Aerial Photography and Video

Before we start, here are some of the jobs I have done commercially. These have been for the likes of Channel 4, a team from Pinewood Studios, the Sailing World Cup, golf courses, property developers and local businesses:

Sample aerial video clips

Aerial photography and video is now firmly established as a huge hobby, pass-time and business for many people all around the world. It is now a multi-billion Pound/Dollar industry and is here to stay. With sales figures set to increase as people are looking to fly drones for:

I’ve been a photographer and videographer for a few decades now. When aerial photography and video became accessible in the form of drone flying, I jumped in with both feet. I wanted to get involved and haven’t looked back since.

The shots you can get from between 10 and 400ft is amazing and simply not doable from any other source. Hiring a helicopter or plane is costly and will not allow you to get lower than 500ft. Telescopic poles are great for static shots but not for dramatic, moving and distant subjects. Once you get used to flying, it is a hell of a lot of fun!

Fancy learning to fly a camera drone?

Are you thinking of buying a drone and possibly using it to make money, earn a living or add it to your existing business services? If so, please bookmark this page or "Like Us" at the bottom as we grow this section with flying tips, equipment advice and the law and regulations surrounding this exciting industry.

Index of Pages

Getting Started with Aerial Photography and Video

Before you do anything or buy any type of drone or UAV, I suggest that you start small. See if you enjoy flying drones before leaping in and spending thousands of £’s or $’s. If you are a novice photographer or video producer, you also need to think about upping your knowledge in these areas before taking to the skies.

I have seen many people join this industry thinking it will be a breeze to make money flying a drone with camera. Only to end up selling their aerial equipment a few months down the line.

Don’t think this is an easy way to make money. There are a lot of talented pilots combined with years of experience in photography and video out there who have a head start on you.

However, with our help and advice, there is no reason why you cannot join the fun and reap the rewards with a bit of hard work when starting your own business.

Your First Drone

A few years ago, I put a £150 deposit on what I thought would be the best drone for my needs back then. I already had a number of Go Pro cameras so all I needed was a decent platform to fly it on. I opted for the DJI Flamewheel 550 with separate gimbal for the Go Pro.

However, I soon had my deposit returned as I felt a little uneasy about the regulations surrounding the drone industry at the time. Then came the incredible DJI Phantom quadcopter...a real game changer.

Before buying the Phantom, I wanted to be sure this is what I wanted so I bought a really funky little Hubsan X4 H107C with HD 2MP Camera from Amazon. What a lot of fun and I practiced with this for a few months (I still have it now…two in fact)!

See my review of the Hubsan Drone here

Learn to fly in manual

I learned to fly in full manual mode with the Hubsan. This meant I became competent enough to the upgrade to a full DJI Phantom Quadcopter kit. Flying the Hubsan proved to me that this was how I wanted to move my photography business forward.

I now fly a DJI Inspire 1 PRO with Zenmuse X5 4K Camera as in the image below. Update 2018: I now have the DJI X5R (RAW) which shoots raw footage up to 2.4gbps as opposed to the 100mbps of the X5 camera. This allows some serious editing without image degradation.

Please note: Some of the links on this page are affiliated with various outlets from which we are paid a small commission if you buy from them. You don't pay any more for your products, we get paid by the manufacturers. Also, we only promote stuff we love or think you will need or love yourselves!