Gadgetory

most people have never heard of DJI innovations but if you showed them the Hong Kong startups best-selling product everyone would recognize it immediately DJI has created our favorite drone the Phantom a unit so ubiquitous it has become the face of the technology across popular culture for better or worse it's the Kleenex of drones what made the DJI phantom so popular was its combination of power price and simplicity they have also offered a much more expensive unit for Hollywood professionals but it wasn't safe for affordable for the average consumer today the company is trying to bridge the gap between those two with its newest unit the inspire one our product design team said that they looked at some sci-fi movies and started designing it one of our product engineers said that it looks like a dragon skull I don't know what that's about we see this as bridging both the community that once really easy to use systems without thinking too much about the mechanics of flight with the crowd that wants really professional video easily captured from the sky the first thing you notice about the inspire is the way it transforms on takeoff this borrows spreading link technology DJI developed for its s-class units the legs lift overhead after takeoff allowing the inspire to shoot 360 degrees of video so you got a 4k camera and also streams Full HD video 1.7 kilometers distance and near-real-time down to your iPad it also has an HD in my video out on the controller so you can automatically see this on a large screen or connect it to your animals recorder right now it's a modular payload that's formatted specifically for this camera but we'll have a lot more exciting things to say about that later down the road it's got redesigned motors and electronic speed controllers it's to the point where if you follow forward and then let go it's almost like you've thrown a brakes on a car it's quite impressive another big addition to the inspire is a camera on the bottom that can recognize what's below it and lock on to its current location when you're flying outside and you're not sure if you have a GPS connection flight close to the ground and you'll be studying the inspire can offer a dual operator mode with pilot and one cameraman it's still possible to do both with one person but adding another set of hands allows for more flexible and fine-tuned shooting for single operators the inspire offers the ability to lock the camera and maintain an area of focus even as the unit moves about a godsend for any wedding photographers hoping to capture the perfect aerial shot of that first kiss the DJI phantom cost around $1,500 while a fully loaded s1000 ended up closer to 10 grand the inspire one tries to split the difference with a price point of roughly $3,000 DJI is also announcing its first software development kit or SDK allowing outside developers to integrate their programs with the unit's camera and video software there's some applications looking at 3d mapping that we're really excited about there's a whole host of applications that we never really realized that these aerial systems were perfect for but people are using the systems to explore the inspire one marks another big step forward in the amount of power and photographic capability available to the average consumer at a price point that won't break the bank that in turn is a reminder of how little safety and privacy regulation currently exists in the US with $3,000 anyone no matter how old or inexperienced can purchase this unit and start flying at the same day when people start thinking about this technology they recognize not only the form factor of the phantom which is pretty iconic at this point but also how easy and accessible it is to use so that even Cartman can fly it you know weights so epic there definitely is that question of how do you integrate this technology into the airspace safely and that everybody's following the rules and Eyewitness News investigators exclusive that's getting a lot of attention tonight how was a man able to fly a drone over the busy streets of Manhattan from our perspective we're looking forward to a lot clearer rules in the u.s. and several other markets like Japan Australia Germany there is already that framework in place and we're seeing a lot of success one of the things that we've cooperated with the Australian and New Zealand government's with is creating a document that says these are the best safe flying practices and with every phantom sold in those countries you get that pamphlet that says you can do this you can't do this we think that sets a really clear tone for what's acceptable in terms of best safe flying practices and if you don't follow those practices here are the consequences the other thing to consider is that with any new imaging technology there's always this question of privacy and appropriate use so on the one hand you have government's implementing privacy rules that help protect people's privacy on the other there's a bit of social etiquette like you don't take Google glass into the bathroom or you don't climb a tree with a telephoto lens so those are kinds of things that I think people will start to understand a little bit more as the technology becomes more commonplace you