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US Open (Golf) this week at Erin Hills! - Drone flyovers

Great footage, was this flown manually or premapped with AutoPilot. Particularly like the semi orbit of the greens

Thank you. Par 5's and some par 4's were premapped, the rest were flown manually. Autopilot came in handy on par 5's where sun angles were tricky and needed to be flown many times and therefore the repeatability was a must to nail down the full flight path.

Nice job. Good intel if you intend to play the course too.

Very true regarding intel for the course. Especially because Monday was the first time that many of these pros have played Erin Hills. It's a new course to professional golf and should be a very good test for many of these pros. It could be a very interesting Open depending on how they set the course and how mother nature behaves. WI weather is very unstable right now with such high humidity and so far this week it has made for some windy and very heavy air conditions.
 
Really nice to see some good honest solid work like this! How many hours did you end up investing in the project - it must have been considerable given the constraints of lighting, weather and hours available for flying without being chased by golf balls!!
 
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Really nice to see some good honest solid work like this! How many hours did you end up investing in the project - it must have been considerable given the constraints of lighting, weather and hours available for flying without being chased by golf balls!!

Let's just say we wayyyy underestimated hours on the job for this project. It took all of July and August. WI weather is very unpredictable when it gets so humid in the summer. Between rain, overcast skies, maintenance days, and golf events, we struggled to find enough perfect shooting days for this project over the course of two months. Guests also pay a pretty penny to play at Erin Hills and we had to be at least two holes ahead or behind of any guests to avoid any possible complaint about "the annoying drones".
 
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Regarding the holes that were mapped using AutoPilot, how did you calculate the height throughout the hole as if you for example specify 50 foot at take off and want to orbit the green at say 15 foot but it's up hill (or down) do you just guess/estimate the difference? Could be quite tough and there's no way to maintain the height accurately

I'm doing a course Thursday and for the first time will try mapping them (as a test) but concerned about the undulation of a hole and knowing what height to enter
 
One other question if you don't mind what angle did you put in for the focus trigger? Is straight ahead 0 degrees? Or is directly down 0 degrees? Is you see what I mean

Thanks
Dean
 
One other question if you don't mind what angle did you put in for the focus trigger? Is straight ahead 0 degrees? Or is directly down 0 degrees? Is you see what I mean

Thanks
Dean

For Focus Triggers it all depends how much horizon you are looking to have in your shot and what kind of distance away you are shooting from the subject but typically its a negative angle. 0 degrees is straight ahead. Focus triggers can be a bit challenging to nail down perfectly in AP, especially if you're using multiple focus triggers and interpolating them. That's where a cam op comes in to save time with trying perfectly interpolate camera triggers.
 
Yeah that's a good point regarding the camera operator, as the course I'm shooting Thursday have been specific about heights, the want like a ball flight so for example 25ft waypoint 1, up to wp4 80ft then gradually down to wp7 25 ft maintain that while orbiting the hole! Think second controller/camera operator would be best as working out each angle for 10 waypoint could be tough

FYI I wouldn't want much horizon in good to know 0 is straight ahead though, just for knowledge is directly down -90 so around -45 would be diagonal?
 
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FYI I wouldn't want much horizon in good to know 0 is straight ahead though, just for knowledge is directly down -90 so around -45 would be diagonal?

Yes, I believe you are correct. I've seen optimal to be around 75ish percent but again thats going to vary based on altitude of the copter, altitude of the subject, and your optimal amount of horizon.
 
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Wow very nice. Super high quality. "Props" to you guys...will be watching the golf on TV
 
Whoops, meant to write -75 degrees in that last post. No percents, and will definitely be a negative value. Sorry for any confusion...must have gotten sidetracked when I was writing that earlier.

Ah that makes sense :) no problem thanks for confirming and thanks for your advice, I'll share how ours goes Thursday (if the weather in the U.K. Holds out!)
 
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I find myself shouting out when watching TV.."Drone shot!" I think my wife is sick of hearing it. :).

I think you guys did a great job! But I did notice that what is shown on TV was almost double speed which makes ANY drone footage jerky. Why did they do that to you? Did they suggest a framerate, speed, Raw, etc...? Curious if the courses I am doing could be filmed in sport mode??? Nice videos you posted btw. And beautiful pics.
 
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I find myself shouting out when watching TV.."Drone shot!" I think my wife is sick of hearing it. :).

I think you guys did a great job! But I did notice that what is shown on TV was almost double speed which makes ANY drone footage jerky. Why did they do that to you? Did they suggest a framerate, speed, Raw, etc...? Curious if the courses I am doing could be filmed in sport mode??? Nice videos you posted btw. And beautiful pics.

The flyovers they are showing throughout the broadcast are Fox Sports' and are a completely different style of flyover. Very rushed, poor lighting and odd, inconsistent altitudes that do not show Erin Hills' features which make it such a spectacular course. A few of the different commercials/spots they are showing throughout the coverage have some of our Inspire aerials as well.
 
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Hello!

I will do this kind of flyover as well with Inspire 1 Pro, but in a more difficult terrain with a lot of trees.

My question to you: Where did the pilot and camera op "hide" in the shots? :)

I will also do a lot of testing to see that I get good videosignal so we don't fly in the dark. My cam op display tend to lag a lot. :(
 
Hello!

I will do this kind of flyover as well with Inspire 1 Pro, but in a more difficult terrain with a lot of trees.

My question to you: Where did the pilot and camera op "hide" in the shots? :)

I will also do a lot of testing to see that I get good videosignal so we don't fly in the dark. My cam op display tend to lag a lot. :(

Hi there – Best of luck to you on your upcoming job.

Regarding our operating positions, we had scouted about 4-5 locations on the course and noted what holes we had the best reception to fly and shoot final takes. All of these locations had our crew out of the shot. With such a large course and such small lighting windows for different holes, the only way we get through our shot list when the course allowed us to film was by finding central locations to fly from. From there we could nail takes on multiple holes that had overlapping lighting windows and not have to chase around the course when time and light was limited.

Safe flying.
 

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