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Tech Tip
by Brad Appleby
Appleby Arts

Drones



Drones recently made the news big-time when an Amazon’s delivery drone was introduced on 60 Minutes. As the story goes, Amazon believes that drones could deliver a five pound or less package to your home in thirty minutes via “Octocopter” Drones.

Octocopters are helicopters with eight blades, while Quadrocopters have four blades. The Parrot AR Quadrocopter Drone will let you fly it through your smart phone. It comes with a charger and batteries that last about thirty minutes, and it starts at about $300. You link your smart phone to the Drone using WiFi, and you can fly it without looking directly at it, but at the screen of your smart phone. You can capture flight footage, stream video and record directly to your smart phone using the Drone’s built-in 720p HD camera. By using a free application, you can see what the Drone sees and the controller is on your phone screen.

The Parrot AR Drone is exciting to use and not hard to fly. It hovers very well using the four blades, and it comes with two different body styles, one with protectors around the blades and one without the blade protectors. The video capture is great and saves very fast to your smart phone. When you fly the Drone around with your smart phone, your view is from the front of the Drone. After a few minutes of practice, you will be able to take off, land, hover and flip the Drone! There is an emergency landing button if you get into trouble, or you can press the “home” button and the Drone will return to where you started flying.

Right now the maximum speed record for the Parrot AR Drone is 24 miles per hour with the maximum altitude at 538 feet. The company’s website is parrot.com. Go there to see videos and find out more information.

The FAA is having issues with some types of personal drones because this is a new idea and there are not many rules yet. You can fly one now for fun but new rules and regulations are coming that may limit some types of personal drone use. Just remember to always fly safe and responsibly, and don’t fly near people or airports.

To learn more about this and other Tech Tip articles, contact Brad at (702) 294-1392 or applebyarts.com.




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