How to Shoot Better Travel Videos With a Drone

How to shoot better travel videos with a drone.

Filming with a drone, even without professional expertise, can be rewarding. However, if you want to do it better, there are specific steps you can take. To help you enhance your craft, we present a guide to shooting better travel videos with a drone.

Getting that “cinematic” look with a drone is less about having the most expensive gear and more about mastering the physics of light and motion. Since you’re already operating in the drone services space, you likely know the basics, but here is how to elevate your footage to a professional, high-end production level.

 

Make a solid flight plan.

Now, you can, of course, wing it as you travel. Spontaneous filming does have certain advantages. However, planning often outweighs them considerably. This is not merely because knowing the beautiful scenery and sights ahead allows you to plan the best approach. Equally important is the opportunity it provides to explore the rules and regulations governing drone flight. Certain areas do not permit drone access. It is due to safety or privacy concerns that using a drone might cause. The Grand Canyon, for example, is one such area. Going into things blind can land you in serious trouble.

Test out your audio recording abilities.

You may plan to include narration or utilize the audio your drone is recording. For example, you might be visiting a carnival or similar event and want to capture the essence of the experience. That cannot be done without the sound! However, it is essential to consider that your drone will be flying; as a result, the audio quality and how it captures it will be only marginally similar to what you might expect from a regular camera. So, do some tests! Observe how the drone behaves and records audio at higher altitudes compared to when it is kept relatively close to the ground. You will find significant differences between the two.

Plan for the time of day. “Magic Hour” is Non-Negotiable

Avoid shooting at high noon. The vertical sun creates harsh, “flat” shadows and washes out colors.

• Golden Hour: The hour after sunrise and before sunset. The long shadows and warm, directional light add instant texture and “expensive-looking” contrast to buildings and landscapes.

• Blue Hour: The period just after sunset. This is perfect for cityscapes (like the Las Vegas Strip) where the ambient sky light balances perfectly with the glowing lights of the buildings.

The atmosphere conjured by the sunrise differs significantly from that evoked by sunset or noon. You need to carefully consider the type of video you want to create. One that produces excitement and adventure as you engage in a physically challenging ‘adventure course,’ running along a suspension bridge and over obstacles? Or a romantic, panoramic viewing of the countryside as you stroll along a hiking or walking trail? Depending on your intentions, you will find that some times of day work better for you than others. You will not, for example, want to be filming an action sequence in near-complete darkness that your audience would not even be able to follow correctly.

The atmosphere created by proper lighting can make or break a video.

Compositional Depth

The sky is empty, so flying too high often makes for boring shots.

• Foreground Interest: Keep something in the foreground—tree branches, a cliff edge, or a building corner. As you fly past it, the viewer gets a sense of speed and scale that you lose when flying in open air.

• Rule of Thirds: Enable the grid lines on your controller. Avoid putting your subject right in the center; placing them on the “power points” (the intersections of the lines) creates a more balanced, professional composition.

Pro Tip: Always record for 3–5 seconds before and after your intended movement. This gives you “handles” for transitions when you’re editing later.

Do not only focus on aerial shots.

Now, spectacular aerial shots are the main draw of a drone-recorded video. There’s nothing like taking in the scene from high above. However, this does not mean you should never take your drone below 10 meters above ground. Sometimes, you can be very well served by letting your drone follow you as you stroll. Taking a shot with the drone right next to you as you browse local wares in a traditional open-air market, for example, will add much more flavor and draw than simply having it hover above.

If you plan to travel with your drone to explore new scenery, ensure your belongings at home are secure. You can rent a storage unit to store your belongings while you plan routes and scout the best filming locations. This will ensure the safety of your items while you are away, allowing you to focus on capturing that perfect shot.

Take advantage of the safety a drone provides

This should be prefaced by saying that you should not, under any circumstances, put yourself or others at risk. Learning how to operate a drone safely in urban areas is particularly important. That said, if you are not in a metropolitan area, drone flight is permitted there. Some risk is acceptable with the supplement we are discussing; it affects the drone, not you. After all, drone access and detachment recording is too valuable not to leverage! You can look closer at perilous cliffs and into seemingly bottomless ravines of gaping black. The insides of caves are considered too dangerous for tourists to visit, and if you are reckless, you might suffer equipment damage. But if you are successful and careful, you will walk away with some stunning video footage! Additionally, if you want to edit drone videos, video editors like FlexClip make it easy to transform camera drone footage into engaging videos.

Be mindful of the weather.

This should not come as a surprise. Even planes cannot fly in certain weather conditions, and drones are much less durable. For example, a thousand potential disasters can occur if you take a drone into a severe storm. So, leave your drone behind when the weather outside is frightful and enjoy yourself.

Look into accessories and filters.

Specific attachments, such as ND Filters, can enhance your filming, including subtle motion blur. They’re a perfect choice if you’re sure you want to invest in improving your video. Of course, you should not forget the essentials. Extra batteries, lenses, and propellers will not necessarily improve the quality of your videos. However, they will ensure you can keep filming, even if an accident cracks your camera lens. Or one of your propellers is getting damaged. You do not want to call your filming off simply because you didn’t have spares.

There are plenty of toys to add to your drone, and all of them are helpful!

 

Utilize the intelligent flight modes.

Unless you want to consider hiring a professional drone pilot or are one yourself, you likely haven’t mastered the art of drone flight. If you want the drone to follow you in a cinematic way, manual control may make its flight unstable as you focus on sightseeing. Alternatively, set the flight mode to ‘Active Tracking’ to let the drone handle the task. You can even set your drone to ‘orbit’ a certain point, allowing for some fantastic shots.

You can even record ‘Waypoint’ for your drone to automatically follow!

 

Summary of Advice

The core of shooting better travel videos with a drone is planning smartly and making the most of your resources. If you approach the planning phase of your endeavor correctly, its quality will soar! As always, remember to take the proper safety precautions for both you and your drone.