crowdsurfer

THE CROWDSURFER FORMULA

I was in NYC for a few nights on work, my friend FPVVegan hit me up to go with him as his spotter for flying over the crowds after the Knicks game let out at MSG. He had been contacted by a local media outlet to get some footage, but the footgae they sent was topdown shots from a GPS drone. This got me thinking, how can we get these type shots with a micro drone? In a conversation with Yves from Fractal Engineering, he was talking about unnconventional ways to build his F75: "flip it over and make it a pusher"

It was this phrase, echoing in my mind in his beautiful french accent, that brought the crowdsurfer to life. I've always been a fan of "build it wrong until it works" but this was a new level: what if we just took a standard whoop, flipped the props and made it fly "upside down" - with the camera canopy hanging below and the battery on top, then we could get the overhead look. Maybe Angle mode would help stabalzize things? I managed to build a working version and brought it out that night but it was more chaotic than anticipated and i didn't get to try it out until we got a little further away from the crowds. you can see that maiden flight here. Ok, here's the formula:

1. Flip camera 180 degrees. If you can do this within your camera or if you have to physically do it, this is the first step. Up is now down.

2. Flip props physically. remove and flip them so the bottom of the prop is showing when looking at the motor from above.

3.Betaflight adjustments: Board Orientation (180 Roll axis) and double check motor order / motor direction / props are reversed button

4. PRACTICE flying somewhere safe. Horizon mode set to 30 strength might be helpful at first, but I actually feel more comfortable with acro. The hardest part is getting used to what is practically a -30 degree camera angle