Good video-only ship

[birdtrick]

I'm looking to put together a platform solely for shooting video. Like anybody new here, I am feeling slightly overwhelmed. I have asked a lot of questions from individual manufactures and sifted through hundreds of threads. I will admit I am still a bit lost.

My purpose is to get some unique shots for a few of my documentary producer friends. So it would have to be HD. I am an experienced flyer but new to the video aspect. I am willing to put in the time to figure it out, and expect the frustrations. But I am really hoping by starting with the right equipment I can make this goal more attainable. I do realize this could be a year or two project.

Please, any advice would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks

Troy

[Wbird]

Sounds Great,

The project won't take long to put together as far as the mechanical part of it. What can take a while is the funding (never ending, lol) and the experience to get a decent HD video that is smooth. I have seen samples that DJ, AZChoppercam has done that were incredible. Might want to research his threads. There has been many others as well that have done great works too. You need a smooth heli and a steady hand at the controls. Smooth heli is hard to get but steady hand can take longer. Good Luck

[Razor_Racer]

I was wondering that too, but I finally decided upon a Tricopter, the design is fairly unknown but it works well. It uses three outrunner motors evenly spaced, facing up. It doesnt require any special mixers, just uses a radio with heli 120 degree CCPM. The only moving parts are the motors, and the pivots for controlling rudder, so theres almost no vibration. Plus it is fairly cheap compared to anything else.

Also you can consider a Quadrocopter, which has four motors, and no rudder pivots, so its slightly more stable, but even just a control board costs $300 and up, since it needs a lot of mixing.

I thought those two were the best for a hovering aerial video platform that were in a reasonable price range.

The normal type helis can be used too, but they have more vibrations due to all the moving parts, so it would take a little work to get out the little bugs. If there are people around, you could crash and hurt someone badly. Also they can auto, so in the event of something coming up you can land somewhat softly, where these other things would fall.

[MarkWebber]

Helps to have some specifics:

Camera weight
Mount type and weight
Desired flight time
Areas you would like to fly in
Budget

It's easy to suggest a particular heli but without knowing how you want to use the platform, it's all to easy to get the wrong thing.

[hamslice]

I was wondering that too, but I finally decided upon a Tricopter, the design is fairly unknown but it works well. It uses three outrunner motors evenly spaced, facing up. It doesnt require any special mixers, just uses a radio with heli 120 degree CCPM. The only moving parts are the motors, and the pivots for controlling rudder, so theres almost no vibration. Plus it is fairly cheap compared to anything else.

Also you can consider a Quadrocopter, which has four motors, and no rudder pivots, so its slightly more stable, but even just a control board costs $300 and up, since it needs a lot of mixing.

I thought those two were the best for a hovering aerial video platform that were in a reasonable price range.

The normal type helis can be used too, but they have more vibrations due to all the moving parts, so it would take a little work to get out the little bugs. If there are people around, you could crash and hurt someone badly. Also they can auto, so in the event of something coming up you can land somewhat softly, where these other things would fall.

do you have a link to this tricopter?

[birdtrick]

Thanks for all of the replies so far. I spent yesterday reading DJ's posts, and then after putting up this question, I spent a few hours reading Tabb's posts. My brain hurts now. I am seeing the reality that it isn't just a matter of building a clean bird, getting the latest mount technology, and spending a lot of time refining flying skills. That would be great, and I would be up for it. But what I am finding is that there is an extraordinary amount of time spent tweaking and maintaining the heli, constantly searching for where the vibration issue is. It seems a lot of after-market mods are needed as well.

I guess I am trying to sort out whether or not I have the time and patience to become as much an engineer as a pilot. Maybe somebody that got into this recently (and has the same "Keep it Simple" mentality as me) can tell me if it is really as involved as it sounds in these posts.

Flustered, and searching for hope...

[bullaculla]

I was wondering that too, but I finally decided upon a Tricopter, the design is fairly unknown but it works well. It uses three outrunner motors evenly spaced, facing up. It doesnt require any special mixers, just uses a radio with heli 120 degree CCPM. The only moving parts are the motors, and the pivots for controlling rudder, so theres almost no vibration. Plus it is fairly cheap compared to anything else.

Also you can consider a Quadrocopter, which has four motors, and no rudder pivots, so its slightly more stable, but even just a control board costs $300 and up, since it needs a lot of mixing.


Those are nice and stable, but cant lift much. Even the $5000 draganflyer can only lift a pound.
Only good for those little spy cams.

do you have a link to this tricopter?

This is the draganflyer one:
http://www.rctoys.com/rc-products-catalog/RC-HELICOPTERS.html

[hamslice]

i am guessing that any wind would really throw the tri/quad copter around pretty bad.

[Razor_Racer]

Those are nice and stable, but cant lift much. Even the $5000 draganflyer can only lift a pound.
Only good for those little spy cams.






Depends on how big... I ordered parts for a fairly large tricopter, I'm sure it can lift a digital camera. The draganflyer is way overpriced... a normal quadrocopter should cost about 300-400 for the control board, and then all you need is four outrunners w/esc and a radio.

Yep, wind is the only problem... these are like FPs so 20mph or more winds might gust it around a little, when I get mine flying I'll see how much it can take.

BTW the dragonflyer is a quadrocopter, lots more expensive because the mixing is complicated. A tricopter has only 3 motors, and you can use 120 degree CCPM on it, so all I needed to buy was some outrunners and ESCS (got 3 motors and escs for $60 on hobbycity :D) All I need to do is build the frame, which wont be expensive.

[bullaculla]

Very interesting. looking forward to your thread :D
but i still have concerns. like autorotations.
and yeah, that dragan flyer is insane expensive. I wonder who actually bought those.
:)

[Djago]

Here is mine:

http://www.rcgroups.com/forums/attachment.php?attachmentid=1264698

Flighttime with Canon A620 & 5400 mAh 12 min.

Greetz,

Peter

[bullaculla]

Cool. some nice pics in your gallery Peter.
:)

[phover]

You can take a look at this thread (1 meter brushless quadrocopter for $500, but you have to build it):
http://www.rcuniverse.com/forum/m_6581766/tm.htm

can lift 4 pounds (minus the weigth of the machine).

Cheers,

Martin
photo-vertige.com
avusee.com

[Razor_Racer]

Also if your radio has 4 servo 90 degree CCPM, you can use that to fly the quadrocopter instead of the $375 mixing board!

[trackhead]

I'd stick with a more proven video platform than a quadracopter.

You're an experienced pilot, and you want to shoot quality HD for work that should have a budget to work with. So, in my opinion, build up a nice Maxi Joker with 800mm blades. Buy an underslung mount of your choice that will accomodate some of the bigger 3ccd HDV cameras. This set up will get you in the air the quickest, with minimal frustration, and likely fairly smooth, vibration free video.

Best of luck.

[KarbonBird]

Some of the best, reasonable length video foootage I have seen has been shot from a JR GSR260 with a Airfoil Pro 1 mount. Check out these two clips to get an idea of what I mean - then you be the judge:

http://www.smithprod.com/motorcycle.wmv
This is the smithprod website showing the gear: http://www.smithprod.com/aerial%20services.htm

http://www.icecam.is/video/icecam640.mov
This is Maurice's website: http://www.pbase.com/stjarna/icecam

The KS2 gyro makes a really big difference and whereas many have tried (including myself) to get by using a large electric heli without the aid of a gyro, it appears that this is not possible if you want to get consistently stable video footage.

Much of the footage I have seen that is taken from larger electric helis uses extensive post production "smoothing" techniques to get it to a usable standard, however this is accompanied by a quality loss. Whilst some have suggested that this approach is acceptable to use to insert brief video clips together with ground footage when producing a complete promo for example, I have had requests from people who require "Raw" footage wanting to do their own post production work. For this reason I believe that it is important to be able to produce good, stable footage straight out of the camera.

Of course there is a cost factor to consider in setting up a complete gas rig with gyro stabilised which is quite a lot more expensive than for an electric heli. I guess it comes down to what you intend producing video for and your budget.

On the camera selection, I have tested a HV20 and a HC7 on a T-Rex 600 with both an underslung and a front mount. My findings were: The HV20 was totally usuitable due to vibration sensitivity, while the HC7 video quality was slightly better, but in my view still not acceptable as it required post production smoothing. Both of these cameras were returned to the shop for a refund.