Aviator Goggles For The Drone Flyer

Don't expect fashion in this column - you won't be wearing a leather coat and a RayBan's for drone flying. You'll be lucky to score a giggle hat and a worried expression - and no-one will be shouting " Chocks Away ", " Tally Ho ", and " Wizard Prang " when you stack your expensive machinery into the side of a bus.

If you're flying it with straight visual control you are in much the same position as any of the R/C airplane types - peering into the sky trying to see what altitude, attitude, and wind reaction is going on at any particular time. Good luck with that...I have memories of crashing balsa wood all over the place in my youth. Model airplanes move in three dimensions up and down, side by side, and fore and aft. Their pilots also move in these ways but they add the additional dimensions of fear, expense, and regret.

But back to the drones. Some of the civilian ones may be fitted with cameras rather than 20mm cannon and these cameras can send images back to the operator - this allows them to see what the drone sees - effectively putting the pilot in the driver's seat of a plane that has no seats. The images that come back to the ground can be received by smart phones and pads with appropriate apps.

Well and good, but anyone who has ever tried to see the screen of a flat smart phone or pad in glaring sun knows that it can be nearly impossible to pick up details. And if you are busy operating the radio control set with both hands you have no way to shade the screen. Until now.

  
Hoodman have brought out a set of hoods and accessories that will blank off extraneous light from iPhone 6. iPone6+, iPad Mini, and iPad Air devices. The hoods attach by various elastic straps and velcro pads to firmly grip the screens - no falling off in the heat of the moment if your flying style involves a lot of body English.

You're not restricted to just one style, either- if the shorter hood is not doing the job for you there are extension packs that velcro on with padded edges so that you can push your face right down in there and no extra light gets in.

If you need to poke away at the phone or pad screen there are cut-aways and elasticised panels that let your fingers into the dark. You may look like a bit of a robot attached to your control panel and screen but at least you will have the best view of what the drone is seeing and that has to give you better control.

You can buy the individual parts to fit iPhone 6 and iPhone 6+ as well as the iPad Mini and iPad Air or you can elect to get them as paired kits. The all go under the moniker of Hoodman Drone Aviator and they are all very well made.

They are in stock right now at Camera Electronic or you can order them through the on-line shop. good insurance for that vital flight.

The Cross-Eyed Shuffle And The Body Slide

No, it is not the horrors of the dance floor. You can do what you wish at the disco without my let or hindrance.

I refers to weekend experiments with stereo shots using the Fujifilm X-E2 camera. They are on-going , so you'll need to follow them on the wordpress site:

frontierandcolonial.wordpress.com

The preliminary trial involved seeing whether a Cullmann Concept One tripod quick release plate - the medium ones - could be used as a stereo slide. It did work when sliding in a Cullmann Concept One head but not quite enough for normal interpupilary distance of 66 mm. You could get a bare 50mm for the medium plate. This, of course, was more than enough for macro stereo.

The answer will be the 200mm Cullman Concept One OCX388 plate - this will leave more than enough slide for regular work and can be extended for hyper stereo trials.

You need still subjects for two-shot stereo - the garden plants were cooperative. It was easy to shoot left then right with a slide between them and the exposures on the Fujifilm X-E2 are the same every time.

Opening the files in Adobe Photoshop Elements is easy, but it took an hour of experimentation to find out the optimum size for the images themselves when they were butted against themselves and presented on a computer screen. The heading image shows a sort ofd fake stereo card effect but when opened in PE, I can do a free-view and get a clear stereo window in the middle.

It is tiring to do free-viewing for a long time so the next experiments will be on how to adapt modern commercially-made items like the Hoodman Hoodloupe 3.2 to viewing a computer or iPad screen. Even the big mobile phones may be a vehicle for displaying the stereo shots if this idea works.

One thing missing - I wish I had access to Edmund Scientific Supplies - they were the treasure trove for experimenters in my youth. I coveted a set of vernier rockets from them but could never afford them...

How To Hold Your iPad WHen Your Hands Are Busy

We've been looking at an intriguing new item from Manfrotto for the digitally delighted - those photographers who are so connected that they have App dreams instead of nightmares.

It's a cradle for an iPad that allows all the things that the camera you are using at the time to appear on the pad - but without making it hard to do. Tethering, if you will, for dummies. It is going to need one of the later generation of DSLR or mirror-less cameras to work but the facility it will give for the shooter is magic.

Shooting a composition that someone else has to okay before you press the button? Let them see the iPad image as you compose and focus. It won't make art directors any better but it might make them quieter.

Need to see the framing for your own shot? For a video you are recording? Attach the Digital Director to a bracket on your tripod and swivel it around until you are taking a high-quality selfie. No duck faces, now...

Just sick of squinting down a viewfinder or trying to see an LCD screen in dappled light? Use the Digital Director and shield the iPad at a convenient angle.

More on the device when we get to play with it.