[AiboPet]

Thats REAL cool Kevin. I used to attempt to do this the "hard way" by actually trying to get video TRANSMITTED from an RC helicopter. I found out QUICKLY that my ability to build and configure this setup and get it to work.....was well beyond my ability to actually FLY it though.

This "Crazy Horst"....WOW!! I have been watching and downloading these ALL morning! Small cameras have come SO far now, and the memory capacity lets him just "shoot it all" and then MASTERFULLY edit and mix all the footage later....and the apparent range he has to fly the aircraft have enabled some REALLY stunning shots. I used to consider myself lucky to get a couple hundred feet in WIDE open space. I do still have one helicopter I outfitted with a small pinhole cam, UHF transmitter....and a "holster" reciever which I could watch with little virtual reality glasses.

As I mentioned before. I could BUILD the thing, but I just couldn't master FLYING it....and sorta gave it up after going through countless rotor blades and taping crap back together. My transmitter would never stand up to a PLANE because it would go out of range for the transmitted video just about the time it reached takeoff distance. The short time I had the helicopter up and running...I would fly it from the video glasses, which is just about the most asinine roundabout way of doing this. The range was terrible (about 200 feet at best). The color and resolution AWFUL (NTSC), and I had no way of recording it unless I felt like strapping a Sony "Watchman" type 8mm thing to the receiver's output. I gave up on it before it got that crazy :-P

I got the idea from playing with software for Sony AIBO robots that allowed remote control via WiFi. You could walk the robot (ERS7) around with full telemetry, but of course this was NOWHERE near as open to trouble as an RC aircraft. A small robotic dog ambling VERY slowly can only get in trouble....VERY slowly :-P