Hello Friends,

Can I ask for some help please ? :spin:

I need to take some low altitude pictures of my family's farm. It is a wooded piece of property and I am trying to do an aerial survey to tell what locations have what kinds of trees after a clearcut. The brush is so thick you can not walk through it with trees 10 to 20 feet high. I need to do about an 80 acre area.

I want to rig up a setup to take pictures to determine locations and calculate areas to determine where to put firelanes and where to clear and plant pine trees.

I need help in coming up with a remote controlled camera system to do that. I have read about KAP Kite Aerial Photography but the only problem with that is the camera getting lost in the brush when it crashes. I thought of a chopper but the same problem occurs. I have thought of a balloon / Kite combo idea like a tethered weather balloon instead of a small blimp. However the blimp idea is nice because I could move it around and upwind to cover the whole area in several pictures.

Can I have your thoughts please ? :newstuff:

Thanks,

Treebud

This may help...

http://z7.invisionfree.com/MARCMAP_Forum/i...?showtopic=1247

Thanks Jon,

I checked that out and am now reviewing some of your info about the disposable video camera.

Any tips on how to lift a two still high resolution camera rig (such as 35 mm disposable cameras that can be rewound with a RC servo or 2 low cost high resolution (cheap) light digital cameras) , into great position to make some vertical photos that I can use to make photo maps to calculate areas of pine trees versus areas of briar thickets ?

Some stereo pictures would be even better !! See this cool rig at this KAP (Kite Aerial Photo) website. The stereo setup is at the bottom of the page. http://www.brooxes.com/newsite/KAP%20equipment/index.html

1) My main concerns are having a stable dependable lifting and moving and airframe that I can keep from crashing into the impenatrable thickets or swamps or 100 foot trees around the borders.
2) My other concern is not spending to much money.
3) Also I would like to be able to start practicing next week with something and like to make the pictures in 2 weeks. I have had aerial photos made by a commercial pilot before but he will not go below 10,000 feet and if a car can even be seen ther is no way to tell anything about it. Much less anything about vegetation such as pine trees. He uses a digital camera and two pixels equals a car. Way to grainy for what I need.

Thanks,

RC-Camera

How much would the cheapest chopper that would work cost me and how hard would it be to learn to fly it ? Would it come with an emergency parachute ?

Check out the forums at RCGroups.com and scroll down to the Aerial Photography threads. There is plenty of information available there, and plenty of people who have the experience to answer your questions.

And here is a link to the Remote Video and Photography forum on the RunRyder RC helicopter board.
Helicopter can be a stable ideal platform for airborne pictures, but would be expensive and time consuming for learning to fly them.
Check it out anyway to learn some more about what is used camera and technique wise.

RunRyder Helicopter Camera Topics - Click Here

Hey Guys,

It is real kind of you to help me with some direction. :)

Thanks very much for the tips and the more the merrier,

p.s. Look at this fun idea I found while following your links !
http://www.rcgroups.com/forums/showthread.php?t=645369

I might be able to use it or a modification of it in some cases ! Talk about low cost !! :dance:

I mainly need advice on a low cost good remote control setup that I can use to control a camera off of whatever I wind up using to lift it.

Can you make some suggestions as well as price ranges please ?

Thanks,

RC-CAMERA

p.s. I now nothing about RC but I choose the name because that is what I intend to learn about !

Radio suitable for operating camera.

Considering that if you go with a tethered camera platform such as the hot air balloon.
You would only need the remote for actual camera function.
One of the cheaper digital cameras would only need a servo to press a button on camera for each picture taken.

Just to give you some idea of what is available at very reasonable price that would easily do the job.
I am not recommending this particular RC system one way or the other as there are several at these specs and price range and would be fine for the job at hand.
It is three channels, meaning it can control three functions in the aircraft/ballon/camera/whatever.
I see one channel used to operate camera and that would leave two functions unused or let your imagination take over. Say the balloon broke free and was drifting away with your camera attached, you could use a channel to drop the camera and airborne radio gear away from the balloon on a parachute for recovery.

Also this particular radio comes with a "micro" flight pac, meaning that the components going up in the air are smaller and lighter than standard. Light weight would be desired for the camera and radio gear in a balloon application as you are talking about.

Sample Radio System - Click Here

Hey Guys,

I found something that is a cross between a chopper and a plane ! Might be just the ticket for when I can master it. It says it can hover and take off and land on a short runway. Might be great for a narrow dirt road in the woods ! :dance:

Has anybody out there flown one of these with a camera ?

Here is the website of the manufacturer.
http://www.autogyro-rc.com/Almost-Ready-To-Fly(ARF).html

Can you guys take a look and let me know what you think please. You have tons of experience to make an educated judgement versus me the rookie.

This is the link for the article about it in FLY RC magazine.
http://www.autogyro-rc.com/user/Gyro%20Bee%200105.pdf

Thanks,

RC-Camera

p.s. I saw a TV program on the history channel about a year or so ago about the real AutoGYRO's that a guy flys in Britian. It was pretty wild !! :twocents:

Hey Alvinonline,

Thanks for the ideas on the transmitter ! I also like the idea of a backup plan like if the balloon broke free having a parachute bring down my camera and equipment instead of it going bye-bye !

I wonder how I could make it deploy the chute and where I could get one. I could probably make one from trash bags.

Thanks for the brainstorming and advice !

RC-camera

Let me know how i can help, you can call if you like. Send me an email and i'll give you my phone number.
Ralph