This month AE2S Communications will be looking up more often. For the first time, we have a certified pilot on staff ready to shoot videos and photos with an Unmanned Aerial System (UAS).
Our team has always been ready to produce high-quality engaging videos. We have creative storytellers who develop really engaging videos about projects, people, and innovative technology. We have storyboarded, shot, and edited clips, but now we are adding the ability to get videos and photos from up to 400 feet above the ground.
It’s exciting, but also slightly terrifying for me, as I’m the one in charge of making sure the UAS safely returns to the ground with all parts in working order. Crashing is not an option.
At this point, my excitement outweighs my terror by 320%. Giving our clients the ability to have regular fly-over videos of their projects is going to be a great way to tell their story. I can’t wait to have video of facilities like wastewater treatment plants that seem big and impersonal when standing on the ground, but can look really neat from the air. It’s going to be amazing to have flyover videos that can show how a construction project is progressing.
This technology can give everyone a different perspective. That is thrilling.
It’s exciting to be a part of something new, like commercial UAS operations. This is only possible as the FAA recently changed their rules governing UAS for commercial purposes. The new rules have sparked growth in this industry. According to Business Insider Magazine, photography use now makes up almost 43% of all drone use across industries. Real estate is second with at 20%. The FAA expects there will be 2.5 million drones in use in the United States by the end of next month. By 2020, the agency expects that number to triple to more than 7 million.
We are a part of that movement. I’m busy making checklists for our flights and determining how flight logs will be kept. It’s exciting examining all the possible areas UAS could be used to improve communications of projects, opportunities, and potential problems to surveying and mapping to monitoring and reclamation and restoration.
Getting our AE2S Communications UAS program off the ground is a dream come true for me. A dream that requires some safety training, aeronautical charts and a flying hat of course.