I am an FAA licensed commercial drone pilot. Somehow it sounds like I fly jetliners around, but actually it took all of about 14 days to get the license. Indeed, I am one of 275,565 remote pilots in the US and that number grows daily. And yet I see people basing their future income on being a commercial drone pilot. They take it on as a profession. The problem is that many of them have no professional skills other than flying a drone, and some don’t have even that. Most of the course work is basically how to avoid being thrown in jail by the FAA, not actually how to fly a drone.

Many of those people will give up, sooner or later, though there will certainly be a core of pilots who learn and adjust, or in fact do have special skills such as surveying or inspection. I fit the later variety, having been a professional photographer and videographer for many years. To me the drone is a tool, like the others I use to create unique photographs and videos. It gives me one more path to creativity.

But along with my 14 days of commercial pilot training, I bring along many thousands of hours using professional editing software like Photoshop, Premiere and After Affects. I also bring along a lifetime of photographic experience, including as a photojournalist.

In this blog, I will probably talk about doing photography and video jobs, but I may gripe or even predict the future of photography or drones. I also have a few other projects I’m working on for myself, such as the Lubbock Canyon Lakes project. This is probably only of local interest, but I am trying to fly the entire distance of these series of lakes and small rivers. However, I also want to do some close in work and describe some of the features.

Lubbock Historical Homes Project

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Being a Commercial (sec 107) Drone Pilot