how do I learn to quadcopter?
how do I learn to quadcopter?
what's there to learn beyond just buying existing product?
I'm comfortable tinkering with hardware and software, it would be nice if that meant a drone with fewer backdoors.
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Fpv is hard but there are good sims (I like Liftoff) that you can play by plugging your transmitter into a computer. I am so bad at it and crash constantly, and the sim is way cheaper than breaking a bunch of drones.
Camera drones are super easy though. They stabilize and hover themselves, and you can figure them out just playing around for a lil bit.
You need a TRUST certificate to fly, but you can get that in a like couple hours tops https://www.faa.gov/uas/recreational_flyers/knowledge_test_updates
There are hella limits as to what "recreational" flying is, and you need a much more complicated Part 107 license to legally do commercial photography or anything like that.
You also gotta make sure it's legal to fly where you are. You'd be surprised where no-fly zones are. Near airports, near military installations, some other infrastructure things...I use the OpenSky app which makes things pretty clear.
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The FAA rules on drones are somewhat excessive, you're not even supposed to fly FPV without a spotter standing next to you keeping line of sight and there are tons of places you just can't legally fly at all, especially around cities.
There is a fairly robust community of home built FPV quadcopter enthusiasts who focus on speed and aerobatics. Ardupilot is a popular Free Software firmware for all kinds of drones.