The Image that started it all.

Back in April 2015 I took my new home made quad and Go Pro and went to the beautiful Badminton Estate in Gloucestershire. I was working at the event and after seeking permission from the land owner and site manager I was allowed to put my Whirlybird in the air. Primarily this was about just having some fun, in a big field with Nick and my Son, Harrison. We had an opportunity and some great weather before the event kicked off proper. There was no way we could fly, legally, once the event had started.

We purposefully stayed away from the main site, with marquees and stuff and made sure that there was no one else around. I put the Go Pro on a 2 second time lapse and up and away she went. Nick and Harrison spotted for me while I did my best to position my quadcopter to get photographs of what I thought would look good.

It was great fun, but slightly nerve wracking but overwhelmingly exhilerating when we saw the results. The sun was just at the right level, and the right intensity and the shadows were amazing. We went to a few other locations around the site and did some more with mostly excellent results.

I felt the photos were too good to not share so I shared them with British Eventing and Badminton Horse Trails. They were kind enough to share them and credit me. I was humbled by the amount of likes and shares the photo below, especially, got. It got me to thinking that, perhaps, what people really liked about the photo was seeing something they were quite familiar with, but from a highly immersive and unfamiliar perspective.

This is what aerial imaging is for me. Seeing things that are familiar to you, but from amazingly different perspectives. It brings something perhaps ordinary, or taken for granted, to life again.

So it was the picture above that got us thinking and after a lot of thought and planning we are well on the way to making the idea of Whirlybird Imaging a commercial reality. Happy Days!!