I’ve been wanting a drone for several years. I love photography and video, but never have the time. There’s something about moving light, panning and horizons. I’ve always been musical, I think, always a humming in my head of a tune, I used to drive my friends as a kids a little crazy on the school bus because I would make up my own little silly songs. I learned to play the piano by myself, then played in church for years, eventually learning the drums, a little bass guitar. Anyway, my point is that as much as I find myself in study, running business or doing non-creative type things, my soul finds life in art.
As I get older, I’m learning to find discipline myself to do things that in fact, bring life. The western ‘productivity’ engine that I was shaped in wants me to stay focused. The hamster wheel just keeps running faster until we forget who we are, we’re breathing, but we’re not aware of the gift of life and living into this present moment. So, back to the drone!
Last summer I was in Canada, and my brother Trevor, and his daughter Alexa (yes, I know two Alexa’s that aren’t from Amazon!) graciously blessed my with a broken Phantom 4 drone. These drone’s are quite expensive, and I was convinced that in Ukraine, I could get it fixed.. Ukrainians have never met something broken and called it a day. Anyway, we brought it back, Covid hit, and it lie dormant for 9 months. I eventually found a place in Kyiv to look at it, took it, and a few days later, with a $400 bill, it was good as new! I then had to figure a way to get it, as I’m rarely in Kyiv with all these lock down rules. Deb, however, was off with a group serving in another town with the widow’s team – they ended up getting rerouted through Kyiv, which is a massive City.. and she calls me the other day, “Hey, we’re in front of the drone repair place I think..” Sure enough, she was, and a couple hrs later I had the drone.
I share that because honestly I was still on the fence about the whole thing. I really don’t have a lot of time, I’m buried in school, reading literally 8 books at once at the moment, and any extra time is for family and Lighthouse.. and this crazy Marathon! But I felt the joy of the Spirit, God blessed me with the drone, then fixed it, then picked it up for me – it’s like He was saying, “play with this you goose.”
So, I’ve begun playing. Each night I go out, fly it up to ranges I’m not sure I’m allowed to – I need to research this more. It can go 5km, and up to 500 meters high! It’s super fun, but all the batteries are dead and only one works, lasting 15 minutes.. so I have to be careful how far I fly. I’ve crashed it twice, once because of the dog (it thinks its a bird and tries to bit it during landing) and once because I was exceedingly stupid and tried to land it on my 2nd story deck, on a small, with a drink on it.
I have uploaded some footage to Shutterstock, and going to start trying to master some short clips, using Final Cut to color correct and such. I have a lot to learn.. and I hope my next post isn’t about it landed in the Dnepr River.. but it’s sure fun flying the friendly skies. I hope my neighbors don’t complain.. I must be sensitive to their gardening 🙂