4/9/24
On Monday the weather
was bad all morning with heavy rain, but by the afternoon it seemed to
have stopped and I went out to buy some eggs and milk that we needed, but
ended up with quite an extended walk around Laxey! I only had the
little Ace Pro with me as I hadn't planned a photographic trip.
Insta360 Ace Pro 2/9/24
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
5/9/24
On Tuesday afternoon
I had a walk up Glen Auldyn, parking the and walking from the old chapel,
which looks like it is being converted into a house now. I was mainly
shooting video, which I hope to edit and upload shortly, but I also shot
a few still, mainly from the air.
DJI Mini 2 & DJI
Osmo Pocket 3 3/9/24
    
   
6/9/24
I spent a fair part
of yesterday editing up the video that I shot on Tuesday in Glen Auldyn,
I was quite surprised myself that I'd shot 69 ground level segments and
4 aerial ones! Of course not all ended up being used and those that
were were generally fairly savagely cut down in length, nevertheless the
video ended up at just under 25 minutes long. I only appear and do
a bit of talking at the start, then it's just the natural background sounds,
including me being out of breath! It's quite a steep walk up there,
the bit I did from the old chapel gained around 630 ft in a couple of miles
- and I didn't realise how sensitive the DJI wireless Mic is!
DJI Osmo Pocket 4 &
DJI Mini 2 3/9/24
I shot these sky pictures
from home late afternoon and just as the sun was about to vanish behind
cloud in the evening.
The first pic is actually
from Monday evening, when I just saw the dramatic sky and grabbed the Ace
Pro to capture it.
Insta360 Ace Pro
2/9/24 & 5/9/24
  
8/9/24
Wetlands & Wallabies!
On Friday afternoon
we went for a walk in the Ballaugh Curraghs wetlands area. This internationally
recognised area of ice age origins was at one time drained and used as
agricultural land, but has been allowed to revert back to its natural state
with large areas of bog and open water. There have been footpaths
created through it, often on narrow boardwalks through the boggy areas,
but also utilizing the old 'Manx Hedges', that used to delineate fields.
These are raised earthworks and form a good path through the often wet
areas on either side. The curragh is a major home to the island's
wallaby population that thrive here. Sometimes we can walk through
and not see a single one, but on Friday we saw lots of them.
Panasonic FZ82 6/9/24
    
    
    
    
   
9/9/24
Some more aerial photography
in the Douglas area, flying from three locations.
DJI Mini 2 7/9/24
    
 
 
  
 
   
10/9/24
After shooting the Douglas
town panoramas I decided to do one more flight before heading home and
drove up to Douglas Head to get some shots from there. When I arrived,
there was another chap already flying a drone there, so I had to be careful
to de-conflict with his flight area. He was flying a DJI Mini 4K
which is the current version of my Mini 2. If you read this, Hi John,
happy and safe flying!
DJI Mini 2 7/9/24
   
  
 
11/9/24
On Saturday afternoon
we went to Ramsey to visit a shop there and I also took a stroll around
with my camera of course!
Panasonic FZ82 7/9/24
 
    
Whilst I was doing my
aerial photography in the morning, I'd noticed that one setting was not
as normal, and I noticed another after downloading the pictures.
After a bit of investigation I managed to sort out both issues but wanted
to test fly it to confirm, so had a quick flight at Ramsey while we were
there.
DJI Mini 2 7/9/24
    
    
  
 
A lot later in the evening,
as we were preparing dinner, I noticed what looked like a dramatic sunset
and raced upstairs to photograph it.
Insta360 Ace Pro &
Panasonic FZ82 7/9/24
    
12/9/24
A visit to and wander
round at Niarbyl on an overcast day with a cold northerly wind blowing.
Insta360 Ace Pro 10/9/24
    
    
    
   
14/9/24
On Thursday afternoon
I had a visit to the picturesque Port Cornaa, followed by a walk up the
valley to the edge of Ballaglass Glen. It's less than two miles but
the lane does climb up around 175 ft from sea level.
Insta360 Ace Pro
12/9/24
    
    
    
    
    
Some sunset sky pictures
from home.
Insta360 Ace Pro
12/9/24
   
13/9/24
Cruise ship 'Seabourn
Sojourn' visiting the island yesterday and anchoring in Douglas Bay.
Panasonic FZ82 12/9/24
 
15/9/24
These aerial pictures
were taken on two flights from Port Jack, Onchan, on Friday afternoon.
It was really a test to compare 360 degree panoramas shot with different
control software for the drone, Litchi and DJI Fly, but I also took some
ordinary pictures at the same time.
DJI Mini 2 13/9/24
    
   
The location was chosen
deliberately to provide a bit of a challenge to the panorama stitching
program, PtGui, with large areas of sea and a fairly featureless sky, although
the cruise ship provided a good point of reference. In the end the
set shot with the 'Fly' app worked better so I'm just presenting those.
 
Whilst I had the drone
in the air I took the opportunity to get some shots of the cruise ship
'Crystal Symphony' at anchor in the bay.
The pictures were taken
over both flights carried out.
    
There are nine
new Railway pictures in Railways
2014 Pt1 MER Car No 9 at Ramsey.
Insta360 Ace Pro 14/9/21
   
16/9/24
Late yesterday afternoon
I did some more experimenting with comparing 360 degree panoramas shot
using Litchi and DJI Fly, this time using the DJI Air 2S drone. The Litchi
panoramas went according to plan, giving me 78 AEB pictures to stitch with
PtGui producing the three ones below.
DJI Air 2S 15/9/24
  
The panoramas shot using
the DJI 'Fly' app proved to me more problematic, initially as there was
no sign at all of them on the SD card from the drone! I had noticed
that the app seemed to be stitching them during the flight, but I did expect
some evidence on the card, but there was nothing apart from some conventional
pictures that I had shot at the time. I did eventually find them
by starting up the drone and connecting the 'Fly' app, whereupon I found
them in the Gallery section. I managed to download them to me phone
and email them to myself for processing on the main computer. Quite
where they are stored is still a total mystery to me, also there was no
sign of the original shots so very little chance of any post shooting editing.
I can only assume that the drone deletes the original shots once it has
stitched the panorama, which is not very useful to me! The only post-processing
was to darken them as they were too light as processed by 'Fly'
  
Some evening photographs
from home last night.
Insta360 Ace Pro 15/9/24
  
17/9/24
Yesterday I was doing
some more test flying, shooting 360 degree panoramas with the Air 2S drone
using the DJI 'Fly' software. I'd done some research and found out that
if you want access to the original images, you have to shoot them in 'RAW'
format and then they appear in a separate folder on the SD card.
I dis a fairly quick flight from the park at the top of my road to prove
it worked, but also shot the panoramas using Litchi AEB mode. The
'Fly' ones worked fine, but I felt that the 'Litchi' ones had the edge
over them, so here are two of the latter, at Ballacottier and Hillberry.
DJI Air 2S 16/9/24
 
Some atmospheric post
sunset and a moon picture from yesterday evening.
Insta360 Ace Pro 16/9/24
 
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