Start with the real estate drone, learn on that (and make money with it) then step into a racing drone down the line. That’s what I’d do.
I mostly want a drone for photography. My biggest complaint right now is that I have a great drone, but I’m limited to where I can fly it legally.
That Skydio really impresses me though. At least in sample vids.
The Skydio does seem nice. And the making money part sounds good for getting the drone as well but as for the learning, that part wont matter as I’ve learn how to fly RC planes and Heli’s which take a lot more knowledge to fly. I can fly a drone like the Skydio or DJI with ease. It’s almost boring to fly them to be honest.
Curious what the Skydio would be like if I put it to follow me while I hopped into a drift car at the track and the footage it could give me while chasing us down.
I’m pretty much an expert with all things RC (cars, boats, planes, helis and quads). That expertise meant nothing when I tried ripping a fast quad around with nothing but the first person view from the quad to guide me.
That I expect to be a challenge and learning curve. Flying a drone with assisted flying is another story. They are definitely sweet to get photos and videos but I’d find myself enjoying myself flying FPV racing drones. I will get one one of these days.
I didn’t get a chance to take mine out of acro mode last night and play around with angle mode and horizon mode. I think either will be a huge help until I get better at flying FPV.
Enabled horizon mode and went over to Clearfield park after work. Between having a LOT more room and nothing to run into I was ripping some laps around the park. Going to be a LONG time before I’m confident enough to fly this around my house with all the obstacles though so I’m going to pick up a little 1s Tiny Whoop to learn FPV on. It will work with all the gear I have so just need to pick up the quad and some 1s cells.
there is no inbetween option, racing drones wont have a gimbal, other ones might.
also racing drones cameras are angled up, as they are usually flying pitched nose down, you would literally have to dive bomb the ground or be inverted to get pictures of houses
that being said i’m probably selling my chroma, with the 1080p camera, gimbal and hand held mount
while i’m at it i have a blade 180qx(stock) and a blade 200qx(carbon frame, 3d blades) that i’m interested in getting rid of, the 200qx is on a carbon chassis much like a 250 size race quad. strap on a camera and you are good to go. it also can fly inverted and do most of the tricks a 3d heli can do. so if anyone is interested, let me know
Dropped the throttle mixing down to 60% on my transmitter and it made the little Larva X a lot more docile. Enough so that I can now fly it around my house without constantly hitting trees, the ground and my house.
Just a quick video from testing out the on board DVR this morning.
Took another little rip on lunch but set the throttle mixer back to 100%.
Around 0:37 did a quick punch out climb.
Kinda looks like you filmed that with a 1980’s camcorder 
Haha… it`s onboard DVR from a quad smaller than my palm. It’s made for ripping around not selfies on your jet ski 
Must have been a very calm day. I couldn’t see something this small flying in 5mph winds. haha Pretty sweet little flyer though.
It can handle the wind surprisingly well. 3s power, carbon fiber and strong brushless motors help a lot. It’s around 75 grams with a 3s 300 battery so it’s chunky compared to a little 1s brushed motor TinyWhoop class.
My Tinyhawk S gets here Thursday and while it’s about the same dimensions it’s only around 40 grams with the 1s 450 so it won’t handle the wind well but it will be way more fun to bash around inside (fully enclosed props).
if you are looking to get a little crazy with it I have a 200QX
brushless motors, 250 sized CF racing frame, runs on 2s, maybe also 3s i’d have to look it up, 3d props and normal props included.
get to flying inverted, join the real fun
Getting better all the time. Hung a hula hoop from a branch as an obstacle.
I was expecting you to do a pass between the porch columns, lol. That thing hauls.
I’ve made it between the columns and the house several times but on that flight I was standing in a bad spot to try it.
It’s getting fast. That vid had all the controls, including throttle still mixed to 75%, and even then I’m not going full throttle.
Only did one short outdoor flight today. The wind was pushing it around a little too much for how many things there are to crash into. Instead Jill and I ripped the Tinyhawk around our indoor race course. I need to get a DVR for my goggles so I can record those flights.
Have you crashed yet at speeds like you have in this video? Curious the abuse this takes now that you are flying it faster.
Looks like a pretty solid flyer. How much did the entire setup cost you if you don’t mind. Quad, goggles, controller. (don’t need exacts but a ballpark number)
Thanks
I went high speed into the sided part of my house the other day. Not a glancing blow, dead straight on to a full stop. I was ripping between the white posts and the house and forgot the garage roof sticks out so far and just drilled it. It dislodged the VTX board from it’s rubber mounts and I had to take it inside to loosen everything up so I could pop the board back in. Zero frame damage, zero prop damage. In that last vid I posted you can see where I nailed the hula hoop and didn’t even stop flying. I’ve had several other crashes into tree branches and the ground and I’ve just brushed it off, set it back on the driveway and went right back to flying.
If you want to start out, I’d really recommend the Tinyhawk S over the Larva X. The Tinyhawk is smaller and more durable. It’s just as much fun to fly but it’s much more forgiving. As a huge plus when the weather sucks the Tinyhawk is a blast to fly around the house and because the props are enclosed and it’s outer shell is flexible you don’t have to worry about wrecking your house. The Larva X is carbon fiber, runs on 3s lipos instead of 1s or 2s lipos and is really only good outdoors. I don’t have any video of the Tinyhawk just because it doesn’t have onboard DVR and I haven’t added DVR to my goggles yet. The Larva can fly in winds the Tinyhawk can’t, but if it’s decently calm (10mph or under) I have more fun flying the Tinyhawk in my back yard using my kid’s fort as an obstacle course than I do flying the Larva X. Must more than 10mph it’s honestly not much fun flying either outdoors because all you can do is fly the Larva around above all the obstacles and that gets boring. The Tinyhawk also has turtle mode, which is amazing. You crash the quad somewhere and it ends up upside down. Flip the disarm switch on the radio, flip the turtle mode switch, re-arm the quad and when you use the right stick it runs the motors in reverse, in pairs, so it will flip the quad back upright. Once it flips, disarm, turn off turtle mode, re-arm and fly away. You can’t do this with an exposed prop quad so you have to get up and manually flip it over any time you crash.
Figure around $400 to get all in with gear you’ll be able to use going forward, less if you search around for the best price or find shit on sale (the goggles were $79 and radio $89 when I bought, now they’re $95 and $99). Or buy an RTF Tinyhawk kit for $165. That’s the original Tinyhawk, not the S. The S can be run on 2s cells when you want more power. The problem with the kit is you’re unlikely to ever use that radio or charger for any future quads.
My recommendation:
Radio:
Quad (Tinyhawk S):
Or:
Quad (Larva X):
Goggles:
These are not top of the line goggles. In fact, I guess they’re not really goggles at all since it’s really a headset with 2 mirrors to reflect the little screen directly in front of your face, but the reviews are great, they’re super cheap and the range and video quality is excellent. They’re on several youtubers lists for starter FPV.
Charger:
I had an Onyx 235 from my old heli days and it’s a nice lipo balance charger. I went to Fields because I needed some difference balance adapters and they had a nice $40 balance charger that came with all the leads I needed and by the time I bought the leads separate I just bought their charger. It’s been nice having two chargers so I can charge quad batteries and my radio or goggle batteries at the same time. Either way, figure $40 for a basic balance charger. I’ll update this with a link to the one I bought at fields when I get home because I forgot the model.
Batteries:
For the Tinyhawk:
For the Larva X:
For the goggles:
For the radio:
Misc:
Parallel charge board so you can charge a bunch of quad batteries at once:
One last note, on goggles, I would recommend spending as little as possible because DJI really changed the game with their recently introduced digital FPV system. It’s expensive right now, but I guarantee you there are shops all over China tearing down DJI’s system and in the next year you’re going to see ripoffs of DJI’s system cheap on Banggood and GetFPV.
Check out comparison here: