Kyle Van Vranken and Scott Shawcroft want to change the publics perception of quadcopters.
Kyle Van Vranken and Scott Shawcroft want to change the public's perception of "quadcopters." Also, they are not bros. KR

Last week, Slog readers overwhelmingly told me they want me to continue writing about drones. (Aren't you sick of hearing about drones? Rich Smith seems to think they'd be good batting practice for teens.) So yesterday afternoon, I embarked on a droning expedition with Scott Shawcroft and Kyle Van Vranken, the guys who believe they disrupted my picnic at Magnuson Park a few weeks ago and had invited me to come with them on one of their outings. We went to Discovery Park so that they could show me their drones* and prove that, while it's illegal to fly them in city parks, they aren’t antithetical to the public enjoyment of those parks. (This mission was only semi-successful.) But first, there were a few things they wanted to clear up:

1) They’re not creeping on people.
Initially, I sort of questioned whether the drones I had encountered were equipped with cameras or not, and wondered what exactly the drone operators were aiming to see when they flew around people at the park. Well, Kyle would like you to know that he has no interest in surreptitiously recording people, and in fact tries very hard to stay away from all animate objects.

2) *They’re not bros.
After meeting Scott and Kyle, I now stand corrected. They are not bros. (They are a programmer and software engineer, respectively, but not the bro-y kind.)

3) *Drones are not drones!
Scott and Kyle both reject the term drones and prefer to call their unmanned aerial vehicles “quads” or “quadcopters.” (Quad is in reference to how many arms it has; there are also tricopters, hexacopters, and octocopters.) “Drone” is also a dirty word in their eyes. “To me a drone is something the US government flies and launches missiles from,” said Scott. “It has a negative connotation.” No missiles here!

A teeny tiny toy quadcopter.
A teeny-tiny toy quadcopter. KR

According to Scott, there are two classes of quadcopters: the racing kind (which are small and less automated) and the kind that’s used primarily for aerial photography (which are larger, more expensive, and tend to get in trouble). There are also two kinds of flying: line of sight (in which the operator is viewing the quad from the ground) and first person view, or FPV (in which the operator views the quad through the camera mounted on it using goggles).

Kyle Van Vranken operates his racing quadcopter in FPV mode.
Kyle Van Vranken operates his racing quadcopter in FPV mode. KR

Scott and Kyle both have racing copters and operate them using FPV. They’re relatively new to the hobby—both have been flying for about six months (they met while flying at Discovery Park). Since then, they’ve both become quadcopter enthusiasts and have formed a Facebook group, Seattle Multirotors, partially to connect like-minded racers like themselves (there are currently 58 members) and also to raise visibility of their hobby and to establish some guidelines for responsible flying.

A larger quadcopter that Scott uses for racing.
A larger quadcopter that Scott uses for racing. KR

Indeed, Scott and Kyle both seemed quite cautious. They purposefully went out after work (and a little on the early side, at 5:30pm) when Discovery Park was mostly empty. And they staked out a place in an open field that was mostly out of the way of major trails. One would fly while the other would be on the lookout for people nearby, and if people could be heard approaching, they would fly in the other direction. In short, they tried to be as respectful and as unobtrusive as possible.

Here's a video of Scott operating his ElectroHub quadcopter (his takeoff was a little shaky because he's used to operating it via FPV, and don't ask me where the audio went).

I didn’t fly the quad, but I did wear an extra pair of goggles as Kyle operated his quad. (Note: You have to sit down while wearing the goggles because the sensation of flying is so disorienting that you’d likely fall over.) While Kyle and Scott both said it’s not nearly as fun to wear the goggles as a bystander as it is to wear them as an operator (I believe them), it was still a thrilling sensation to get a bird’s-eye view of the park. My first thought as he zipped around the trees and flew high in the air was that it could be a very useful tool for recovering lost hikers.

Here's video of our flight yesterday:

Ultimately, Scott and Kyle want to change the public perception of drones—er, quadcopters. “I would like to see the laws change,” said Scott, referring to Seattle’s ordinance banning drones in city parks. “The ordinance is from 1987. I was, like, one [year old]. There should be newer legislation because there are people who know better. Parks are a shared public space. I do my best not to interfere with other people. It’s definitely contentious. But most people have a positive response to us.”

Most people, perhaps, but not all. About maybe a half hour into our flying expedition, a guy with a gray ponytail approached us. “I’m not trying to tell you what to do,” he said, “but your flying your gizmos is really unsettling. You don’t know where it’s gonna go. The vibe is in opposition to what we’re trying to experience here. I know you mean no harm. I see you’re trying to be respectful.” He explained that his friend was sitting farther up the hill and trying to paint and “capture the essence” of the park, and that their drones were messing all that up.

Scott and Kyle weren’t combative at all. Instead, they asked the man what bothered him the most. Was it the noise?

“The noise and knowing this gizmo is flying around at high speeds and who knows where it’s going to go,” he responded. (The man refused to identify himself when I told him I was a reporter.)

After the man went about his way, Scott and Kyle decided to move to another grassy area that was away from the man’s painter friend. Although clearly not happy about the encounter (especially with a reporter present), Scott seemed grateful for the interaction. “It’s great that the guy could come over and give us feedback,” he said.

“I feel bad about it but at the same time we’re in a really new hobby,” said Scott. “If we can demonstrate that we’re reasonable people, next time he sees [a drone] he’ll know there’s a reasonable person behind it.”

He added that he hopes his Facebook group can work with the parks department to perhaps have a designated flying day, or to establish a designated space for flying. “I live in an apartment in Ballard,” said Scott. “I don’t have an open space to fly. We’re trying to compromise.”