Just had my first 'incident' with someone expressing their concern about privacy. I live on a corner with only one joining neighbor but 4 others on my side of the street, and behind us is a solid 40 acres of pasture with some cattle on it. Not mine, but we do regularly interact with them; feeding and petting.
I launch from my backyard to about 5-6m, then travel out to the pasture before gaining any further elevation or doing any other flying. I'm basically practicing at this point with about 5 hours of flight time. Decided to go photograph the cows to work with photos as I've only done some photos of our house and one neighbor (after discussing with him).
My drone is registered and tagged, and I do my best to consider privacy and rules.
I was standing on one of our benches watching my drone as I was photographing the cows (actually, by this time I was about 50-60m up over the far tree line) when a car stopped on the street and the driver asked me if "that was my drone that was flying in her backyard". I said that "If you mean the drone in the back pasture, then yes, that is mine". She asked if it had a camera to which I replied "yes, it does". All reasonably cordial at this point, though I could tell she was headed somewhere with her conversation and it was unlikely to be pleasant. She then said that it made her very uncomfortable that I was photographing her backyard. I said that I had no interest in her backyard and was only taking pictures of the cows. I was probably only 8-10 feet high when doing that. She said that she saw the camera pointed at her backyard (which is only enclosed by a wrought iron fence) and it made her very uncomfortable. I said that I respected her concerns and would avoid that area in the future, but also reiterated that in no way was I photographing or filming her space. She continued to insist that she had seen the camera pointed at the back yard and how uncomfortable it made her. I again assured her that even though the drone may have been facing her, the camera was focused on the cattle. I also repeated that I would respect her concerns. This conversation may have gone back and forth once or twice more, I don't truly recall. Her tone changed during the conversation to the point where it was no longer cordial. Not specifically rude, but clearly not wanting to hear my side of the conversation.
Clearly, she was upset by the fact that a drone was in the space 'near' her back yard. I reviewed the logs and don't think I was ever within 50 feet of their fence. Most of my photos are 180 degrees from their yard. One was parallel.
During the whole conversation, the drone was essentially parked at about 50m height over the far tree line with me checking on it about every 5-10 seconds (which is not the best practice). After the conversation I brought the drone down and landed it to sit and think for a bit. I actually feel really bad that I upset someone, but at the same time wasn't going to be pushed around and have someone persist in their accusation of me photographing their space.
The whole event has sort of soured me on the hobby a little. Worse so that it's one of our neighbors. We don't know them well, but the very few interactions to date have been pleasant. If I have to load up the car and travel every time I want to fly, that changes the whole dynamic of my not insignificant investment. I guess in the back of my mind, I had the thought that this might happen at some point. Just didn't realize it would be with a neighbor over me photographing cows. If my humor were in place, I'd say this is just 'bullshi_'
Anyway, thoughts and comments from anyone on how to a) deal with these situations any differently than I did, b) how to get past feeling bad (if I should), and c) did I do anything wrong?
Technically, I probably should have asked for permission to fly the pasture. It's a very nice little piece of land with a homing pond that ducks, geese, herons, and any number of other fowl use. Hawks and other predators patrol it from the tree line of about another 20 acres. There are no dwellings or structures other than what is probably an old pump shed back in the trees. The house was bulldozed about 2 years ago.
FWIW, Country of record is the US.
I launch from my backyard to about 5-6m, then travel out to the pasture before gaining any further elevation or doing any other flying. I'm basically practicing at this point with about 5 hours of flight time. Decided to go photograph the cows to work with photos as I've only done some photos of our house and one neighbor (after discussing with him).
My drone is registered and tagged, and I do my best to consider privacy and rules.
I was standing on one of our benches watching my drone as I was photographing the cows (actually, by this time I was about 50-60m up over the far tree line) when a car stopped on the street and the driver asked me if "that was my drone that was flying in her backyard". I said that "If you mean the drone in the back pasture, then yes, that is mine". She asked if it had a camera to which I replied "yes, it does". All reasonably cordial at this point, though I could tell she was headed somewhere with her conversation and it was unlikely to be pleasant. She then said that it made her very uncomfortable that I was photographing her backyard. I said that I had no interest in her backyard and was only taking pictures of the cows. I was probably only 8-10 feet high when doing that. She said that she saw the camera pointed at her backyard (which is only enclosed by a wrought iron fence) and it made her very uncomfortable. I said that I respected her concerns and would avoid that area in the future, but also reiterated that in no way was I photographing or filming her space. She continued to insist that she had seen the camera pointed at the back yard and how uncomfortable it made her. I again assured her that even though the drone may have been facing her, the camera was focused on the cattle. I also repeated that I would respect her concerns. This conversation may have gone back and forth once or twice more, I don't truly recall. Her tone changed during the conversation to the point where it was no longer cordial. Not specifically rude, but clearly not wanting to hear my side of the conversation.
Clearly, she was upset by the fact that a drone was in the space 'near' her back yard. I reviewed the logs and don't think I was ever within 50 feet of their fence. Most of my photos are 180 degrees from their yard. One was parallel.
During the whole conversation, the drone was essentially parked at about 50m height over the far tree line with me checking on it about every 5-10 seconds (which is not the best practice). After the conversation I brought the drone down and landed it to sit and think for a bit. I actually feel really bad that I upset someone, but at the same time wasn't going to be pushed around and have someone persist in their accusation of me photographing their space.
The whole event has sort of soured me on the hobby a little. Worse so that it's one of our neighbors. We don't know them well, but the very few interactions to date have been pleasant. If I have to load up the car and travel every time I want to fly, that changes the whole dynamic of my not insignificant investment. I guess in the back of my mind, I had the thought that this might happen at some point. Just didn't realize it would be with a neighbor over me photographing cows. If my humor were in place, I'd say this is just 'bullshi_'
Anyway, thoughts and comments from anyone on how to a) deal with these situations any differently than I did, b) how to get past feeling bad (if I should), and c) did I do anything wrong?
Technically, I probably should have asked for permission to fly the pasture. It's a very nice little piece of land with a homing pond that ducks, geese, herons, and any number of other fowl use. Hawks and other predators patrol it from the tree line of about another 20 acres. There are no dwellings or structures other than what is probably an old pump shed back in the trees. The house was bulldozed about 2 years ago.
FWIW, Country of record is the US.
