Tag Archives: DronePhotography

Skywatch Friday – All Over the Place Edition

Somebody published a geocache within walking distance of the house. Well, i’ve walked over there twice and can’t find it. It’s in a tree just to left of this scene. I didn’t find the cache but I’ve got two walks over to look for it and a not bad photo.

A full moon in October. Not the greatest I’ve done but here it is.

And a better rendition of a half moon, also in August.

I got a new action camera recently. It’s a GoPro clone at literally one tenth the cost. About seventy percent as good as a GoPro, so I’m ahead the way I figure it. I attach it to my bike’s handlebars and set it to take a photo every ten seconds. Most of the photos are of nothing memorable so I delete them. I love vintage power plants and this is Public Service Company of Oklahoma’s Tulsa Power Station. It hardly ever runs but it still on the rate base making money for PSO whether it runs or not. I used to work for a sister company to PSO that supplied the gas to all the power plants. We had a systems that would show us graphically all the gas the power company was burning to make electricity. It was cool watching the load go up during extremely hot or cold weather. Lots of people worked hard to make sure the lights stayed on.

Here is another action camera shot of this person riding an escooter on the RiverParks trails.

And somebody else walking their dog and a guy in an electric wheelchair crossing the river on the new pedestrian bridge. A big variety of people use Tulsa’s RiverParks. I’m always amazed.

A sunset drone shot from 50 meters above my back yard.

And a stormy weather drone shot about 30 meters above my back yard. Stormy means windy and my little microdrone doesn’t like wind.

That’s sall this week folks. Sorry I don’t have a theme besides skies.

I’m linking with Skywatch Friday

Shadow Shot Sunday – Last Sunday in October Edition

In my previous post I wrote about my new action camera and tested it on our pets. A day or two later I put it on my bike and went for a ride. I set it to take a photo every ten seconds so I end up deleting almost all of the images. Here I am at a stop, off my bike. You can see the action camera mounted on the bike and me. If the weather is good I carry along my superzoom camera.

Here is another rest stop with a shadow and my fingers.

This is a phone shot at a local park. I love all the various shadow patterns.

One day I loaded up my drone and took it the Thomas Gilcrease House here in Tulsa. A one time oil baron who bequeathed the Gilcrease Museum to the City of Tulsa. His house has formal garden with a fountain so you can see the shadow of the fountain.

Here is what the fountain looks like.

I am linking with Shadow Shot Sunday

360 Degree Skywatch over my Backyard in Tulsa

Recently I posted some sunset photos from my drone. I had forgotten that I made a 360 video of the same thing. A video from my drone at 150 meters over my backyard.

It’s only 35 seconds long.

I start out looking straight west and then go to the right. Not often you get color everywhere one looks at sunset.

I am linking with Skywatch Friday.

Skywatch Friday – Oklahoma Sunset

The other day the sky looked promising for a decent sunset. It seems the best conditions are high thin clouds. If they are too thick they kind of smother the sun and you get no color. And the thing is the colors don’t last so you have to be ready to go or the opportunity is gone. So I was home, my drone batteries were charged up so I launched it from the back yard.

If you are lucky, and I was that day, you get opposite sunsets which is where you get colors in any direction. So this is looking north.

And this is looking south.

And this was the west, the day before.

And this is looking down. You can see my orange landing pad. I do think that is my new roof. We color matched it to the old roof so there it looks the same. I do only periscope flights. I go straight up from the backyard and look around and then come back down. I don’t fly the drone over other people’s property or anywhere where I can’t just legally walk over and pick it up if something goes wrong. That’s just me though.

I’m linking with Skywatch Friday

Skywatch Friday – Sunset with Half Moon

I got sidelined for a few days with a sore knee. I finally went to the bone doctor and he gave me a range of treatment options from continue using OTC Ibuprofen to getting a steroid injected in the knee to a “surgical solution.” I opted the steroid in the knee. And it helped but I’m not 100% yet. We’ll just have to see how it goes.

I’ve been out and about. My wife and I had our 35th anniversary the other day and so we went to the zoo and 16,000 steps later my knee was calling my name!!! It felt great at first.

I’m linking with Skywatch Friday

A Man on the Moon, and Other Views

The other day, the moon here was 99% full and we had some scattered clouds so I took some photos. This one looks like the moon has a face, featuring a split lips. Reminds me of a cat actually so I guess this isn’t a man on the moon it’s a cat or man in the moon kind of thing.

We had some color in the sky the other day so I launched the old drone. This is looking roughly south of northwest from our house. About 40 meters up.

And this is a similar view looking straight west at the same elevation.

And this is roughly southwest.

And looking straight east. One can see the faintest tints of pink in the clouds. I love reverse sunsets.

And that is it this week. I am linking with Skywatch Friday. Come check them out.

Skywatch Friday – Backyard Dronephotography

We’ve been having scattered cloudy days in Tulsa. Those potentially turn into decent sunset shots. So if I can try and be home then and launch my elderly mini drone up to about 150 feet or from my backyard and see what I can see.

Sometimes you luck out and get some color and texture.

I love those days. The color lasts only for a minute or two and then it is gone.

I’ve learned to turn the drone to look east as well to see the soft pink of the “reverse sunset.”

Sometimes you don’t get any pink but the reverse sunset is always worth looking checking out.

I’m linking with Skywatch Friday

No Northern Lights for Me!!

Our family flat out missed the northern lights extravaganza last week. We tried but there was too much light here. I had lots of photos from our backyard to the northern sky but none of them showed anything. Oh well, I think there was just too much ambient light to show anything.

I launched my drone and I got some late sunset photos. The drone’s controller was squawking at me the whole time about not enough light, blah, blah, blah. I thought we were masters of our technology but it seems to have a mind of its own sometimes. So the above is the sky to our west.

And this is to the northwest. Waayyy too much light.

We have had lots of weather here. Here is a storm cloud to the east from our gym parking lot. Generally we don’t have to worry about the storm when it is to the east but we do worry about the people who are in its path.

After we went home I launched the drone. It was kind of windy and the drone controller was telling me to get it back because the wind is about to carry it off. That has only happened to me once and I had to do the mission abort thing. It worked it brought the drone back home back against a strong wind. It is almost panic inducing. Anyway, turns out that the storm under the clouds was just rain, no rotation, no damage. Which is good.

So I was hoping for some northern light photos. I saw lots on social media and I feel kind of left out. Some wags who also didn’t have any luck posted their plain pics with some colors obviously added. I thought that was funny the first couple hundred times I saw it.

I’m linking with Skywatch Friday.

Aerial Shadows of Tulsa

A drone shot at about 50 meters over the back yard showing the shadows from the fence and trees and on the west side of roofs. The orange square is my takeoff and landing pad. So I am somewhere on the patio next to the landing pad.

View looking west where from the same spot. Maybe 10 meters lower. Showing my neighbors shadows from their trees and fence lines.

And from another day a droneselfie of the drone pilot sporting his brand new Dallas Cowboys hat.

I’m linking with Shadow Shot Sunday

Skywatch Friday – Life is Better Outside

Life sure is better when you can get outside and do things!

Launched my drone again from my back yard. I thought the sunset was going to be better than what it was. Better than nothing though.

I pointed the aircraft west and oriented the camera down a little bit and caught the west side of our neighborhood.

Son, Logan and I went for a hike on Turkey Mountain the other day. It was beautiful. We spent some time on the paved trail next to the Arkansas River.

We had a good time.

I went geocaching the other day. The sky was pretty cool, and I had a successful hunt. It was close to residences and I was feeling watched.

Found some more at a neighborhood park in an older part of town. It was an historic park. For one thing it was close to aircraft manufacturing plants during World War II. The men were at war so the housewives worked. There was an old retired guy who looked after the kids at this park during the workday. I bet that was a zoo.

I got lucky and found a very small geocache, It still counts.

I’m linking with Skywatch Friday. Come check it out.

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