Los Angeles, CA —Before I share my thoughts I want you to see what a seemingly thoughtful journalist, Matt Waite has to say about the use of drones for Electronic News Gathering or ENG .  It’s important that you first watch his video presentation. My response is below the video. Okay, Waite made a really melodramatic example of anecdote from his reporting past to make a point.  It was a really unfair and simplistic overstatement of a highly unusual situation he once encountered.  Waite’s dramatic example is one we all can resolve by simply keeping enough distance between the drone and the grieving woman that Waite described. Only the most soulless bastard would dare to bring a buzzing drone into that poor woman’s face!  Additionally, Waite unleashed his little drone inside the theater where he’s speaking and the natural acoustics there exaggerated the multi-rotor drone’s noise substantially.    At 40 or 50 feet outdoors that noise is barely n...

Abbe Lyle, photographer, conventional aircraft and drone pilot. Los Angeles, CA —As we speak I’m producing a documentary about multi-rotor camera drones and their pilots. There is so much ignorance, fear and loathing out there clouding the truth.   Every day various conventional aircraft pilots are reporting drone sightings.  Are these things somehow a public threat? This trend is very reminiscent of the late 1950’s and early 1960’s when Hollywood films about flying saucers and little green men were very popular.  Suddenly t here were imaginative but somewhat credible sounding UFO and alien sightings by various airline pilots reported in the news almost nightly. Now it's the multi-rotor drones some of which have been reported being seen by some pilots at 30,000 feet and traveling at Mach 1.   If you own or operate these little devices you know the claims are quite ridicules. As a licensed private investigator and drone pilot I can say they ar...

Phoenix, AZ —Okay, I have to confess that my two camera drones have brought out the child in me!   I put one under my own tree last Christmas.   I’m middle-aged but have become hopelessly hooked on these incredible things.  I now own a  DJI Phantom 2 and a Blade 350QX quad-copters that use those great GoPro cameras.  For some unknown reason these multi-rotor camera drones have not caught the affection of women like they have men.   I don’t understand this since women are generally more creative then men.   I hope this changes because they have no clue what they’re missing. The popularity of the multi-rotor drones is exploding especially with photographers.   They allow limitless perspectives of the subject mater sought to make or capture breathtaking images.   They have starter drones on the substantially less-expensive end such as the Blade 200-QX that can help your child master the very important skills in controlling, operating...

Phoenix, AZ—I number of my friends and visitors want to know more about my Phantom 2 camera drone so I have provided a close-up view. The Go Pro camera with gimbal is a better choice then the built in camera on the Phantom 2 Vision plus for better images. Check out my new retractable landing gear that’s never in my video shots anymore.   My trusted dealer in Van Nuys, CA is Pirofliprc at 16205 Victory Blvd, Van Nuys, CA   91406- Telephone 818-781-3401.

Daniel Saulmon/Tom Zebra Los Angeles, CA — Daniel Saulmon , 42 better known as Tom Zebra is being held in a jail cell here since his 4:00 PM arrest on September 23 rd .  Saulmon was late for his misdemeanor citation received weeks earlier for flying his camera drone.   When Saulmon appeared later that morning they kept him waiting for hours and then was ordered held on a punitive $30K bail.  Saulmon spent five days in jail until his supporters were able to post his bail.   The crime Saulmon is accused of is flying his little plastic remote control Phantom 2 camera drone on Los Angeles park property.  The little known L.A. ordinance Saulmon was arrested on is not new.  It banned flying of remote controlled aircraft.  However this put on the books long before the little multi-rotor Phantom gizmos with cameras ever existed.   At the time they enacted this remote controlled aircraft law, the city council had no way to know the mu...

Los Angeles, CA —Local news coverage here is as lame is it gets anywhere!   The entertainment capitol of the world and the second largest television market puts out  pathetic   minimalist crap instead of comprehensive news. It's downright shameful! What used to be called print media has now been forcibly   moved to the Internet and they now must adapt to publishing quality video or simply become history. I don’t give a rat’s ass if you’re at the bottom position and pay grade in your news organization there’s no excuse for you being unable to make a broadcast quality news story if you come upon breaking news.   If you can’t put together a watchable story on your iPhone you need to get out of the news business.   You don’t have to be pretty or an award winning cinematographer to create a great news story.   You do need to be capable of using a little investigative effort and get some watchable video and simply tell your story. ...