Have you ever seen a drone photo and thought... "Man, I wish I could take drone photos as good as that!". Well, hopefully this blog post and the two following ones will help you get to where you want to be with a few well thought out tips and tricks. This advice will be split into three sections and three separate blog posts:
Planning
Execution
Post production
For reference, I have shot with three drones over the years all of which being DJI drones and I'm currently using the Dji Mavic Pro 2 + Fly more combo.
I won't go into too much detail about the drone I use in this post as it's more about getting the most out of the drone you have.
Onto the tips and tricks..
Planning
Location Scouting
Websites & apps such as Instagram, 500px & Pinterest are all a great place to start whilst looking for an area that interests you. Whilst some of my favourite images have been a spur of the moment shot where I've spotted a composition whilst driving along, or hiking up a mountain; scouting for images with tools like Google Earth & Photopills is super important in narrowing down where and what you want to actually go and shoot.
Using the available tools to your advantage can hugely improve the quality of your images. There's nothing worse than turning up to a location with an image in mind and finding that the sun is being blocked by an adjacent mountain or object.
Google Maps/Earth - being able to scout out a location in 3D can give you a great sense of what you may be able to capture when you're there in person. For this example I'll use the cover image for this post, taken at Tre Cime di Lavaredo.
Scouting this area in Google maps allowed me to recognise a ton of potential, whether it is the panoramic shot which focuses on the ridge-line, or smaller details such as using the refuge as a focal point with the mountains that surround it as the background. So now you know where you are aiming for you can start to fine tune your planning.
PhotoPills App
PhotoPills quickly became my go to in terms of planning how light will fall in my shots. There is a staggering amount of features in the app which can help you plan your shots, both for ground based photography and drone photography - I doubt I've seen even half of them in all honesty!
The feature I mainly use whilst planning, not surprisingly is the "Planner". This will allow you to zero in on anywhere in the world and plot the sun & light over google maps at any time and date of your choosing. I would suggest changing the map to "Terrain mode" is the best way to view the map, you can then tell whether adjacent objects will block the sun out.
Going back to the cover image for this blog post, from the map below I could see that the light wouldn't catch the front of the famous three towers of Tre Cime but it would fall between the other mountains and catch the ridge-line and the mountain's around the refuge and the refuge itself - perfect!
You may notice the AR options in PhotoPills too, these are really useful for when you're on the ground - it will show the path of the sun/moon/milkyway throughout the day/night so you can check to see if your composition will line up with the elements you want in your shot.
Checking the weather
Whilst this is pretty straight forward, having a quick search online to see what the conditions are likely to be is a good first step, the main things for drone photography being wind/rain/cloud. I tend to cross reference a few websites in order to get a more accurate picture of the upcoming weather. If only they were always 100% accurate!
There are tools online that you can use to go even further which I find to be incredibly useful, one such as MetCheck.com and their CloudWatch which gives you a cross section forecast of the clouds in that area (Today in Ambleside, UK for example below). They have loads of different forecasts that you can use to gain a better insight to what the conditions will be when you arrive on location.
If you're looking to capture specific conditions such as mist/fog, there are indicators that you can look for on the general weather sites such as changing visibility, going from good to medium/poor and having very low wind overnight.
Planning specific shots
I wouldn't get too hung up on exactly the shot you want (height, distance from your subject etc) before you go to a location, unless it's a very specific top down shot that you are after. I'd mainly concentrate on the direction that the light will be coming from whilst planning.
Making sure you're comfortable - layer up!
This might be an obvious one to some, however, I know I've planned poorly and either been left carrying excess clothing I didn't need or not having enough and getting cold!
Make sure you have spare memory cards!
Storage for most drones nowadays is very cheap, always take a couple of spare cards with you just in case. I tend to keep a couple in my main camera bag, and an additional one in the drone case if I'm taking that with me too. I've only ever had one card fail on me in years of shooting, but it's something that haunts me. Getting your drone up and your card failing or realising it's already full is a nightmare. Also, if you forget to put your card back in your drone after transferring your images at an earlier date you're still covered!
I've used Sandisk Micro SD cards for years, they're now very fast and more than capable of recording 4k video too.
On the day
Try your best to get to your chosen location early so you can have a walk around and find a suitable place to take off from and away from other people. I tend to shoot around sunrise/sunset in order to capture the softer, warmer light that golden hour brings. Ideally I'd be on location an hour and a half before sunset and in position a minimum of 30 minutes before sunrise.
I hope this first part of this series has given you some food for thought. Feel free to drop any comments below if you've got any other tips or favourite apps! As always, fly safe!
James
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