Drone helicopter takes off at NBR Towers (with VIDEO)
The ultimate office toy? A "quadricopter" remote controlled by iPhone or iPad. The ultimate office toy?
If we may take a wee moment to step away from recession, finance company failures and ultrafast broadband/Rugby World Cup controversy for a moment ....
The Parrot AR Drone arrived at NBR Towers today. It's billed as the world's first remotely-controlled quadricopter.
It's controlled, via wi-fi, by your iPhone or iPad (we used an iPad 2), using a free app, and the iPad or iPhone gyroscope.
Alex is in geek-love; stand by for her full report Friday.
I'm wowed too, but also a little dubious if the cheap-looking construction, with lots of polystyrene (yes, it's light) and exposed circuitry is worth $499. Certainly, it seems a little fragile.
Anyhow, there's some cool stuff, including cameras on the Drone that act as "pilot's eyes", feeding video to your iPhone or iPad, plus the ability to multiplay a Drone game called AR.Pursuit (the API is open source, so expect other titles to follow - I know Wellington developer "Chopper" Dave Frampton has a Drone, so watch this space).
But more on that Friday.
Below are a couple of am-cam videos (plus, lastly, one submitted by @LazyGeek, who's obviously become a bit of a pro since the Drone's March 25 release, and some flash Mashable footage of mutliple Drones flyingt together at E3).
After a couple of basic up-down flights, Alex was about to try some more advanced manoevres - but then the battery went flat (it had been on stand-by for a couple of hours).
Jock was angling to shoot the Drone down with the office Nerf gun.
Me, I've got my own fantasy: to fly a Drone over a World Cup game (though I guess it would violate Air New Zealand's sponorship deal).
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Drone helicopter takes off at NBR Towers (with VIDEO)
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