I have finally… FINALLY… got the paperwork all sorted out for the Civil Aviation Authority and submitted all that for another year’s Operational Authorisation! There were quite a few updates required to my Operations Manual for this year, along with sitting a new exam to upgrade from the old PfCO standard to the new GVC which all prevented me from taking my usual route of sending everything off to a specialist consultant and letting them sort it all for me! I have to say, having done it all myself… that is certainly money well spent!
Now I just have to await a response from the CAA - which will hopefully come in the form of a new certificate to operate at the highest level!
Looking ahead I am wondering if I carry on flying in this manner or whether I cut back to a lesser authorisation and add a smaller drone to my fleet. The current Mavic Mini 3 Pro/Mini 4 options are both “okay” but with the small sensor they are still, basically speaking, flying mobile phone cameras. The Air 3 uprates that to something akin to a high end digicam whilst the Mavic 3, which is my current drone of choice, uprates that to a m4/3 sensor similar to that found in the excellent Olympus OM series cameras and Hassleblad optics! It really is several steps up from the little drones! So at the moment I don’t think I am comfortable with downgrading my more urban work to Mini standards, there will no doubt be a Mini 5 before too long though so I will wait and see what they do in terms of image quality with that one.
The other drone that I REALLY REALLY want is a Splash Drone. I need to find more examples of image quality from one, but I am beyond intrigued by them as they can fly in considerably less favourable conditions being fully waterproof - they can even land on water and film with a submerged camera! The potential of this in terms of creativity and my location is pretty staggering! I am also having thoughts about getting into submersible drones for sub-sea work… but I have a few other things to do before then!
So with the drone side of things (hopefully) wrapped up it is time to start concentrating on the next thing on the “to do” list and put together the first half of next years workshop program! I think I am going to push Orkney back to Autumn purely because I want to be here over the first half of the year to work on the huts programme, so I am going to dominate the early part of the year with day and weekend workshops, as well as a push on 1:1 sessions. This will also fit in better with commitments I have made to the RNLI as I train up to become a Launch Authority for the Loch Ness Lifeboat which is all kicking off in the early part of 2024.
Hopefully I will have some dates in the next week or so for the courses!
