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Kite Aerial Photography
SethJohnson writes "People have been attaching cameras to kites for quick-and-dirty aerial photographs for almost a hundred years. Hobbyists have progressed the art far beyond it's quick-and-dirty origins to produce stunning results. NASA even has a fairly detailed how-to using a disposable camera. Looks like a fun science fair project for those dads out there with kids."
Over the nudist beach!
134340: I am not a number. I am a free planet!
now all i need are a couple of hot models to move in next door and sun bathe naked for test objects and i'll be good to go!!
;-)
oh wait.. that's the whole purpose of my roof
plus it's november.. so i guess i better put this idea off..
"The ones who dont do anything are always the ones who try to pull you down" -- Henry Rollins
I have a feeling many cameras will be returned to the store for "spontaneously fragmenting."
I'll form my OWN solar system! With blackjack! And hookers!
Bow! Bow! Wow! Bow! Wow! Kite flying will be hip again.
you mean areola photos?
So I assume someone has done there duty and that Laura Betterly and Chris Connell are signed up for the Kite Photography mailing list? :)
You are checking your backups, aren't you?
Those along waterfronts know that daily patterns of onshore and offshore breezes can aid in getting good wind.
Brooks Leffler pioneered the art with a magazine (!!!) that he still has back issues of. He even sells stabilizing tails. The most stunning pictures in my opinion have been by the vastly-experienced Chris Benton... he inspired my finally getting into this. $100 for the kite, $80 for the camera, $100 radio+misc, and you're up and going.
For as long as I can remember I've alwase thought that this was a cool idea but somthing that I thought would be also realy fun was sailboat cameras. While not as use full they would be tons of fun you would be able to take picutres of your family on the beach, of other boats in Central Park's pund, and for my all time favorite, if you removed the mast you would be able to send your camera on a boad tied to a string down the sewers to take pictures of aligators.
ok, I'm done laughing. But that has to be the funniest looking picture I've seen in awhile. It's like looking at someone's family album.
"That's your Uncle Bort."
how about a timer-controlled camera on a helium balloon. it could take a picture every 10 seconds or something... the only tricky part would be getting the camera back after it had floated off. maybe you could promise whoever found it that you would send them reprints :)
I don't want to think about all the lawsuits that could arise from a curious kid with a camera on a kite! *shudder*
As opposed to... ?
example.org - powered by Linux!
Terrorists in our own backyards!! We must immediately ban kites and imprison kite owners without trial. God only knows what these religious fanatics were trying to survey before destroying. I'm glad we caught them before they actually did something. God Bless America.
We even take down government sites.
...but how will all those cameras affect Charlie Brown's kite-eating tree? I'd imagine they're not too healthy.
Okay, that wasn't funny. It's late. Night night.
[PowerPoint] is a tool for capitalist presentation
Looks like its up. My oops
Remember when you used to play wargames as a kid? Now you can do it with your very own Spy Satellite.
"Now you'll know all of your enemies moves; where they're keeping the water ballon stash, how many they have, and if that teenage girl in the house across the street is sun bathing topless again."
oh...
Build your own website - full service homepage system your m
There is/was an estes rocket that did this. Two of my friends had them... One never recovered the rocket(typical of our launches) and the other pictures came out great!
It's not as controlled as a kite, but you get great landscape pictures.
Nice Kite: $100 New Digital Camera: $400 Crashing it into the ground on your first try: Priceless (And thats why I don't even try ;) )
We've sent our little 35mm's up to 112,000 feet! try that with a kite!
"Okay, I'm getting a signal now. Wait. Is this a screen-saver image?
It looks like an under-water sce.......DAMN!"
Table-ized A.I.
huh?
High Alt Balloon Group
Looks like a fun science fair project for those dads out there with kids.
What about all all of those moms out there with kids? Are they not allowed to geek it out too?
How about moms?
;-)
You didn't say "dads with sons" so presumably being old and female is the handicap? I went to school down the road from MIT and met plenty of women gifted with the geeky arts.
real-time video feed from kite
sure is a lot cheaper than a remote control helicopter. =)
My life in the land of the rising sun.
What the... Hey! Science Fair Projects are for the KIDS to do! The KIDS! Not the DADS! jeez, you don't want to raise a cheater, do you? (Besides, everyone knows mothers do better work....)
I don't need to be made to look evil. I can do that on my own. - Christopher Walken
As opposed to... ?
A pimp-daddy.
You know the pirates around here do some slave trading on the weekends. Gotta supplement the ol' VCD business in order to support that luxurious case-modder lifestyle with the $400 a month video card habit.
Ummm, you might try using filler chars such as periods,,, really though don't be a dipshit, we all know that really long lines (like 400 periods in a row without spaces) will break /. so just be a nice troll and use reasonable judgement and normal length lines, we all (at least most of us) enjoy a good troll song, so I decided to help you out, but please don't be an ass, just troll and be happy.
The dads whose kids are DEAD, you heartless BASTARD!
Timmy.. where are you timmy.. daddy's here.. *sniff*
What I plan on implementing is a wireless 802.11b camera/camcorder hooked up to a kite.
V ideo/dcs1000w/
here is a link to one vendor who currently supports offers the 802.11b camera
http://www.dlink.com/products/DigitalHome/Digital
for the predator BTW, I wonder if anyone's attached an Hellfire to a kite?
So does Anonymous Coward have good karma?
Most interesting is the rigging! This suspention reduces flopping about as the whole thing would have to lift and spin to tip sideways. Ingenious! Although, a very old idea...
I run a kite site and am fanatical about the sport, so i should hope to have a little authority on the subject. While i haven't done any KAP myself, i've read extensively on the subject. There are some amazing photos coming back from people lofting cameras on their kites. There is also some interesting tech going into the works too. I've seem plans for radio controlled microcontrollers that will depress the camera trigger, hold it till a beep for the camera to focus, then press the trigger harder to take the photo. There are setups using small video cameras and transmitters that allow the user to see what he's about to take a photo of. There are a bunch of pan-rotate-zoom setups using servos and the like. It's mostly R/C tech, but still quite cool.
My fav site for KAP is here.
My website (in sig) doesn't have much for KAP resources, but it is useful to look at to see some of the other spiffy stuff.
By the way, the kite obelisk folks are still at it, planning an even bigger lift, and with period materials. Should be exciting, but I don't have the full scoop, they are keeping it quiet until they pull it off.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
You missed his point, if you're a dad, that means you have kids. The original quote is redundant, because of this.
then you wouldnt be a dad anymore, so no
At my high school (http://rhs.seattleschools.org) we have an after school club that builds rigs for kite arial photography. The trick is making the rig lightweight, yet strong enough that it doesnt suddenly snap 500 ft above the surface. Our mentor will be traveling to Antarctica this winter, and he will be taking a few of the rigs we have built. The Drachen Foundation has more info.
Dads whose kids were killed by 40 pound kites with sharp metal parts attached falling out of the sky.
Did you know you can fertilize your lawn with used motor oil?
I see this one (the tiny l'espion camera), but see no supplier in the U.S. (anyone know of one?), which appears inexpensive and very light (40 grams!).
There's also the SiPix StyleCam Blink, which is about $40, and slightly larger but takes higher-res pictures, too.
What other tiny ones would be suitable for tossing on a kite (whether or not the two I've named would be), and what would be the best way to trigger them?
timothy
jrnl: http://tinyurl.com/c2l8yr / foes: http://tinyurl.com/ckjno5
the way, what're you goin' didactic on yo ass!
example.org - powered by Linux!
thanks - I'll give it a go for the next fp...
Look at the penguin kites: http://arch.ced.berkeley.edu/kap/images/pengarch.j pg
yann arthus-bertrand's absolutely tremendous photography was on display in chicago late this summer. yann took his images from a helicopter so i can imagine they are a bit more costly than its little brother kite. these images are nothing short of amazing.
chicago department of cultural affairs: earth from above
elexon presents: earth from above
fujifilm presents: earth from above
yann arthus-bertrand
I attach a small, cheap, 1.3MP digital Pencam to my R/C planes for aerial shots. Aiptek makes a 1.3MP "pencam" that weighs about 50grams. (without batteries) that works pretty well. The pictures out of the CMOS sensor and the cheap lens aren't as nice as conventional photographs - even from disposable cameras - but you can take a lot of them, and the really bad ones don't cost anything to develop.
The camera is ~US$60-70 at Walmart and Circuit City.
The official Pencam web site
And a picture taken with my pencam from my R/C plane
I used to fly kites a lot as a kid (was also when I did the model rocket photography) and never had a problem but now that I have these so called stunt kites, all that I'm ever able to do is a nose dive.
The more I think about this, the more I like the idea though. If I get a better kite (that's a lot easier to fly and requires less wind), and I use a small wireless camera transmitting to my laptop, I wonder what kind of images I could get... could be quite impressive.
How come all of the good ideas involving the outdoors seem to come around when the rainy season hits? I live in Seattle and the rainy season is upon us... I'll have to wait until the beach has some people worth photographing and then I'll give this a try. What's a very cheap wireless camera that can survive slamming into the ground repeatedly when the kite crashes? Any ideas?
How is it that one careless match can start a forest fire, but it takes a whole box to start a campfire?
That guys thumbnails in his gallery are 35k gif's... Talk about ASKING for bandwidth issues with slashdot.
Looks like NASA has finally declassified it's old 1960's reconnaissance techniques...
To make a pun demonstrates the highest understanding of a language
This was the Taliban equivalent of modern satellite imaging & targeting. If it wasn't for that they probably wouldn't have lasted as long as they did.
Then I realized Jewish people can't fly!
The company I work for can orthorectify those cheapo shots for you, esp if you shoot a mosaic of these...
http://pixxures.com
Me sending my $800 Canon digital up into the sky to photograph scenes I would otherwise have to get from a low flying plane. Imagine the savings :-)
Saskboy's blog is good. 9 out of 10 dentists agree.
don't laugh, some 3rd world countries are using this technique for air reconassance.
In modern countries, ppl are using it to spy on there neighbors. Must we wait before there is a kiteonacamera.com ? "Kites flown over hollywood celebrities residences, 100% legal. For $5.95 a month you can have 24hr aerial vision of a hollywood supermodels".
Analytic & algebraic topology of locally Euclidean meterization of infinitely differentiable Riemmanian manifold
Here's who he's talking about
The man who trades freedom for security does not deserve nor will he ever receive either. - Benjamin Franklin
"Looks like a fun science fair project for those dads out there with kids."
Now, logically if you're a dad, you have kids, therefore if you have kids, you are a dad. What else could make a man a dad if he didn't have kids?
Looks like a fun science fair project for those dads out there with kids.
*ahem* And moms. :p
You don't have to be the person you've become.
A man with DEAD kids you Ass hole.
It's a little hard to play with a corpse, you knob!
Day after day, week after week, I tell them that the word "ITS" is the possesive form of "IT," and the word "IT'S" means "IT IS."
Despite my best efforts, the editors come up with phrases like:
art far beyond it's quick-and-dirty origins
What can we--Slashdot readers who wince when we see our mother tounge mangled--do to make them stop?
Ever notice how all the FP people have small penises?
I did.
I don't usually look, but it is hard not to when they run around naked yelling, "I'm an Ass hole with a small dick." I just wanted to confirm that they were not an Ass hole, and that their dick was smaller than mine, and it didn't take long to see that both were true.
Maybe the military would be interested if you just add a bomb under it and have a longer wire.
Omigod, slippery slope! Quick, someone
:)
call ACLU! Who knows how long until they
start using kites with cameras
to snoop on everybody!
(In ye olde days, an obFUD would be included
here. So it is, by implication
Considered harmful.
You sir are clearly a gay Canadian.
Just look at your preocupation with homosexuality, and Canadian subjects.
I think you need to move the Montreal very soon, if you are ever to be happy.
Go fly a kite too you knob.
in case anyone was dumb enough (like me) to click on that link...
Note that Charles Benton (The guy who runs the first site listed) is offering a particular geeky barter: exchanging photos for slide rules)
There are also plenty of people who take pictures and/or videos from high-power rockets as well - and I'm not talking about the cheap Estes camera rockets. The preferred way to get still-shots is to use a decent-enough "point-and-shoot" with auto-advance, and wire a timer to the contacts of the button which takes the picture, although others use a servo to actuate the button, like this example.
It seems like even more people take videos, however - everything from a tiny "X10"-style camera with a transmitter to the full monty, where multiple digital video cameras are mounted inside the rockets. One of the founders of Xircom, Dirk Gates, has some very high-quality DV videos of his rocket flights at http://gbrocketry.com/movie_theater.htm.
Oh, you're not stuck, you're just unable to let go of the onion rings.
$5 / month hosted VPS on linux = awesome!
There's also Photoplane who published similar works (taken from a motorized model plane) on GNUArt.net
Trolling using another account since 2005.
This hobby could pay for itself. People like having photos of their houses from the sky; especially rich people with nice houses and land.
If you get the owners with their dogs in there, I bet they'd pay double!
Are there any camera/trigger combo mechanisms which could take more than one picture per flight? I mean if I let a kite out for 6 minutes, it's going to get a great shot from really high up...but then I have to reel the kite back in to take another picture.
Anybody have any ideas on a fairly easy way to hook up something like an RC button to both shoot the picture and advance the film...or maybe a lightweight camera that auto-advances...so the RC motor only has to hit the exposure button...?
Mordor...a magical, mythical land where women are more rare than dragons--but where every man would rather find a dragon
... you mean this ?
As opposed to WarDriving. Just use aluminum rods to act as both the antenna and support for the kite itself.
Hint: Fly this in a city park and enjoy the fun.
For an outsider like me, it seems that the risk of ending with a totally broken camera is high. How often does it happen ?
I've browsed the pages and they dont seem to mention digital cameras. Is it because they are too expensive to risk them ? (my aim is NOT to reopen the passionate discussion about digital/conventional cameras !)
And the scarier thing is - I was intrigued.
the major advances in civilization are processes which all but wreck the societies in which they occur - A.N. White
I've got a couple of Brooks Leffer's box kites I bought from him when he had a shop in Annapolis 10 or 15 years ago. He builds a beyotch of a kite .. they're still flying to this day
Looks like a fun science fair project for those dads out there with kids."
Editors modification: those responsible dads
Otherwise, our publication will be sued when the inevitable mishap occurs.
You know the one, that starts innocently like
"Provided by the management for your protection."
In the very back of the September 2000 issue of Scientific American there is an article Using a Kite as an Experimental Platform, which provides plans for a 'Picavet Suspension' system that you can use to keep your equipment (camera) level in flight, historical references, a discussion of kite types/recommended uses, and references.
By the way, Shawn Carlson, the guy that wrote that article, is the Founder and Executive Director of the Society for Amateur Scientists. Seems like the type of organization slashdotters would enjoy.
Hoo-rah for the day of the citizen scientist! Hoo-ray for the impending American Renaissance.
Great occasions do not make heroes or cowards; they simply unveil them to the eyes. -Bishop Westcott
My company Skycell has developed a range of airships which we use of aerial inspection, surveying, photography etc. We do a lot of work in Heritage and particularly stained glass recording in Cathedrals. See our work in York Minster (UK) here. http://www.skycell.ltd.uk/heritage/danminster.htm Other applications include industrial surveying or building inspection. The vehicles are precise enough to pick out any inch of the Cathedral in precise detail, yet small enough to fit through doors. We also have a (larger) vehicle that operates outside.
People have been attaching cameras to kites for quick-and-dirty aerial photographs for almost a hundred years.
Either this story has been in the queue for way too long, or you need to verify your sources.
Kite Aerial Photograhy began at least as early as the late 1880's with the work of Arthur Batut in Labruguiere, France - including this 1889 image of the city. He went so far as to use an altimeter to automatically adjust the focal length of the camera
~~~~~~
KAP seems like a great application for one of those X10 wireless cameras. Outdoors they have a range of maybe 200 feet and that could probably be enhanced with a directional antenna.
Work for Change & GET PAID!
This could add a whole dimension to kite fighting. Did anyone else do that as a kid? Duck tape the nose of a delta wing, use light fishing line, and try to destroy other kites. It's sort of like playing chicken or joust. I am not sure how a camera would hold up in combat though.
Atlas Shrugged : Thematic Story
As the sport of kiting has boomed in the past 10 years, (ok so boomed is an exaggeration), I am thinking of building a 'Kite Park'. Not just an area set aside for flying kites in a public place, but a kind of small resort. A place that you could stay for a week and fly kites, build kites, ride kite buggies, practice KAP(kite aerial photography), etc.
This park would be built and designed for kite fanatics by a kite fanatic.
No motorized vehicles, LOW noise, few trees, wide open spaces.
...dads out there with kids..
really now... dads have kids? wouldn't have guessed it
--------
Don't Get Caught
After 911 the cops have given me much more problems. On more than one occasion I have the police come up and ask me what I have hanging from my kite. Usually after I explain things it is cool with them, but I have heard stories of people having the cops pull guns on them thinking they are distributing anthrax or other badness.
http://www.windmeadow.com/
I use pole aerial photography for shots that kites can't make due to limited space or power lines. The trick is building a telescoping pole that is lightweight, but rigid when extended. Some folks who've been at it longer than myself have mounted 50 foot rigs to the backs of pickup trucks and minivans.
... that it sounds like a good episode for Junkyard Wars? :)
My mistake.
I should have guessed you were actually from Michigan, but you must have taken a bath last week.
Phillipe Hurbain, a fellow panoramic/spherical panoramic photographer in France, has a site up on how he took a full-spherical panoramic picture from a kite. He's obviously much braver than me to put a $800 camera hanging underneath a kite!
Pretty cool, and the panoramas are literally like you're floating in mid-air.
http://philohome.free.fr/kitephoto/kapp.htm
Wait, NASA actually has a page for rigging a cheasy disposible camera to a kite, but nothing along the lines of an X10? China IS going to beat us back to the moon at this rate...
You need a FREE iPod Nano
Bringing new meaning to the product name...
Although given X-10's marketing strategy, I'm not sure if it is really a new meaning...
retrorocket.o not found, launch anyway?
Why not? A cheap web cam, a wireless transmitter (or cat5 kite string), and you can snap away without film--you could even make video.
Shoot, I bet there's someone who's set up a live KAP web cam with direct-to-internet feed. Just gotta search Google to find him...
forget kite photography. remote control helicopter photography is way cooler. check out these video clips:
http://www.rc-cam.com/moviecat.htm
RC hobbists have been doing this for years.
We have considered but not yet tried doing a KAP shoot (perhaps with video) during a "rokakku challenge" style of kite fight. One of the main reasons we haven't yet is that we have generally been participating in the battle, and couldn't be in two places at the same time. Another is the difficulty in keeping the KAP kite from interfering with the battle. (We tend to use rokakku for our KAP platforms.) Putting a camera directly on a fighting kite would be pretty dangerous. It would hammer your maneuverability, most likely break if you got cut, and stand a decent chance of injuring someone. For more info on our KAP and rokakku fighting activity visit Midnight Squadron.
I bought a kite from a guy in Gwinn, Michigan a
about eight years ago. It was called a GBK.
His idea was to use them for aerial photography.
The kite is, to put it mildly, enormous.
It's 19.5 feet wide by 10 feet high - a big delta.
The frame of the kite is articulated easton aluminum carbon fiber spars.
It can be flown as a single liner or as a stunt kite.
My idea would be - it generates so much lift that it really is perfect for aerial photography.
Even on days with no or low wind the ground effect just generates unbelievable amounts of lift.
I think I might just get into this and try it out.
One night we were flying this and two other 9 footers with lights every 15 feet up the lines.
And we flew them at night at a local field.
We had people stopping their cars in the middle
of the streets since the intersecting lines looked
quite a lot like some kind of UFO or the like.
Finally, people 20 miles away dropped by in their car and mentioned they saw them for miles.
Night aerial photography would be quite amazing this way I think.
The 9-20 foot kites have plenty of lift to lift nearly anything you can think of off the ground.
One night we took two nine foot deltas and put a separate line between the keels of the two kites and hung a 6 volt halogen lantern that weight about eight pounds between the two. It was a very windy night but that thing went careening around crazily. Again, a camera would just as well and would likely be much lighter in weight.
Anyway.....
For anyone who's afraid of heights, this could very well be a solution...though I don't know how good of a camera you would want to use...(oh gee would you look at that, it's made a new friend[tree/wire]! *smashie smashie*). And if NASA is using this??? Are we progressing or regressing?? (Though I have to admit, I wish I had known about it when I had to do science projects back in the day!) LDP @~}~~
~~{~~@ LDP @~~}~~
Don't even try. Its' a mute point.
Second post and already considered redundant? Apparently who ever moderated that forgot what slashdot truly stands for.
This has been taken a step further, using a fisheye lens on a digital camera. Users of Panorama Tools may already be familiar with this.
Maybe try hanging the weight from the line about 50 feet below the kites next time. With my big lifters(hagaman 140, hagaman 60) I find the kite needs room to work and hanging a weight directly from the kite would interfere with the kites stability in a couple of ways. One is that a weight of a few pounds(connected to the kite body) will surely deform it, causing erratic flight. The next point is a little difficult to explain. Wind power is not like 'gasoline power'? For example I can lift a 20 pound bag of sand zippANG 70-80 feet in the air but only for a few seconds before the bag comes down at a pretty frantic pace. And then like a seesaw it will scream up again and repeat as long as the wind blows. With my biggest kite the 20 pound bag will go up and stay up but it will still bob up and down about 10-20 feet.
You slashdotted your cable box, you bastard!
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
It would only be scary if you published a recognizable image of someone without their consent. The disreputable state of your backyard, or you as you sunbathe there, can be seen by anyone in any small aircraft. Technology claimed that expectation of privacy long ago.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
It is only by risking our persons from one hour to another that we live
at all. And often enough our faith beforehand in an uncertified result
is the only thing that makes the result come true.
-- William James
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