While most of us think capturing outdoor footage from a drone would be pretty cool, the expense and likelihood of crashing said drone as a newbie pilot prohibits us from taking the leap. Enter the Micro Drone 3.0. At $150 and the size of your palm, this is a drone for mere mortals. A starter drone if you will.
Intelligent motion sensors onboard the Micro Drone 3.0 enable it to hover and fly in a straight line–this means it depends less on your expert flying skills to keep afloat and headed in the right direction. The drone comes with indoor bumpers to protect the rotors in case you crash into something, as you most likely will.
The personal drone’s camera shoots full 720 x 1280 HD video at 30 frames per second with an onboard microphone for capturing audio. The 450mAh Lithium Cell battery provides 8 minutes of continuous flying time. This doesn’t sound like much but you can quickly swap out the battery (everything is snap-in modular) and get your drone up in the air again–additional batteries will cost $15 a piece.
Want to view the world upside down? No problem. Simply flip the switch on the drone or shake your phone and the drone will invert 180 degrees, reversing its propellers.
The drone comes with both a main controller that connects via WiFi and a companion phone app where you can control the device, live stream video, capture photos and video (via the onboard MicroSD card), and even live share on social media channels such as Meerkat. Depending on modes, the drone will operate in a 50-300 foot range. So at least you don’t have to worry about it crashing into airplanes.
Expected delivery is the end of 2015.