Photographing and filming lions with technology

<p>An interesting clip from National Geographic on the use of track vehicles and octocopters to film lions, and the use of Infrared for night illumination:<br>

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<p>Some footage obtained in this short clip along with clusters of crittercams and GoPros:<br>

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<p>Hi Michael, great stuff! thanks for the link.<br /> <br /> The BBC has been doing this for a while now. One was a series about Asian Tigers (<em>Spy in the Jungle</em>) where the disguised (as a log, as a rock etc ) RC cams were transported around by elephants. The footage was amazing.<br /> <br /> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AclKp8672w4<br /> <br /> Another more recent one was about antarctic penguins (<em>Spy in the Huddle</em>). Here the RC cams were dressed up as one of four species of penguin which were able to mix with the penguins without apparently causing the slightest alarm for them. Truly eye-opening stuff!<br /> <br /> http://www.bbcamerica.com/anglophenia/2013/03/what-are-brits-watching-penguins-spy-in-the-huddle/<br /> <br /> RC cams seem to be the way forward. I'm thinking about stealing my son's RC car and adapting it with some feathers, a beak, my camera.... ;_)</p>

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<p>Colin, it'd be really hard to top the BBC film crew. I sill wonder how they captured those wonderful footages over 10 years ago in that Attenborough wildlife series. They used one of the first batches of Sony HD cameras available at the time. </p>

<p>On your son's RC car, I've had a few thoughts about rigging something too, however the trouble with us tinkerers is that we're playing with solutions looking for a problem, but it just might be perfect for scaring a few local stray cats! :-) </p>

<p>Terrific stuff, Michael - thanks for the links!<br /><br />This topic is especially fascinating to me, as I'm exploring some remote capabilities now, on a number of fronts.</p>

<p>Matt, how's the noise level on your quadcopter, and do you know the typical prop speed in flight? </p>

<p>You can see the lions clearly startled/frightened by the noise of the octocopter in the clip; I imagine an electric helicopter will be much quieter due to its reduced rotor velocity over the screaming props in a multi-copter. </p>

<p>Michael: My small quad sounds like a loud mosquito!<br /><br />I'm building a larger hexacopter. The bigger ones spin a little slower and have larger props ... they seem to have a bit "throatier" of a sound, a deeper hum. There are huge variations - just using props a half an inch longer or shorter can really change the sound.<br /><br />The factory props on the Phantom are injection-molded white plastic. They're kinda noisy. To reduce vibrations, I switched them out for four carbon fiber rotors - much quieter. Even <em>more</em> quiet once I properly balanced them down to the fraction of a gram. Hovering and non-aggressive flying is surprisingly quiet. Descending quickly into the prop wash (straight down) makes a lot of "fluffy" noise.<br /><br />I noticed the lions' behavior in that shot too - but I'll bet it was more about the unfamiliar sight than it was the sound, per se. I'll bet that if they flew the camera drone around them for several days straight, they'd get just about as bored with it as they are with that double-DSLR mini-tank in the video (about which they didn't seem to give a hoot, either way!).</p>

<p>Thanks, Matt. </p>

<p>I guess a source of that unique multi-copter sound is because it's unlike a conventional helicopter where the blade-pitch is variable to accommodate lift and the rotor speed can remain relatively constant depending on the type of flying. Without variable pitch, the only means to control lift is by way of motor speed. </p>

<p>There is also the beat-frequency between prop blades even if they're running at the same speed - any imbalance/difference is going to produce slightly difference beat harmonics.</p>

<p>One of the objections on my old Hirobo Shuttle is the engine noise; I've been thinking of retrofitting electrics to it (if possible) now that electric drive is cheap and reliable, although I must say that the trailing smoke from that 1 HP gas engine makes for a perfect wind direction indicator. :-) </p>

 

<p>Here's a coaxial design with a very different noise profile from quadcopters:<br>

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<p>Hmm. That coax copter makes a racket! I'll have to shoot some hovering video and mic it with a decent Sennheiser shotgun so you can hear a faithful recording of it. A good project anyway.<br /><br />And, I've been thinking about wind. When working with bird dogs, I use pieces of surveyor's tape on bushes and branches - a poor man's windsock, basically, to know where the bird scent is blowing. I've found my subjective wind measurement skills are needing a bit of buffing up, since I'm piloting a flying lawnmower around.</p>

<p>Matt and Colin, you guys might be interested in this - a new interactive site National Geographic created on the lion story. I've linked it to the robot page but you can use the arrows to navigate:<br>

<a href="http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/serengeti-lion/index.html#/the-robot">http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/serengeti-lion/index.html#/the-robot</a></p>