Ideas for drone formation flying?

[RCdancer]

Thunderdrones has a great idea for the climax of training on June 8th at Acworth Beach. An "Apocalypse Now" scenario of a drone formation coming across the lake with a single drone behind and above filming the formation group. Post editing would add the soundtrack from "Flight of the Valkeryies".

Ideas for safe drone formation flying? I'm thinking perhaps a lead drone that slowly and safely flies with all other drones "tracking" a drone in front of them. It is possible to track an airborne object?

Any other ideas on drone formation flying?

 

[msinger]

I'm thinking perhaps a lead drone that slowly and safely flies with all other drones "tracking" the drone in front of them. It is possible to track an airborne object?

You won't be able to use the ActiveTrack in DJI GO if that's what you have in mind. DJI drones are too small to track.

 

[Former Member]

Drone #1 will be on an autonomous Litchi mission. The others might be manually flown either following or abreast, or also on a Litchi mission but would need to be sequenced. We've got a bunch of helo pilots here.

 

[AMann]

Ideas for drone swarm flying? Have any enemies?

 

[Former Member]

Footage can be done by having one person on the ground near the pavilion, and the drones attacking, and also switch between footage of each drone. Lots of editing for you Bob!

 

[RCdancer]

Yes, automated Litchi missions would be much safer. I'm thinking each drone following their own Litchi mission with adequate spacing both vertical and horizontal. Rob, how about you plan a very simple Litchi mission out over the lake and back in a gentle wide circle as the lead drone and then share it. Anyone that wants to participate should use your mission as a baseline and slightly modify the course to be offset horizontally and vertically and fly at the same speed. Let you review all missions to ensure safety and compatibility. All drones into the air and hovering at their respective start points and then execute at the same time.

What do you think?

 

[STUFF2C]

Kinda like riding with a bunch of Harley riders... accident waiting to happen ?

 

[RCdancer]

Kinda like riding with a bunch of Harley riders... accident waiting to happen ?

That's why we do it at the end of the day ...

 

[Former Member]

Kinda like riding with a bunch of Harley riders... accident waiting to happen ?

Ummm not exactly Harley Riders. More like electronics geeks. Difference? We dont drink beer, we drink punch. We dont wear cutoffs, we wear polo shirts. We dont fight, we just debate. We dont ride Harleys, mostly scooters.

As far as accidents waiting to happen, we check actuarial tables, crossrefence that to the traffic flow, and pilots level of experience, divided by type of drone flown. Its all science. Thats whats great about being a geek. I speak for myself of course.

 

[Former Member]

Yes, automated Litchi missions would be much safer. I'm thinking each drone following their own Litchi mission with adequate spacing both vertical and horizontal. Rob, how about you plan a very simple Litchi mission out over the lake and back in a gentle wide circle as the lead drone and then share it. Anyone that wants to participate should use your mission as a baseline and slightly modify the course to be offset horizontally and vertically and fly at the same speed. Let you review all missions to ensure safety and compatibility. All drones into the air and hovering at their respective start points and then execute at the same time.

What do you think?

Sounds like a plan.

 

[RCdancer]

If we can pull it off, I guarantee the video to end all drone videos.

 

[RCdancer]

Sounds like a plan.

Minimum vertical spacing of 20 ft and horizontal spacing of 20 feet?

 

[Former Member]

Minimum vertical spacing of 20 ft and horizontal spacing of 20 feet?

That would be close enough for the first time. As we get closer to the land cam, and slower, we can tighten it up, one at a time.

 

[Former Member]

We will be close enough to eachother to communicate. I will bring different color silicone drone skins for easier ID.

 

[RCdancer]

If it all goes wrong and there's a giant fireball involving multiple drones, everyone remember that it was Thunderdrone's idea to begin with.

But I'll be sure to capture the spectacular carnage on video ...

 

[Gryphon962]

Suggest you ensure everyone runs their drones for at least 15 min beforehand to make sure you all have current GPS almanac and ephemeris. You might also want to think about turning obstacle avoidance stuff OFF, as all it takes is for one to pull up on a proximity alert and .............?

 

[BD0G]

Wingman for DJI Drones all the way!

‎Wingman For DJI

‎Wingman is flight app that makes DJI drone follow with another automatically. After auto follow been activated, regardless of leader's movement direction is the follower would always maintain a relative position with leader. Wingman could let user enjoy formation flight with your drone mates...

itunes.apple.com

 

[RCdancer]

Wingman for DJI Drones all the way!

‎Wingman For DJI

‎Wingman is flight app that makes DJI drone follow with another automatically. After auto follow been activated, regardless of leader's movement direction is the follower would always maintain a relative position with leader. Wingman could let user enjoy formation flight with your drone mates...

itunes.apple.com

Holy Cow. Gonna download it right now. Thanks!

Update - turns out I had already downloaded it but had not yet tried it.

 

[RCdancer]

Rob, this looks like the ticket. Looking at the app user guide, it does permit multi-peer networking - up to 4 peers. If we have more than 4 that want to participate, we could do 2 flight leaders, each with 3 followers for a total of 8 drones. Or even more.

Send out an email to all attendees announcing your hair-brained scheme and directing anyone that wants to participate to download the app and read through the user guide beforehand. I gotta see if Tom Baldridge wants to try this with me this weekend so I have a solid understanding of how it works.

 

[brett8883]

Thunderdrones has a great idea for the climax of training on June 8th at Acworth Beach. An "Apocalypse Now" scenario of a drone formation coming across the lake with a single drone behind and above filming the formation group. Post editing would add the soundtrack from "Flight of the Valkeryies".

Ideas for safe drone formation flying? I'm thinking perhaps a lead drone that slowly and safely flies with all other drones "tracking" a drone in front of them. It is possible to track an airborne object?

Any other ideas on drone formation flying?

I was just reading something today and this reminded me of it 526 glittering drones form beautiful 3-D images in futuristic show