Getting there!

https://www.pinkbike.com/news/next-level-drone-footage-with-antoine-buffart.html

I was primed and ready to type hashtag boring but wow. That is seriously impressive. As they say imagine that type of footage intercut into Worldcup DH – could make it a spectacular sport to watch.

wow, that’s pretty smart. Assuming its flying itself rather than being piloted?

Nope, piloted.

Nope, piloted

That’s pretty impressive 😯

I was convinced it was using some kind of sensor on the rider to follow him until just over 1 min into the video when it started doing it’s own thing!

Unfortunately at a Wc that is never going to happen as the route for the drone would be full of spectators. But if there was enough money to make it viable then camera on cables would make DH look fabulous.

Oh look. It’s another guy half my age doing amazing stuff that I’ll never be able to do with borderline zero relevance to my actual riding.

TBF, I don’t think anyone would be impressed with walking pace bimbling either!

Or going darkside, tracking riders on the TdF/Vuelta etc? Rather than getting camera footage from a helicopter positioned a few hundred metres away, just have drones picking up the footage close to the action. Would also mean motorbikes don’t have to tail a rider doing 60mph down an alpine descent. Being able to flick between drones could make footage of racing really intensive.

Brilliant,great video that.Pilot must be bloody good.

Or going darkside, tracking riders on the TdF/Vuelta etc? Rather than getting camera footage from a helicopter positioned a few hundred metres away, just have drones picking up the footage close to the action. Would also mean motorbikes don’t have to tail a rider doing 60mph down an alpine descent. Being able to flick between drones could make footage of racing really intensive.

Almost impossible in road racing. That MTB shot is relatively easy since it’s one rider and can probably be staggered, staged, re-run etc. Also it’ll be on a fairly small overall area to maintain FPV flying and transmission range.

Trying that in a road race on a much longer range at much higher speeds in a pack is going to be insanely difficult. There’s the risk of crashing them into spectators or riders too which is considerably reduced when it’s one rider on a DH course.

Battery life is going to be 20 minutes max at those sort of speeds and manouevres as well.

Fake news. Helmet cam

nice footage
as alluded to it looks like a racing drone flown by a pilot using FPV (first person view) with another person operating the camera which is on a stabilised gimbal

Hopefully this is just the start of whats to come

I think it is a helmet cam with a fancy stabiliser to make it appear it was a drone. It follows the jumps trajectory and never goes anywhere which a bike couldn’t.
I want it to be real though and I like the concept.

Why is the view going up and down as if its a helmet cam?

How about if someone could fly a drone backwards to get a front view of the rider coming towards the drone? That would be cool.
Has it been done maybe?

To give a sense of excitement? (reply to BB)
[Edit].. would you want potentially charge into a drone, if the pilot got it wrong (filmed at the same height)
If it helmet cam how come it go so close to some jumps before rising, or floats down rather than drops after the jumps? (eg. 40-50 seconds)
Near the beginning it can’t keep up on the slalom corners and go over the crests without ending up 10 foot skyward (eg. 20-30seconds).

Meh, didn’t really do much for me as it just seemed like any other camera following biker vid and they didn’t really add anything that played to the strengthens of using a drone

Can drones ground track? Can’t imagine it would be too hard to fit an ultrasonic/radar altimeter so they maintain a constant height off the ground so the pilot could concentrate on steering?

Needs some generic thrash rock music, sounds like he’s being chased by somone with a fetish for King hubs.

According to some comments on YouTube it was filmed with one of these.
[video]https://vimeo.com/225198477[/video]