Promoting Commercial sUAS.

[Av8Chuck]

Anyone interested in this please bare with me as I try to explain what I'm thinking.

As some of you may be aware I've been vocal about wanting to organize people interested in building and growing small sUAS businesses. Also over the past couple of months I have received permission, along with working with the TSA to shoot aerial footage at two very busy commercial airports, John Wayne Orange County Airport and Van Nuys Airport.

About a month or so ago I was asked by the KCMA Camarillo Air Show committee if I would shoot aerial of their upcoming show, August 23-24, I told them I would be glad to if they got an LOA from the FAA. To my surprise they did and they took it a step further and got permission to do an aerial demonstration. I'm not keen on flying in front of several thousand people, but I reluctantly agreed. Then they told me that they would like to interview me on medea day, this Thursday.

After giving this some thought this is what I've come up with. Since things are not sorted out with the FAA, I don't want to bite off my nose to spite my face, its probably not a good idea for me to promote my fledgling sUAS business but this might be a good opportunity to promote sUAS in general. I would like to promote the positive aspects of many of the industrial applications of RC's/MR's. Some of you, especially people from outside the US have posted some great examples of industrial uses of MR's as well as some inspirational footage of great locations around the world. It would be great to share some of this, outside of the Internet, with the people attending this show [in a very non threatening to the FAA way] what great things the rest of the world is doing in this industry.

The announcer will say whatever we provide, about 3-5 minutes, during the show. I'd be willing to purchase some booth space and provide the necessary equipment to display any HD video you guys would be willing to share, it would also be great if we can provide footage for an EPK [Electronic Press Kit] for the medea.

It would also be hugely helpful if there were people willing to make the pilgrimage to Camarillo who would like to fly their MR's in front of large crowds.

This isn't Farnborough or OshKosh, it generally has about 65,000 attendees but for whatever reason they certainly seem to be interested in "Drones" so maybe we can use this event to put a positive spin on the sUAS business.

So I could really use some help in writing what we want the announcer to say, getting footage, preferably ProRes for the medea day this Thursday as well as footage for the day's of the show and some demo pilots with their own MR's. It would also be great if we had a good turn out of MR's for a static display.

Thanks

 

[Old Man]

Kudos to you!! Camarillo is a heck of an air show and being just north of the mega L.A. metro area gets a lot of public exposure. The Oxnard/Ventura locale also holds a lot of L.A. political money so go for broke buddy. It would be great if some of the local talent, and I'm sure there is some, would come out to at least show off some of the pro level stuff.

 

[FlyGirl]

Don't forget to mention us "non-pro hobbyists" too Chuck and kudos for doing this! What a great way to change 65,000 minds all at once about sUAS!

 

[SamaraMedia]

Congrats Chuck! What a awesome opportunity to showcase the usefulness of MR's, WITH approval of the FAA! I can understand your reluctance to promote your sUAS business but it seems like the FAA is giving you a green light and I would guess they already know about your skills as a MR pilot from past approval at the mentioned airports. I don't think I would handle flying in front of a crowd that size very well, I would probably have dead hands or at least shakey thumbs with that much attention but following your posts here I feel you would be a great representative of the MR community as a whole, from professional and industrial use to hobbyist.

Look forward to reading about the outcome of this event and the other professionals in your area that come forward to support in some way. Being on the East coast I can live vicariously through you.

Good luck!

Now to do some testing on a hexa build I've been working on

John

 

[kloner]

i'd love to help ya out but were booked thursday

the faa is suprisingly open and receptive to low altitude type uav in general.

 

[Av8Chuck]

Thanks everyone, appreciate the kind words. Remember everyone who can't make it to the event itself it would still be hugely helpful if you could contribute some footage or help write the announcers dialog and press release.

Kloner, interested in flying at the show itself?

 

[kloner]

whats the dates? if i'm not booked i'd love to come help ya

 

[Av8Chuck]

August 23-24.

 

[kloner]

I couldn't help much with footage (incriminating) and my pencil is a bit raw as you all know, but i'd be glad to come represent the industry as kloner....... my company would have to stay out of it all.....

 

[Av8Chuck]

I could still use some help.

Here's my thoughts on creating a Press release, any input would be greatly appreciated. We need to figure out a way to support the FAA's efforts, not pick a fight with it, but at the same time educate the public about what's happening and that responsible small sUAS businesses want to help.

Who
Av8Chuck and others yet to be determined.


What
Industrial Multirotor flight demonstrations and static displays.


Where
Camarillo Airport, Camarillo California


When
August 23-24


Why
Not sure what the short answer is: the FAA’s current stance on commercial sUAS [small unmanned aerial systems] does not address the needs, and opportunities of the sUAS business community to avail itself of model aircraft for commercial purposes, other than to declare that activity illegal.


We want to demonstrate and educate the attendees at the Camarillo air show that small sUAS businesses embrace the intent to regulate this emerging industry, that there are professional operators and manufactures who want to operate in a safe, effective and respectful manner.


The rules therefore must fully encompass the commercial use of model aircraft, and set the guidelines for their use by the business community, the freedom to act requires a known regulatory environment.


The intent here is to encourage the FAA to consider the needs of small sUAS businesses in an “encouraging way” not to take on the FAA in public.

 

[Ronan]

Too bad you are pretty far from me (MD) or else i would drop by and help.

sUAV businesses have been around for a certain number of years now, maybe that's something you can mention. Only recently has the FAA and Media tried to make it sound like we are new & bad (until they figure out how to tax us...).

 

[stitch1615]

I could still use some help.

Here's my thoughts on creating a Press release, any input would be greatly appreciated. We need to figure out a way to support the FAA's efforts, not pick a fight with it, but at the same time educate the public about what's happening and that responsible small sUAS businesses want to help.

Who
Av8Chuck and others yet to be determined.


What
Industrial Multirotor flight demonstrations and static displays.


Where
Camarillo Airport, Camarillo California


When
August 23-24


Why
Not sure what the short answer is: the FAA’s current stance on commercial sUAS [small unmanned aerial systems] does not address the needs, and opportunities of the sUAS business community to avail itself of model aircraft for commercial purposes, other than to declare that activity illegal.


We want to demonstrate and educate the attendees at the Camarillo air show that small sUAS businesses embrace the intent to regulate this emerging industry, that there are professional operators and manufactures who want to operate in a safe, effective and respectful manner.


The rules therefore must fully encompass the commercial use of model aircraft, and set the guidelines for their use by the business community, the freedom to act requires a known regulatory environment.


The intent here is to encourage the FAA to consider the needs of small sUAS businesses in an “encouraging way” not to take on the FAA in public.

Excellent plan and I wish you well. It should be a fantastic show.
You may want to limit the references to the FAA to but a few.
You can bet someone from the FAA will be there. Think Positive.
May the Rotor gods be with you and may Murphy take a holiday.
Anything to increase the public's positive awareness of MultiRotors can do nothing but help.
It appears you plan to avoid the dreaded "D" word which is a great start.
Perception, unfortunately, is everything.


You might offer a word of thanks to all the Chinese spies who shared
this great General Dynamics technology with we the hobbyist who obviously
didn't have millions of taxpayers money to spend on R&D.

Or not.

 

[filmfly]

Hey Chuck,

This sounds fantastic. You are really helping us all with your professionalism and effort. I wish I could be there to join (I used to fly quite frequently out of Van Nuys and Camarillo and I've volunteered at the air show). It's true that this is a great opportunity!

I would suggest emphasizing the safety and professionalism with which serious UAS operators approach their work. As many here have repeated, we welcome regulations that will help to give us all a clear path forward and benefit everyone.

Although I'm on the opposite coast from you now, I'd be happy to do what I can from here to help. Just drop me a line. I'll try to work on some more press release stuff for you too.

Cheers,
Dave T.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[Av8Chuck]

I attended the media day for the airshow, there was about 20-30 reporters, three TV stations the rest was either online or print. Lot of fun everything went well and the crowd loved the quad flying. Here's some pictures from before and after. I didn't take any during the event...

 

[SamaraMedia]

That's awesome Chuck! Hopefully of the 20-30 reporters that attended at least a few walked away with a little better understanding of what UAV's (drones) can do and how they can be operated safely for many things. I hope the rest of the weekend goes as smoothly as today, good luck, look forward to seeing your posts.

John

 

[Av8Chuck]

Thanks. The show is actually August 23-24 so the following weekend.

Quite a few of the photographers had Phantoms and were asking a lot of questions about the difference between hobby grade and industrial grade MR's. The Y6 that I took was incomplete, I left it that way because I wanted people to see how these are constructed, the Mini Hive power distribution board says "Made in America" which led to several conversations about engineering out Chinese components to make these more reliable and safe. A few of them had a bit of an attitude but they were the first come up to me after the demo flight. It was a bit breezy and they couldn't believe how stable the quad was.

Of coarse I didn't go there to impress the photographers, we'll have to see if there's any mention of the event over the next couple of weeks. I was also asked by a department chair from USCB if I would be willing to go there in November to speak to students there. We'll see if that happens too, I'm not really interested in becoming a spokesperson for the sUAS industry, I just thought this airshow would be a good place to show the general public why they should care about sUAS's.

 

[Av8Chuck]

here's the video from the GoPro on the demo. I wasn't shooting anything just cruising around for pictures..

 

[kloner]

That's awesome Chuck. I look forward to helping you reach the people....... Were gonna need some bigger tables..... mine are 4' motor to motor

 

[Av8Chuck]

That's awesome Chuck. I look forward to helping you reach the people....... Were gonna need some bigger tables..... mine are 4' motor to motor

I'm talking to the organizers now about booth space, not sure how big a space is available looks like 10'x20'.

OK everyone, Kloner is coming down to help spread the word and display some of his heavy iron so we will have a great static display, MonbasaFlash has already provided some great footage that was part of the EPK that went to the media, this is great but I still need some help.

A lot of you outside the US have posted footage, great examples of the good things MR's can be used for, please share that footage with us for this airshow. We can show your footage without the fear of prosecution from the FAA and its a great example of what can be accomplished when sUAS legal. The owner of the Waypoint, a very nice restaurant located in the thick of the show, has offered to let us play the videos that are located throughout to the hundreds of people eating there during the show (and probably for a few days after).

Finally, still need help writing what the announcer should say.

Thanks

 

[kloner]

10x20 is plenty, we just need lots of tables