(drum music)
(drone whirring)
- [Mark] Oh no, this is bad.
(beeping)
My screen just blitzed.
I just totally got black screened.
- Ooh, this is not good.
(jungle music)
Alright guys, you know what day it is?
Drone day.
- I thought it was Wednesday.
- It is Wednesday, Wednesday's officially drone day.
We are at one of our favorite spots here
at the Costa Rican Amphibian Research Reserve
and Mark is gonna fly the drone.
I'm gonna kinda narrate what's going on.
We're gonna get some super epic shots.
And maybe in this video we'll have a whole montage
of super epic drone shots from Costa Rica.
- [Mark] Cool.
- [Coyote] Now this is a Phantom 4 right?
- This is a Phantom 4 Pro.
It's our first drone, we still haven't it lost yet.
Although I gotta be honest with you guys,
I've come close a couple times to losing the Kestrel
as we call it.
We now have back up drone to the Phantom 4 Pro
and we also have a Mavic which Mario has been
taking on some test flights, right?
- Yup, called the BlackHawk.
- The BlackHawk.
So this is the Kestrel, this is what we'll be flying today.
One of the things that's sort of important
for all of you droners out there
is make sure you put better glass than the drone comes with
over top of your camera.
So first thing I do after I put on the props,
I clean my polarizer and it's dark today,
a little cloudy so we're not gonna go with an ND,
we're just gonna go with the standard polarizer.
Wanna make sure there's nothing on the lens.
(puffing air)
Yup.
We're gonna attach that.
Bingo.
And now, we're ready to find a launch pad
which can be tricky in the jungle.
Sometimes I even have to use my backpack.
So we're gonna take a quick look.
Yup, this is looking like a backpad launch situation.
So what I'm gonna do, we're gonna find a clear landing
and take off space.
This looks good.
I'm gonna try and flatten out my backpack.
Like so.
And I kinda have to hold it up
off the backpack a little bit.
When you hold it up off the backpack the camera clears.
Okay.
- [Coyote] Now is this a dangerous little maneuver,
'cause it looks like.
- It's not technically what you're supposed to be doing
but when you're in the middle of Costa Rica
you have to make do with what you got
and that's what I got, so.
I'm gonna turn on my controller here.
(beeping)
- [Coyote] Is this a dangerous spot for me to be right here?
- Probably.
- So I probably don't want to sit here
when you take off the drone?
- [Mark] Well I wouldn't sit there while I fire it up
in case it tips over.
- Oh man.
I'm a little nervous guys.
- [Mark] Alright you ready?
- Almost.
Okay, go for it.
- [Mark] And take off.
(drone whirring)
And just like that we're flying.
- I hope I got that shot. (chuckles)
- [Mark] Now we're gonna get down in this valley
and get some cool looking footage.
So when you're getting a shot on a drone
you're basically looking for really good straight lines.
Like where can I create contour,
like right here looks like a good one.
I'm gonna spin around, check my settings.
- [Coyote] Alright, let's get some shots.
- [Mark] Here we go, so I'm gonna do this ramp right here.
You see I'm gonna go up and over that crest.
- [Coyote] Alright.
So zoom in on this? - That's what we're gonna do.
Here we go, going for our first shot.
(dramatic music)
- [Mark] Ooh that was cool.
- [Coyote] Well my favorite thing about the drone
that it's added to our episodes
has been that ariel perspective.
I mean before we would have GoPro shots and 5D shots
from on the ground in the environments
but now we've got the opportunity to show everybody
what it looks like from a birds eye perspective
and when you're in a place like the rainforest
of Costa Rica you honestly can't grasp how massive
this rainforest is unless you're over top of it.
You know, we could get you a b-roll sort of hand shot
from right here on this knoll and it looks epic
but until you see it through the eye of the drone,
I mean, words just really don't do it justice.
Man that looks epic.
- [Mark] You see this like knoll of trees,
I'm gonna try just zing in here.
Our transmission signal's weak
so that means I gotta back her up.
Alright, so there's kind of a Jurassic Park look there.
- Ooh yeah, that looks just like Jurassic Park.
What's crazy too about droning is you get to see parts
of the rainforest that you didn't even know existed.
I mean we've been hiking all over the place,
we are on a 120 acres of protected rainforest preserve
right now and I've never seen that knoll.
Where is that?
- It does look just like
Jurassic Park. - It's right up there.
- Oh, way up there.
- Yeah. - Yeah, we've never hiked
that far up, that is up there.
- [Mark] Alright so now this is where
I can really get kinda crafty.
So I'm gonna make a dive back.
I'm gonna cut my clip.
- Okay, how long do you usually roll a clip for?
- You know, I will generally roll the entire flight time
'cause honestly the most valuable thing
rather than card space is battery power.
So I'm trying to maximize what I'm gonna get
out of every single charge.
- So basically every direction you head it's
worth rolling because - You never know.
- taking the time to come back around
and do it a second time is just eating up your battery.
- Like occasionally I'm gonna try for a specific shot,
right, where I see something like,
I don't know if you guys saw a the lighthouse
in the lobster pinch video, that was something
that I attempted multiple times to finally
get the shot I wanted.
But with something like the rainforest,
unless I see something really specific and unique,
I'm just out there trying to explore
and just that process of exploring for fun
yields a lot of really cool shots.
So here's something really cool.
So you see this guys,
now what's neat is the forest floor
is gonna raise up with that incline.
So I'm just going in a straight line right now
and as soon as that incline starts to hit
you're gonna see the forest floor start to raise
and I'm gonna slowly start to raise with it
and I'm gonna progressively increase my speed of ascent
and you're gonna see a really cool warp here.
And this is where it becomes risky,
it's like how far you wanna push it?
- Yeah. - Warp speed.
- [Mark] So I'm going fast.
- [Coyote] Yeah, I see how you're getting closer
and closer to those treetops.
- Yup, op and I have to stop.
See that? - Yeah, image transmission.
- Weak transmission, that means that I'm being blocked.
And now that's one of those times
where it's like you know you could risk it
and go for it but to be really honest with you guys
it's not worth it because it's a high likelihood
you're gonna miss the shot entirely
'cause you're gonna lose connection
and you may crash just based on not seeing
what you're doing so in that instance
I'm just gonna back off.
So here we go guys.
Here comes another find.
This one I'm gonna be able to make.
You'll kinda see my point.
So I'm full speed right now.
I tilt the camera down a little bit
and you're gonna see those trees start
to come into play here.
Here they come.
This is where the risk factor comes in.
How much do you want to risk, how close do you want to get?
- [Coyote] Whoa, that's epic!
- [Mark] And now you're gonna get a really cool reveal
of what's over the mountain.
- [Mario] I also really enjoyed the recent shots
you took in Hawaii.
- Hmm! - Epic.
- [Mark] Yeah the uh, which ones?
- [Mario] Oh man countless.
- [Mark] I like that, good answer, good answer. (chuckles)
- [Mario] There was that one epic one
where you kind of like were going along the coast
and Coyote was on one of those lava rocks.
- [Mark] I timed the wave crashing on the rocks,
I know exactly what you're talking about.
That see, that's an example of a shot
where I had to take multiple attempts
to get the timing correct.
It took me like 15 runs.
- [Mario] We went up that ridge
and we got that epic kind of like Jurassic Park style.
- [Mark] Oh yeah, on the north side of the island.
- Yeah. - Oh man that was probably
the most beautiful place I've ever been.
Right, now I've gotta cut the shot.
Every now and then I just like to check in,
make sure I'm not terribly far away.
So I'm going away, I'm coming back at us.
Ooh.
(beeping)
My screen just blitzed.
I just totally got black screened.
- [Remote] Low battery warning.
- [Coyote] Ooh, this is not good.
- [Mark] Oh, now you got, dude.
No signal, low battery, oh man.
- [Coyote] But it has a home point right?
So you just hit the home button
and it'll automatically return right?
- [Remote] Stop point, battery level is low.
- [Coyote] Uh oh.
(beeping)
That's a lot of beeping Mark.
- [Mark] I gotta cancel these return buttons.
- [Remote] Start going home.
- [Mario] Oh man look at that face.
That's determination there.
But you're pretty calm under this extreme pressure.
- Let's just say I've been in this situation once or twice.
- Well he probably can't panic Mario.
If he panics now, we're not gonna get the drone back.
It is a ways out there.
You've got some good shots on there,
you better bring her home.
- Yup, I'm gonna go for one more close one.
Check this out.
- [Mario] And he's even gonna go for another one.
- Oh yeah, I'm not just gonna fly for no reason.
- Ooh, that looks epic.
Lord of the Rings style right there.
Swooping through the trees.
- Just like a Kestrel.
(beeping and whirring) - I hear it.
- Here she comes.
- [Mark] Oh no, this is bad.
Oh my gosh, it's landing right now.
I took it all the way down like it's gonna land itself.
- It's force landing itself?
- Yeah. - I'm gonna try and film this.
- [Mark] Now you guys noticed how I had to make
a makeshift launchpad right?
- [Mario] Yeah.
- Well because of that, we're also gonna have
equal difficulty landing.
I'm gonna show you,
kids don't try this at home, okay?
You're not supposed to do this,
but when you're in the jungle
and you don't have a clear landing spot,
you gotta do what we call a catch landing.
(drone whirring)
- [Coyote] Woo wee!
- Safe!
- [Coyote] Nailed it!
Man, dude!
That was.
- I took it all the way to the limit on that one.
- A really close call.
- That was seriously close guys, like.
- We almost lost the drone, that was no joke.
I mean I know we were given all those warnings
at the beginning of the video
and then we actually almost lost it.
- It was about a thousand feet out in the rainforest
and it started to manually land.
I had no control over the altitude anymore.
I was lucky enough I heard it and I was like
just get it closer, get it closer,
and luckily I got it right over top of us and shoong.
- Well it was good catch landing
and I think this is pretty much the end of the drone video
but why don't I step out out
and why don't you do the outro today.
- Okay. - Alright?
- Cool, alright. - This is your moment,
this is your episode.
- Okay, here we go.
Alright guys, well I hope you enjoyed the droning.
Tell me in the comments section below
if there are any other places you'd like to see us fly.
I don't know, Grand Canyon, Arches National Park,
maybe somewhere outside the United States.
Tell me about it, maybe we'll go out there.
I'm Captain Mark.
Be brave, stay wild.
We'll see you on the next adventure.
- Woo! - Hey, hey a single take.
(Mark chuckles) Nice.
- [Mark] If you enjoyed this on location,
make sure to go back and check out the time
Coyote and I went scuba diving
and found my favorite animal, the frog fish.
And don't forget, subscribe to join me and the crew
on our next location.
(dramatic music)