Lily, your personal unmanned drone

[Noa Put]

I just came across below video on dvxuser, that would be cool, attach the tracking device on the groom when you are at the photoshoot, start up the drone, select a follow mode, trow the thing away and let it do it's job. Now you can fly a drone with your eyes closed, only hope it won't come across some powerlines or other obstacles on the way.

YouTube (Short URL)

[Anthony McErlean]

What next :) ...that was class.

[Robert Benda]

Some other will do follow modes - I know my Iris+ will, I'd just use my phone as the follow device. However, the ease of flight, transport, and the waterproof part make this very tempting as a 2nd drone. Does't look like it will do regular flying.

[Peter Rush]

Beware...

Photographer faces suspended jail term for 'flying drone over Disneyland Paris' | Daily Mail Online

[Roger Gunkel]

A great idea totally ignoring the requirements of safety and legality. In the UK it wouldn't meet any of the requirements for flying an unmanned airborne machine. In addition, what is to prevent it colliding with trees, cables, poles, higher ground, people at a higher level etc etc. - onboard collision avoidance? I don't think so at that price!

Roger

[Craig McKenna]

The Solo looks better... able to scan the area and make its own flight path, whilst also working with GoPro to create their controllers etc to be able to modify settings and even charge the GoPro if I remember correctly. The best part is the ability to draw the flight path on the screen and then concentrate on controlling the movement of the camera on its own...

Nevertheless, they're doing a nice cheap price if you pre-order the Lily! Does look great though!

[Adrian Tan]

So, you seemingly throw it in the air to activate it, and the demo video also shows the Lily landing on someone's hand.

Makes me curious: what happens if your hand or your face gets struck by those propellers? Or are they weak enough that they won't hurt you?

[Dave Blackhurst]

The blades on these little multi rotor drones are often soft plastic or even foam - they are not whirling stainless steel "blades of death". I know of one death from a single rotor due to operator error (AKA "Darwin award"), but most of the sensationalist reporting about hazards to life and limb are overstated, IMO.

[Roger Gunkel]

The micro copters have fairly flimsy blades, but anything Phantom sized or above will have rigid plastic blades or even carbon fibre ones. Either can give you a nasty cut if not treated with respect.

I normally hand retrieve my Phantom by putting it in a stable hover then walking over to it and holding the landing skid, I never fly it right up to me. I also feel quite strongly that a quad losing control and dropping under power several hundred feet onto someone's head could result in a very nasty injury, which is why observing flying safety rules is vital. The Lily doesn't enable the operator to follow safety rules as far as I can see.

Roger

[Rob Cantwell]

i love the way they threw it in the water and it just flew straight out of it... i'm sure someone will come up with a drone that can submerge and fly up into the air, like something out of a Bond movie.