Thanks for the wise words. I will be showing her this thread so she can see I'm not trying to get out of it.
The steady cam idea is excellent, as it doesn't even seem to draw attention, and sound can be picked up on my phone.
Our regs are the most repressive in the world, with a 50 m distance required (can this be calculated diagonally, i.e. a direct line from drone to person?
I was explaining that i would need 3 drones airborne during the ceremony, and they would have to be within 2 metres to get detail, but she liked the idea,..., i think.
Thanks for pointing out all the legal points, as well as reminding that a drone wiping out a guest would certainly make it as memorable wedding!
There are always children at a wedding and think if something went wrong and your drone went off on its own and hit a child in the face and took out an eye! Or hitting anyone and that happening, what sort of wedding memories would that leave with everyone at that wedding and how could you live with yourself after doing that to a person, just because the bride wanted some cool shots?
I shot weddings for years as a still camera man, not drones, and I have seen all sorts of things happen that you would never dream could happen, so I know from experience that nothing is safe and secure at a wedding. You say she wanted something about 2m away for detail, so think about this, which we have done for year in the past with still cameras shooting video. You mount your drone on a long pole, you can get long and strong collapsible poles from home depot, used for high ceiling cleaning, painting or light bulb changing.
You may have to come up with your own attachment method, but the beauty of the drone use with the pole is that you can also control the camera movement, which we could never do with a still camera fixed to the end. So now you can lower and raise that pole to get great view points, plus move the camera independently to the drone fixed position. That way you can get low down level shots and move right up high and get a shot looking down in the same video roll. Now you have the best of both worlds without any risk to anyone.
We used to re-enact the ring exchange with close up photography because you can't, of course, get that close during the ceremony and can often not see the rings at all, because the bride and groom have their hands covering the ring when they put them on. You can do that with the priest or officiant, after the ceremony and get some great shots, without the need to show the guests seated in the back ground. This added to the rest of the ceremony shot by the still or video ground based photographer will give her what she wants without any risk. And no one will know that the drone was not actually flying during the filming.
When you put your mind to it, you can get really creative with shots using a drone on a pole for the times you want that high vantage point coupled with a low close in shot of a person or group of people and have complete safety. Just image the horror of a drone going out of control in flight and cutting into someone's face during the wedding. Everything would have to come to a stop, the medics called and that would be the end of the wedding right then and there. Would you want that risk and responsibility on your shoulders and possible blame for an injury, forever following you around, just because a bride wanted a special angle with a drone?
