The Drone Trainer Podcast

If you're looking to make the jump from sporadic revenue to scalable and consistent growth in your drone business, TDT Pro is for you! Check out The Drone Trainer Pro right here! Justin is a FPV drone pilot, who is creating some awesome corporate fly through videos. Check him out at @whofpv wherever you get your social media on!

If you're looking to make the jump from sporadic revenue to scalable and consistent growth in your drone business, TDT Pro is for you! Check out The Drone Trainer Pro right here! Marc Sandlhauser started Eye in the Sky Studios a few months ago, and has been working in construction, real estate, and events. His love for drones started off when he picked up a cheap drone on sale, and has since upgrade to the DJI Mavic 2 Pro. For the full show notes, head on over to https://thedronetrainer.com/drone-podcast-83-marc-sandlhauser/ 

If you're looking to make the jump from sporadic revenue to scalable and consistent growth in your drone business, TDT Pro is for you! Check out The Drone Trainer Pro right here! As of June 1, 2019, anyone looking to fly a drone in Canada is regulated by Part IX of the Canadian Aviation Regulations (CARs). The quick and dirty on the changes are: Everyone must register their drones if they weigh 250g or more. Everyone must obtain either a basic or advanced pilot certificate. You must be at least 14 years of age to obtain a pilot certificate. You must keep your drone within line of sight when flying. You are permitted to fly to a max altitude of 400′ above ground. Foreign pilots are required to obtain a SFOC before flying in Canada. How to Fly your Drone in Canada Here is a summary of the key changes that affect both domestic and international pilots that are looking to fly their drones in Canada. Rules for Drone Flight in CanadaPilot Certificates – Section 901.53 All drone pilots are now required to obtain eit

If you're looking to make the jump from sporadic revenue to scalable and consistent growth in your drone business, TDT Pro is for you! Check out The Drone Trainer Pro right here! Shane Adamson from Australia, has recently started Safe Droning Australia as well as a podcast to go with it. Here is his story... Shane has been a licensed drone pilot for 18 months. Recently he identified that there was a need for drone specific safety equipment, and created Safe Droning Australia. Part of his offerings include high visibility vests, signage, barrier tape, first aid kits, fire blankets, and remote lanyards. His vests and signs are customized to say "Drone pilot, do not disturb" or to stay clear of the area. In addition to his site, he's also started a podcast where he chats with a range of guests from the Australian drone world! So far Shane has published 5 episodes, and I've enjoyed hearing his take on the drone industry and hearing from his unique guests. And the beauty of it all is that Shane has credited me wit

If you're looking to make the jump from sporadic revenue to scalable and consistent growth in your drone business, TDT Pro is for you! Check out The Drone Trainer Pro right here! Niels has been flying drones for two years now, both in France and New Zealand. His girlfriend is from New Zealand, so he's been lucky enough to spend time in both countries, while flying his drone for work. In this episode we get into the benefits of drone mapping on wind farms, and some of the cool little techniques that Niels is employing. One of the concerns on wind farms is tree height. Previously before drones, Niels' team would have to measure tree heights by attending the location, and measuring individual trees. Now with drones, they are able to capture imagery of large areas, and quickly calculate all of the tree heights. Why does this matter? Well, it all comes down to financial efficiencies! Higher trees will block the wind, create fewer revolutions, and overall lower the value of the wind farm. Niels is flying the DJI Ma

If you're looking to make the jump from sporadic revenue to scalable and consistent growth in your drone business, TDT Pro is for you! Check out The Drone Trainer Pro right here! She's just starting her drone business, and is ready to share her story. Join us this week as we chat with Liesl Leonard from Hull, England! Liesl Leonard has been interested in photography for a long time, and her love for drones grew as a result of Instagram. She started following a variety of accounts that were publishing drone related content, including Women Who Drone. Immediately inspired by the female drone community, she fully credits Women Who Drone for convincing her to purchase her first drone! Her first drone was a second hand DJI Phantom 3 Advanced, and has since upgraded to the Mavic 2 Pro. She is absolutely in love with the Mavic 2 Pro, and its helped her take her aerial photography skills to the next level. As with many drone photographers, Liesl is looking at picking up a set of ND/PL filters. She currently has her e

If you're looking to make the jump from sporadic revenue to scalable and consistent growth in your drone business, TDT Pro is for you! Check out The Drone Trainer Pro right here! Randall Warnas started Drones Plus in Las Vegas in 2014, resulting in expansion all over North America. Drones Plus turned into the largest brick and mortar drone store in the world, which caught the eye of DJI. DJI was able to convince Randall to join their team, where he went on to start DJI Enterprise. While working at DJI, Randall had his hands on the first 50 FLIR XT payloads off the production line. Similar to how he caught the eye of DJI by building the largest drone store in the world, his interest and prowess with the FLIR XT caught the eye of FLIR. The result? FLIR Commercial Systems took him on as their Global sUAS Segment Leader. During our chat I made reference to it being a natural progression, but Randall made a good counter point to the word "progression." Do you agree with his thoughts on his journey? In addition to

If you're looking to make the jump from sporadic revenue to scalable and consistent growth in your drone business, TDT Pro is for you! Check out The Drone Trainer Pro right here! American drone pilot Brandi Papania is having a blast flying her drone in Hong Kong. Brandi is a copywriter by day, who enjoys flying around the tiny island at night. Let's hear about what it's like flying a drone in Hong Kong from Brandi! Brandi Papania got into drones recently while watching her friend James fly his Mavic Pro. Loving what he was doing with drones, she decided to jump right in and picked up the Mavic 2 Pro! Not a bad choice for a first drone! And guess where she purchased it? Right at the DJI flagship store in Causeway Bay! She was able to test out the Mavic 2 Pro in the caged flying area, and walked out with the drone a few minutes later. Awesome! She's currently flying recreationally, however she's honing her skills in hope of jumping into the commercial side of things when she returns to the USA. Once she's back

If you're looking to make the jump from sporadic revenue to scalable and consistent growth in your drone business, TDT Pro is for you! Check out The Drone Trainer Pro right here! Wolfgang Weber (IMDB) is from Ottawa, but moved to Los Angeles 11 years ago to follow his dreams. Waiting tables led to a few acting gigs, then a few drone gigs, and then a few combo drone and acting gigs! Being a drone pilot, he was able to negotiate a few early roles based on his drone skills, while also inserting himself into the script. Since picking up the sticks, he's started AIRWOLF Drones. Wolfgang started flying a DJI Phantomin 2015, and has since moved up to the Inspire, newer Phantoms, as well as the M600. He also drops a total bomb about the DJI Zenmuse X7 that I was shocked to hear! So far, Wolfgang's favourite projects have been resort work down in the Bahamas, as well as chasing Ferrari around a track during the Ferrari Challengein California. He worked the Ferrari Challenge along with LA Drones, and their fleet of Ins

If you're looking to make the jump from sporadic revenue to scalable and consistent growth in your drone business, TDT Pro is for you! Check out The Drone Trainer Pro right here! What do you do when you need a drone, but not from one of the worlds largest manufacturers? You go to a custom builder, that's what! This week on the podcast I chat with Bobby Watts, a custom drone builder from the eastern United States! Bobby is the founder and CEO of Watts Innovations, based on Baltimore, Maryland. He's been flying radio controlled helicopters and other aircraft since he was 15, and has now branched into building his own systems. He discovered that certain organizations needed homebuilt systems, that didn't rely on commercially available systems. Part of the reason is for privacy, and the other is to allow for heavy payloads. His part choices are ultimately up to the client, and he finds that the DJI A3 flight controller is the best in the world. Lately, government organizations have been requesting Pixhawk over DJ

If you're looking to make the jump from sporadic revenue to scalable and consistent growth in your drone business, TDT Pro is for you! Check out The Drone Trainer Pro right here! Have you heard of Women Who Drone? They're a global community that inspires, educates and empowers women and girls with drone technology! Join in this week as I chat with founder and CEO, Elena Buenrostro! Elena is a drone pilot with a background in video production. Her love of drones started with a trip to the Great Wall of China a few years ago. As she was planning her trip, she started thinking of what kind of equipment to take with her... and guess what? A drone quickly became one of her top choices! She picked up a DJI Mavic Pro, and successfully flew at the Great Wall! Since starting off with the DJI Mavic, she's also picked up the Mavic 2 Pro, Mavic 2 Zoom, and Mavic Air. Who else is envious that she's 4 for 4 in acquiring the Mavic line? Elena prefers to edit with Adobe Premiere, leaving Final Cut Pro X in the dust a few yea

If you're looking to make the jump from sporadic revenue to scalable and consistent growth in your drone business, TDT Pro is for you! Check out The Drone Trainer Pro right here! Tom Noske is a drone pilot from Melbourne, Australia, that is creating beautiful pieces of art with his drone. Yeah, we're going to learn all about his shooting style and editing process during this chat! Tom is currently flying the DJI Mavic 2 Pro, and absolutely loves the larger Hasselblad sensor. He was flying the original Mavic Pro, but since upgrading he's caught the bug for larger sensors. Yeah, that means that the Inspire 2 is on his list for his next purchase. On the commercial side of things, Tom is working with sports teams and fitness professionals. He works with rugby teams, rowing teams, and wants to get into shooting music videos. He's also doing corporate work like real estate, but admits that he doesn't like it as much as the other areas. His editing workflow starts in Adobe Lightroom and then moves into Photoshop. He

If you're looking to make the jump from sporadic revenue to scalable and consistent growth in your drone business, TDT Pro is for you! Check out The Drone Trainer Pro right here! Cheyenne Laux is a drone pilot based in Kentucky, who is operating a drone business with his brother-in-law. His company is called AgDrone PRO, and they concentrate on providing actionable drone data for precision agriculture. Precision agriculture is a farming management concept based on observing, measuring and responding to inter and intra-field variability in crops. Cheyenne and his company utilize drones to capture data, which they can turn into direct action for farmers. Long gone are the days of wasting resources on the entire field! Now you can simply apply to the areas that need it, instead of covering the entire field in the same amounts. With large areas of land to cover, Cheyenne is utilizing a combo of multi-rotor and vertical takeoff and landing (VTOL) drones to capture his data. In addition to the drone, he's also flyi

If you're looking to make the jump from sporadic revenue to scalable and consistent growth in your drone business, TDT Pro is for you! Check out The Drone Trainer Pro right here! David Rule is a globe trotting drone pilot, who calls Pinedale, Wyoming home. He got into photography about 2 years ago, and pulled the trigger on a drone just over a year ago. The drone was the no brainer addition to his toolkit, to help bring his passion for photography to the next level! Being a full time pro, David is shooting both ground and aerial shots for a variety of clients around the world. He's recently returned from Africa, where he had a company reach out to him through Instagram to shoot a project with LifeStraw. During the shoot, they travelled around to schools and villages in Africa, and captured footage of the children using their new water filtration systems. Supplying clean water is one thing, but another awesome benefit is that he had a blast flying around the kids. Listen in as he describes how the drone was pr

If you're looking to make the jump from sporadic revenue to scalable and consistent growth in your drone business, TDT Pro is for you! Check out The Drone Trainer Pro right here! Steve Adcock is a drone pilot from Adelaide, in South Australia. Actually, he's not right in Adelaide, but he's 30km to the east. Regardless, he's flying all over the area, and is having a blast with his drone business. He's currently flying a variety of drones, including several DJI drones from the Spark all the way up to the Inspire 2. He thinks that he's had 13 drones so far, with 3 of them being written off. Good ratio I guess? haha He's been flying in a variety of industries, including real estate, construction, military, and agriculture. Most of his work self described as "pretty pictures and video." He's also done a lot of work with production houses, and enjoys the pressure working in that environment. For a lot of his work, there is only one chance to get the shot, so he makes sure everything is ready before the shoot. Liste

If you're looking to make the jump from sporadic revenue to scalable and consistent growth in your drone business, TDT Pro is for you! Check out The Drone Trainer Pro right here! Filippo Canepa is a 35 year old drone pilot from Turin, Italy. Along with his brother, he is operating a real estate business, concentrating on renting, sales, and a new builds. And guess what? He's looking to use his drone to promote his real estate business! Filippo is flying the Mavic Air, Inspire 2, and is looking at picking up a DJI Spark.  Before he gets going in his real estate business, he's working on studying for and passing his drone license exams in Italy. One of the hurdles that he has to overcome is passing the practical flight exam. This exam is a hands on flight test, where he has to fly with and without a GPS signal. The test even takes things a little further by not allowing use of a screen during testing. Yeah, you have to fly 100% by keeping your eye on the drone, all while in non-GPS mode. If you're looking for t

If you're looking to make the jump from sporadic revenue to scalable and consistent growth in your drone business, TDT Pro is for you! Check out The Drone Trainer Pro right here! This week while the temperatures were hovering just above freezing, I decided to conduct a IMU calibration on my DJI Phantom 4 Pro. After completing the calibration, I wondered what the rest of the drone community was up to, and reached out to find out all of the best practices! What is a drone's IMU? IMU (inertial measurement unit) calibration is one of those things that is critical to keeping your drone straight and level. The IMU is a sensor that detects motion along a horizontal plane, as well as increases and decreases in altitude. Having a tightly calibrated IMU is critical to having the drone know what zero motion feels like. Without a good IMU calibration, your drone will potentially think that it's drifting off in a certain direction, and then create an opposite input. Yeah, it's going to become very difficult to control and

If you're looking to make the jump from sporadic revenue to scalable and consistent growth in your drone business, TDT Pro is for you! Check out The Drone Trainer Pro right here! Danny Engesser is an IT professional who has been running his drone side hustle for the past year. He started off with a Parrot AR, and has since moved up to the DJI Phantom 3 Advanced and now the Inspire 1. So far he's been working in a variety of industries including energy, car dealerships, and corporate group photos. Utilizing the LAANC system (Low Altitude Authorization and Notification Capability), Danny has been able to fly missions in a variety of controlled airspace. So far he's found the system to be fairly straightforward, and hasn't had any issue on obtaining airspace permissions. While in the air, Danny prefers to use the DJI Go app, however has been tinkering with Litchi as well lately. I've used litchi myself, but we also discuss my personal preference of Hangar's Autopilot. Danny mentions that he had some trouble with

If you're looking to make the jump from sporadic revenue to scalable and consistent growth in your drone business, TDT Pro is for you! Check out The Drone Trainer Pro right here! El Paso drone pilot, David Angulo, has been flying for the past two years. David was experiencing some heath problems, and in attempt to make a few extra dollars, he decided to pick up a drone on Black Friday. While it was risky to just pick up a drone and then learn how to use it, it's really worked out for his family as he's now making some great money flying drones. So far David is working in real estate, commercials, and short films. When he does some real estate work, he flies the mission with his drone and then edits with Photoshop and Davinci. Speaking of Davinci, if you're looking for a great piece of free video editing software, make sure to check them out! On the other hand, when he shoots for short films or commercials, he captures the footage in D-Log, and then hands it over to the production company so they can work thei

If you're looking to make the jump from sporadic revenue to scalable and consistent growth in your drone business, TDT Pro is for you! Check out The Drone Trainer Pro right here! Marc Le Cornu is a drone pilot based in the Channel Islands. He's currently a full time firefighter, but as of next week he's going to be retiring from public safety and taking his drone business full time! He's been running his commercial drone operation for a few years now, but once he retires from fire, he will be able to really hit the air and take on everything that comes his way. Speaking of that topic, Marc made comment that he's had to turn down a few jobs and opportunities due to his day job getting in the way. That's all going to change next week though! Marc's current drone fleet consists of the Mavic 2 Pro, Phantom 4 Pro Obsidian, and Inspire 2. Quite the nice fleet, and his current favourite is the Phantom 4 Pro as he says it performs better than the Mavic 2 Pro in low light. He has plans to tackle the low light even mor