Whats our gear worth these days? Closing our aerial business down :( and having a moan

giumick · Jun 28, 2018

Well sadly we are having to wrap up after 2 1/2 years

It sucks and i can safely say now the amount of no R/C experience clowns flying has totally ruined the sector in my opinion and pushed it down a road of app screen tapping numpties. Eventually one of these clowns will seriously hurt someone when the craft has a error and the pressure is on. Combine that with folk like some of the people i encountered on here who just blatantly break the rules and do jobs they should not in ways they should not and it makes for a slim success rate.

I must make it clear these are generic statements i make so do not apply to everyone i know. There is some good people on here and i have had good advice from them i am grateful for.

It really has been a bitter pill to swallow seeing the success of others based on incorrect work practices/ simply having lucky breaks we never had and always will be.

Beyond bad luck I hold DJI as the company responsible for leading the industry down a road it should never have taken and see a future filled with more app jockies tapping screens over skilled fingers on sticks.

I love RC, have flow since i was 6 and will carry on non professionally and i will finish building my PH2 powered 700 span tarot.

Anyway rant over.... i wanted to ask some advice

Mainly...what we should charge for selling off our gear.

We have

1x I1
1x X5r
1x OSMO and x5 adapter
5x I1 batts
1x osmo I1 ink up and holster

And some other accessories.

In this current climate what do you think its worth? Id love to keep it all but the wolves are at the door now.

Regards
Mick

The Editor · Jun 28, 2018

giumick said:
Well sadly we are having to wrap up after 2 1/2 years

It sucks and i can safely say now the amount of no R/C experience clowns flying has totally ruined the sector in my opinion and pushed it down a road of app screen tapping numpties. Eventually one of these clowns will seriously hurt someone when the craft has a error and the pressure is on. Combine that with folk like some of the people i encountered on here who just blatantly break the rules and do jobs they should not in ways they should not and it makes for a slim success rate.

I must make it clear these are generic statements i make so do not apply to everyone i know. There is some good people on here and i have had good advice from them i am grateful for.

It really has been a bitter pill to swallow seeing the success of others based on incorrect work practices/ simply having lucky breaks we never had and always will be.

Beyond bad luck I hold DJI as the company responsible for leading the industry down a road it should never have taken and see a future filled with more app jockies tapping screens over skilled fingers on sticks.

I love RC, have flow since i was 6 and will carry on non professionally and i will finish building my PH2 powered 700 span tarot.

Anyway rant over.... i wanted to ask some advice

Mainly...what we should charge for selling off our gear.

We have

1x I1
1x X5r
1x OSMO and x5 adapter
5x I1 batts
1x osmo I1 ink up and holster

And some other accessories.

In this current climate what do you think its worth? Id love to keep it all but the wolves are at the door now.

Regards
Mick

Hi Mick - have replied to you via PM.

NickU · Jun 28, 2018

Well, this DJI numptie wishes you luck for the future

I am going backwards though.... just bought a small RC Heli to play with and can see me going further into the heli's too. Drones are so easy with all their altitude and positional holds!

Anyway, no idea what your I1 kit is worth, but good luck...

giumick · Jun 28, 2018

NickU said:
Well, this DJI numptie wishes you luck for the future

I am going backwards though.... just bought a small RC Heli to play with and can see me going further into the heli's too. Drones are so easy with all their altitude and positional holds!

Anyway, no idea what your I1 kit is worth, but good luck...

Thanks Nick, Its not a pop at all Dji owners pal so dont take it that way

They had humble beginnings selling on sites like hobbyking with R/C hobbyists initially buying them and Its not our fault they lost their way after the i1 and went all apple hipster max profit style (I think ive just invented a new phrase). Its aimed at the people that actually think they are complicated to fly and use haha.

I am actually scared of RC heli's once they get large. I have a few small ones but mainly planes for my larger stuff. Ive been getting into drone racing as well too recently and got myself a nano one to race around our house/ garden. The sims are pretty cheap to get hold of and a good editing pc runs them great

Boom lets see an i2 keep yup with that haha

adwb · Jun 29, 2018

I really wish the CAA in England would just take the existing commercial licence requirements and make them compulsory for all drone flyers, that would sort out 50% of the cowboys we have here, he rest just need to be traced via their you tube and so on posts and prosecuted , most would stop if they can't post any way I suspect.

Don't know how you protect the rest of the hobby RC flyers but they way it is going we all are getting tarnished by the same brush of irresponsible flying out of LOS and over built up areas and people.

NickU · Jun 29, 2018

Lol, you'd need a few acres to set up the course to run an I2 at 58Mph+ and corner at speed, tho in fairness it can turn very quickly if you play with the settings

No offence taken Mick

Sorry to hear your selling up tho', the days of a drone only business earning a living are getting harder, same goes for photography tho... costs and barriers to entry are so low now, along with a very low bar height in terms of talent

Just beginning the fun of trying to trim out/set up a small heli on the push rods and swash plate etc... afternoon of fun learning what does what

. Got a small fixed pitch one for indoor/outdoor - very cheap spares for crashes and repairs, unlike DJI

always wanted to fly an rc heli since I was a kid, so thought might as well give it a go....also means I can annoy the neighbours with it and fly int he back garden and they can't complain

PortCanaveralFlorida · Jun 29, 2018

giumick said:
Well sadly we are having to wrap up after 2 1/2 years

It sucks and i can safely say now the amount of no R/C experience clowns flying has totally ruined the sector in my opinion and pushed it down a road of app screen tapping numpties. Eventually one of these clowns will seriously hurt someone when the craft has a error and the pressure is on. Combine that with folk like some of the people i encountered on here who just blatantly break the rules and do jobs they should not in ways they should not and it makes for a slim success rate.

I must make it clear these are generic statements i make so do not apply to everyone i know. There is some good people on here and i have had good advice from them i am grateful for.

It really has been a bitter pill to swallow seeing the success of others based on incorrect work practices/ simply having lucky breaks we never had and always will be.

Beyond bad luck I hold DJI as the company responsible for leading the industry down a road it should never have taken and see a future filled with more app jockies tapping screens over skilled fingers on sticks.

I love RC, have flow since i was 6 and will carry on non professionally and i will finish building my PH2 powered 700 span tarot.

Anyway rant over.... i wanted to ask some advice

Mainly...what we should charge for selling off our gear.

We have

1x I1
1x X5r
1x OSMO and x5 adapter
5x I1 batts
1x osmo I1 ink up and holster

And some other accessories.

In this current climate what do you think its worth? Id love to keep it all but the wolves are at the door now.

Regards
Mick

Mick – This space is not only for individuals loving to fly UAVs but also creative people as well , photo and video. You’re here because you are creative, and will create something else that brings you joy. I’m sure all of us here wish you well.

On the other side of the coin look at Hollywood back in the day. They had exclusive toys to edit film, they had the market! Now, every tom/**** and harry has the availability to edit right on their desktop! Those union members were not too happy! Take “professional photography” sounds big! Just think of the camera bodies, lens, all the other stuff that goes with it $$$$ and guess what, many have closed the doors because everyone now has a cell phone and they are “the professional photographer” Are they pointing at Samsung or Apple?

Blaming so-called “clowns or DJI” gets nowhere; it’s lack of marketing on the other end that places you way above the other – In any business.

You’ll do fine, because you are creative and have the support of others - so go create again!

giumick · Jun 29, 2018

PortCanaveralFlorida said:
Mick – This space is not only for individuals loving to fly UAVs but also creative people as well , photo and video. You’re here because you are creative, and will create something else that brings you joy. I’m sure all of us here wish you well.

On the other side of the coin look at Hollywood back in the day. They had exclusive toys to edit film, they had the market! Now, every tom/**** and harry has the availability to edit right on their desktop! Those union members were not too happy! Take “professional photography” sounds big! Just think of the camera bodies, lens, all the other stuff that goes with it $$$$ and guess what, many have closed the doors because everyone now has a cell phone and they are “the professional photographer” Are they pointing at Samsung or Apple?

Blaming so-called “clowns or DJI” gets nowhere; it’s lack of marketing on the other end that places you way above the other – In any business.

You’ll do fine, because you are creative and have the support of others - so go create again!

Your absolutely right pal and there is people on here that can wipe the floor with me with video and photo knowledge so i know we have all walks here.

It took me 2 months to get decent manual set video out of the x5r so by no means was i an expert on every aspect of it. I was a point and shooter before all this.

But the reason i blame people like Dji is because they opened the market up too much and ultimately have made things too easy for inexperienced hands.Of course i wish the CAA did alt more too.

This market is so saturated we never got a chance to shine in my opinion. We filmed a Olympic athlete, did some televised footage but just never got enough work to really make our show reel punch in 2 and a half years.

I am a aerospace engineer and toolmaker by trade but this meant so much more to me as it was the dream of mixing hobby and work so i feel so frustrated it didnt take off.

I even tried to branch into engineering with my background of thermal analysis etc...nothing came of it.Tried another passion of mine filming nature sites and.... the wildlife organisation in question saw our work for our local branch and.... went out and trained operators themselves. A friend of mine is training them up. Our smaller branch as great as they were never had the budget to pay us for anything we did. How much flying experience will the new operators have...chances are very little.

And in reality it means little how well you market if your constantly undercut.

We filmed Olympic athletes, did some televised footage but just never got enough work to really make our show reel punch in 2 and a half years. I am a aerospace engineer and toolmaker by trade but this meant so much more to me as it was the dream of mixing hobby and work.

This is a trend in humanity now not just this sector, we have technology doing all the hard work and inexperienced people as a result.

Mark my words someone will be seriously hurt soon by a DJI product flown by a clown. And everyone professional will potentially suffer as a result. With this whole culture of super easy to control craft relying heavily on on board stabilisation been considered the norm, its a matter of when not if.

Ahhhh i need a stiff drink

And maybe a vacation

giumick · Jun 29, 2018

NickU said:
Lol, you'd need a few acres to set up the course to run an I2 at 58Mph+ and corner at speed, tho in fairness it can turn very quickly if you play with the settings

No offence taken Mick Sorry to hear your selling up tho', the days of a drone only business earning a living are getting harder, same goes for photography tho... costs and barriers to entry are so low now, along with a very low bar height in terms of talent

Just beginning the fun of trying to trim out/set up a small heli on the push rods and swash plate etc... afternoon of fun learning what does what . Got a small fixed pitch one for indoor/outdoor - very cheap spares for crashes and repairs, unlike DJI always wanted to fly an rc heli since I was a kid, so thought might as well give it a go....also means I can annoy the neighbours with it and fly int he back garden and they can't complain

Youll get there pal, Its a learning curve (even more so on helis) but you will sus it out soon enough.

Remember though not to p the neighbors off too much. If they throw something at your heli and it wanders off towards them you may as well have asked wolverine to sort them out for you haha. Thats why im scared of them to a point, my dads pal was minutes from bleeding out in the ambulance years ago when his receiver failed on a old 35mghz unit (before 2.4 frequency).It chased him down the field and butchered his legs. With a fixed wing plane you can kill the motor and its mot a spinning blade of death at least

You should look at 3d drones, They do all the aerobatics that 3d helis do but have less kinetic energy as the props are nice and short

On a thing like that you could assign a kill switch on the TX and it would just be a dead weight to bat out the way if anything went wrong

NickU · Jun 30, 2018

Impressive, but I think I'm more into trying to be able to do slower accurate/precision flying rather than acrobatics - brain's not quick enough to pretend to be top gun pilot these days

The Heli's are also a strategic move for me - As they're model aircraft, so long as it's safe to fly (

), I can continue to practise in the garden with them if the neighbours where ever to decide to be anti-drone or grumble about me flying the drones from base (I can just get the 30m minimum needed for take off and then easily clear the 50/150m as I live in the countryside.) The Heli's also make far more noise as I keep them close in

... so it's a case of which would you rather I do... noisy heli for longer, or quieter drone for a few seconds before it's off in the distance

Don't know if I'll ever go as far as fuel engine Heli's for the scenario you mention - I'd rather have something I can kill the power easily and ditch, or which has a hover in place/land failsafe, don't fancy finding out what being made into mincemeat feels like

NickU · Jun 30, 2018

giumick said:
But the reason i blame people like Dji is because they opened the market up too much and ultimately have made things too easy for inexperienced hands.Of course i wish the CAA did alt more too.

Not really DJI, they're just riding the wave at the minute - the industry is following a pre-beaten track - the only people that make any money are the manufacturers and those providing training. Been there and seen it all with the pro photography market. It'll not be long before the trainers start crashing out big time too (we've already seen one or two go to the wall) - there's too many of them jumping on the wagon now. Some of the manufacturers will follow suite to - we've already seen GoPro burn spectacularly

giumick said:
This market is so saturated we never got a chance to shine in my opinion...

The stuff you mentioned with the organisations and wildlife bunch etc is just typical, sadly we just have to take it on the chin and move on, find a new feeding ground, new contacts. Like in the Pro Photo industry, it tends to be who has the greater endurance... last man standing wins, but sometimes it's hard to keep on standing up after the knock-backs

giumick · Jul 1, 2018

NickU said:
Not really DJI, they're just riding the wave at the minute - the industry is following a pre-beaten track - the only people that make any money are the manufacturers and those providing training. Been there and seen it all with the pro photography market. It'll not be long before the trainers start crashing out big time too (we've already seen one or two go to the wall) - there's too many of them jumping on the wagon now. Some of the manufacturers will follow suite to - we've already seen GoPro burn spectacularly

The stuff you mentioned with the organisations and wildlife bunch etc is just typical, sadly we just have to take it on the chin and move on, find a new feeding ground, new contacts. Like in the Pro Photo industry, it tends to be who has the greater endurance... last man standing wins, but sometimes it's hard to keep on standing up after the knock-backs

I know i moan about Dji but i only do because they have pushed the market in a direction i dont like. I think they should of focused on professional equipment not making professional equipment idiot friendly and locking it off to their own systems. Plus there software updates etc...well enough said on that haha.

I really wish yuneec had beat them to the post as they have a better ethos and way of doing things. The reality is Dji have created a arms race with their control over the market and most people are just getting debted up to keep in the loop without making enough back to justify it. Just like apple they thrive off their customers been in a perpetual state craving the next model landing.

I wish all along i got a yuneec 920 tornado over the i1 raw upon reflection .

And on the subject on jobs yeah its all just a big let down really. I have escaped it now and honestly its a relief.

Photo Jim · Jul 1, 2018

Just like anything business related, you have to change with the times and the technology. I've been a pro photographer since 1985 (yeah, back in the Neanderthal film days), and I rode that wave of true professional photography in my business for many years. Made a lot of money too. Then when digital came out, I thought "this is the greatest thing to ever happen in my industry." Man, was I (and MANY other pros) immensely wrong about that. Digital, while making it easier for pros to accomplish their daily tasks, also made it easy for every Tom, **** and Harry to take "decent" pictures themselves. Oh, and it also allowed them to work their regular full-time jobs and charge a penny to do the photography. Enter cell phone cameras. Now, EVERYONE has a decent camera, and the world is saturated by photography. It has turned my industry upside down, making it nearly impossible for a seasoned professional photographer to work full-time anymore. Fortunately for me, I saw this coming years ago and I added many more services to my repertoire, including video and aerial. I could never just rely on aerial alone, nor could I ever rely on weddings or other areas of photography by themselves. It has cost me so much money acquiring the equipment I need to do all of these things, and that has made my income drop considerably since the film days, but at least I'm still employed full-time and doing what I love doing.

giumick · Jul 1, 2018

Photo Jim said:
Just like anything business related, you have to change with the times and the technology. I've been a pro photographer since 1985 (yeah, back in the Neanderthal film days), and I rode that wave of true professional photography in my business for many years. Made a lot of money too. Then when digital came out, I thought "this is the greatest thing to ever happen in my industry." Man, was I (and MANY other pros) immensely wrong about that. Digital, while making it easier for pros to accomplish their daily tasks, also made it easy for every Tom, **** and Harry to take "decent" pictures themselves. Oh, and it also allowed them to work their regular full-time jobs and charge a penny to do the photography. Enter cell phone cameras. Now, EVERYONE has a decent camera, and the world is saturated by photography. It has turned my industry upside down, making it nearly impossible for a seasoned professional photographer to work full-time anymore. Fortunately for me, I saw this coming years ago and I added many more services to my repertoire, including video and aerial. I could never just rely on aerial alone, nor could I ever rely on weddings or other areas of photography by themselves. It has cost me so much money acquiring the equipment I need to do all of these things, and that has made my income drop considerably since the film days, but at least I'm still employed full-time and doing what I love doing.

New technology has killed alot of sectors sadly and i feel for anyone it affects.

Tookmaking for me was one. All the hand skills i learned became just about irrelevant as CNC machines appeared. I used to train apprentices who couldn't tighten a bolt properly anymore but will monkey push CNC buttons all day long..skilled ey

I am sure we are either rapidly turning into the humans from wall-e or idiocracy haha

toonarmy · Jul 2, 2018

very sad to hear this mick but have to agree its bloody hard when an estate agent says we got it done for 100 quid and you ask were they pfco were they insured and the phone goes dead crazy mate

ianwood · Jul 6, 2018

Sorry to hear you're shutting down shop. If I were still in London when I first became curious about drones, my excitement would probably have been stifled by the CAA's Draconian limitations.

Here in the US, even with more reasonable rules, I see people breaking them often. And that's almost as often as I see new people coming into the space, which is all the time.

Oh, you too made your hobby your business? I see.

So many people in the US complain about the rule breakers and noobs. My message to them is this: if that's what's ruining your business, you're not doing it well enough.

This is a nascent, innovate industry. Technology is breaking down barriers and disrupting the status quo on a regular basis. Noobs will come up with novel ideas. They will exploit the push buttons. So you have to use your head start to stay ahead of them. And the rule breakers, they may make a fast buck but they'll run out of luck eventually. Report them. I do when it's egregious enough.

I think you gripe is with the CAA. I couldn't do there what I do here. Which is too bad. I would like to cover London from every angle. And I could do it safely. But not under the CAA's rules.

ATU · Jul 9, 2018

Brings back memories.. Sorry to hear about your business but glad that you are moving on.

The bigger issue has always been regulation without enforcement which leads to people/companies who want to do the right thing being unfairly disadvantaged by other people/companies who do not play by the same rulebook. In an ideal world, everyone enters the same level playing field, but in reality, everyone is trying to get an edge over their competitors even if it means breaking the law and risk getting hauled in. Putting legislation in place is not a bad thing in and of itself, but what exacerbates the situation is the lack of enforcement and prosecution. When the risk of getting caught and penalised is minuscule, the law breakers become embolden to keep doing it. There will be no end to this unless there is proper enforcement and I do not foresee that happening anytime in the near future maybe unless someone gets hurt or until some terrorist activity actually succeed with the use of drones by which time it may be too late.

Reminds me of 9/11, nobody did anything to secure the cockpit of large commercial airliners because they did not want to entertain the thought that a hijacker could also be a suicide bomber... until it was too late.

FlyaDrone · Jul 14, 2018

OPINION alert - even in the early days of Inspire 1 and the many firmware upgrade nightmares encountered, I doubt that you would have made it as far with the Yuneec 920. There is a good chance that you would have lost it due to fly away.

That said I have like you paid a large amount of capital to get an Inspire 2 and now due to most recent upgrade (not able to roll back) have an uncommon gimbal movement making the camera totally off center while performing flight mode profiles or other command sequences. Very sophisticated machine and better than average camera, but crippled by the manufacturer. Nothing new there, except ME as I have only had it since February.

Sometimes the value of the image depends more on what the object that you are focused on versus your ability to improve the image/video via post processing therefore enhancing it's artistic value. I am most involved in getting skill set to fly in Oil&Gas refineries, which just by nature of location pays at the high end of the scale versus beautiful landscapes etc.

Not that is is easy to enter but long term might be more of a payoff on the bottom line. So industrial settings where you might have prior experience could be a revenue path worth pursuing.

x5yo · Jul 16, 2018

DJI's motive is to sell as many units as possible, they don't care about limiting that so people like you can earn money, they want to make it as easy possible for everyone to press a button and take all the expertise out of everything.

Its happening in lots of things and you're right its making things harder and harder, and I have seen tons of crap work on TV, sadly its not what you know, but who, or what you do to get yourself out there. Having ability is only half the battle.

Its the same in any business.

But drones are worse as so many people now have drones, a lot of people just get a friend to do it and because aerial photos and videos are so impressive by default, even a bad one can do the job, and expecting the police or authorities to go after someone taking a few aerial photos without insurance is realistically petty which is why nothing is ever really done about those who literally just buy a phantom 4 and charge peanuts for work.

Even a big estate agent who used to pay me now do their own with a spark, no license, they just hand them out to their agents, and I mean realistically, what damage is a tiny spark going to do even if it screws up?

A while ago a drone company contacted me because they were being offered aspects of drone work by major councils they could not even do, they wrote to me for weeks pinging me for bits of information and do I want to be part of it, then tried to basically extract all my knowledge from me in emails and went silent.

I knew this is what they were doing from day 1, so I sent them down the garden path knowing they were too stupid to know if what I was saying would work or not. Hopefully they spent a load of money going around in circles, if they actually treated me with respect, instead of thinking I would give up 2 years of expertise/research so they could get it all for free in an email they would have got somewhere.

Good luck, everything is tough when you run your own business, don't give up, use it to benefit your next venture.