Tips on Traveling With Drones and Cinema Equipment

Traveling can be a huge pain, especially when a bunch of large gear that needs to be transported from one place to another. Droneworks breaks down what his team does when he travels and gives us a few helpful tips.

I always want to be sure I have whatever gear I need to do the job when I travel. Traveling light is typically a breeze but when I have to carry around large cases that need to go under the plane, it typically becomes more troublesome. On my most recent trip to Dubai and Tanzania, I was able to stuff a Polar Pro backpack with everything I needed. I squeezed in two Mavic 2's, a Mavic Air, Sony A7R III with a 24-70mm f/2.8, a whole bunch of batteries for the drones and my laptop. This to me is the ideal travel pack only because I know that I am personally responsible for all the equipment I have on me.

When it comes to traveling with bigger gear, it can be more challenging but it is still possible to do. At the production level Droneworks is operating on, they seem to have found the best way to get on a plane with multiple hard cases holding a lot of equipment. Doing work on that level also requires backup equipment incase anything goes wrong, so a lot of the time they are traveling with double the gear. Since they are transporting so much expensive equipment in each case, it is important they label the cases with a number and write down what is inside each one. All the cases are then insured and prepped for travel.

Through years of work and traveling, Droneworks has also come to find that having a media pass, confirmation of the job from the client along with proper verification/ID will more than likely get you through the airport no problem. He also recommends working with the film commission in the state or country you travel to because they are more than likely there to help you import equipment, get you to your location and figure out what times of the day are best to fly.

For more info on Droneworks, check out their website.