Aerial Photography – Canon SD500 – Trainer


I recently have been playing around with doing some R/C plane aerial photography.    I have an old .40 size trainer that I electrified a couple years ago.  It is fairly light for a big (60″ wingspan) trainer.  I have a AXI 2826 with a 3S 4400 battery that will push 700 watts into a 12 x 7 prop.   It will float around nicely, but I have enough watts to go vertical if needed.

I built a simple plywood mount for the Canon SD500, and mounted a servo above it so that I could control the shutter from a switch on my radio.  I am still working on getting all the bugs out, and I have recently installed CHDK to try and get a faster shutter speed.  I will post more about those experiments later.

This first shot is a picture after the plane made an unexpected landing in a soy-bean field.  Also shows the camera mount with servo nicely.

.40 Trainer with a AXI 2826 and camera mount

This is a shot of my house, I am also in this picture, but very small!

Lisbon, MD from the Air

A view of Mt Airy, MD, the water tower in the middle is about four miles away from where this was taken.
Mt Airy, MD from the Air

A view looking South-West, in this picture you can see SugerLoaf Mountain, and to the right the mountains past Frederick, MD.
Suger Loaf Mountain and beyond

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