data gathered in a single flight, which is very impressive. I wonder how well this will scale though, once it comes to possible clashes with political and commercial interests. Pessimism aside though, it would be great to see more support for this kind of initiative.
Oh. A user-interface fault then?
Yes. One of many possibilities.
There will be clashes. We need the tech to get so cheap that abandoning the craft and vanishing is a viable strategy in case of a collision with “teh authoritah”. We the People are getting our eyes, and shouldn’t be willing to give them up. A $1000 craft is a much more difficult thing to just abandon than a $50 toy that can be considered disposable once the video is acquired and beamed away, or even mid-mission when the heat is up.
Same here, same here. Meanwhile we are squandering a lot of manpower in discussions about words…
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