Fisher Towers of Castle Valley

Majestic cliffs and towering rock structures reaching hundreds of feet into the sky dominate the scenery along route 128 through Castle Valley, Utah. I have wanted to drive this route for years, and finally took a day to drive down and explore Fisher Towers. While I hadn't intended to film much on this scouting trip given the wind conditions, I just couldn't resist. The film isn't as smooth and stable as I like due to the turbulent air, but the footage was interesting enough to warrant doing a video.
I intend to go back when the air is calmer and spend several days in the area doing a more thorough job of filming the towers, and getting up to the top of King Fisher tower. Until then, enjoy this film.
Music: David Lanz & Paul Speer "The Dragons Daughter" from "A Childhood Remembered" on the Narada label.
GEAR:
Custom Y6 Frame
Hero3 Black Edition
DragonLink UHF
Yun-1 Gimbal
Circular Wireless SPW Antennas

[@Rachel801]

Spectacular! I have been following your work for a while, from the fun cliff diving videos to the incredible cinematography that you now produce. All I can say is WOW! Your choice of music perfectly matches the film in every way and the slow, gentle camera movements captures the spirit of Utah's beauty. You have defined what FPV can be, and have set a high standard that others cannot reach. Thank you for providing this great gift.

[@sudosuga]

Excellent work yet again. I really love those Gimbal pan shots... gorgeous.

[@milosh9k]

Fisher towers are stunning, unfortunately not that widely known, because what in other parts of the world would be considered extraordinary in Southern Utah it can be lost between tens of other extraordinary places The aerial footage is awesome, such a great opportunity to see this from the top, and moving fast between the rock pillars! Great video!

[@Wyowanderer]

Me likey very much. I especially like the moon in the sky- very well done.

[@SayaKhio]

AWESOME! purely cinematic, watching it felt like a dream

[@ExperimentalAirlines]

Flawless as always. You really raise the bar.

[@sylvainverlaine16]

Beautiful flight & scenery !!

[@treeseatmyplanes]

WOW!! Amazing footage. Love your videos.

[@SonicOrbStudios]

Fantastic flying, camera angles, and editing work!

[@HaOtElyoWnGraceSource888]

Great Great Great... sweet Moon at 3:07 and my HEart is melting like an ice ark in the Sun :-D

[@ProfessorKenny]

Almost expect to heaar attenborough's voice after a few moments in!! :) You are an artist Mr Sheridan. Inspirational to say the least

[@Pozzix65]

Just amazing...

[@ViewsFromAbove]

Amazing quality throughout, well done

[@RCRoss]

Ridiculously awesome Todd. Got to plan a trip there now. Utah looks amazing for FPV.

[@KJ4CTZ]

Very cool video. Great stability.

[@shapelizer]

One word: WOW! Ok, one more: WOW!

[@casonjimmy]

I would love to see your Y6 setup. Im a tricopter guy always looking to upgrade. Awesome video.

[@toddsher2112]

:) Thank you Rachel! I love that it moves you, and appreciate the kind words. I'm anxiously working on some new films! Watch the channel in the next few weeks. Cheers!

[@JakeBullit123]

nicely done,shows what multirotors are capable of.

[@MartinKatera]

Awesome!

[@alex_prizzi]

nice video. I'm planning to go to fisher and castleton towers with my drone this year. I hope i can get some equally awesome footage.

[@bophoto]

You can help the battery by powering it from the flight-battery. I power the GoPro, but still use a flight-cam as Im not keen on the GP crashing while flying. :-)

[@toddsher2112]

Line of Sight occlusion is not as much a problem when flying close to things. It's more an issue for FPV pilots who are flying long distances. If I'm only 200 feet away from my vehicle, the signal is much stronger and penetrates and bends around objects. Most people don't understand how wave forms work. Larger antennas like the 1.3ghz I'm using put out a broader signal, and also have a larger receiving area. 5.8 ghz on the other hand can't penetrate much of anything.

[@JCoreyTube]

Probably the best view of the Moab area I have seen. I am looking into getting a quad for a backpacking trip in Asia next month and eventually came across this FPV. Awesome job, I climbed the Ancient Art route on the shorter of the Fisher towers and always wondered what was around it. I too find the GP3 buggier than the GP2. Can you point me towards a video transmitter that is compatible with the GoPro 3?? Going through mini HDMI I presume?

[@toddsher2112]

I don't have pics. I took two existing quads that I had and mashed their parts together into a custom Y6 configuration. I'm considering a X8 configuration for my next project though. Any over/under motor configuration like the Y6 is going to be less efficient than a traditional hex, but the advantage is it's less cumbersome, less weight (due to 3 fewer arms), it folds easily, plus it has less surface area for wind to affect. It's also easy to tell which way it's going being non-symnmetrical.

[@glassdogangle]

Dude! Yogi Bear spotted at 2:02. Looks like he is wearing a hat...

[@CurryKitten]

Stunning as always - are you getting your control/video signal through solid rock faces in this, or are you moving around to get different views so you can keep the y6 in LOS ?

[@toddsher2112]

Thanks, Dick. This is all filmed from a hovering camera platform, a multirotor. No aircraft were used.

[@tadserralta]

You should know that your vids is what got me into FPV. Your work is so inspiring. Thank you for what you do. Going on my second year and have moved into multirotors. I, too, fly Dragonlink and my vid tx/rx is on 1.3 with cirucular polorized ant from IB Crazy. My question is two parts: What FPV camera do you use and feel comfortable with, and secondly, you mentioned the ability to switch back and forth from GoPro to FPV camera to compose shot. How do you do that?

[@toddsher2112]

I get static occasionally, but I know it's coming if I go behind a rock pillar, and always fly with a trajectory that'll recover the video signal right away. Ya just gotta be smart, be constantly aware of where you are standing in relation to your vehicle, and what the obstacles are.

[@tadserralta]

I use NAZA with GPS and am looking for a good gimbal combo for my GoPro. I can't hardly believe how smooth the YUN-1 (with what I presume to be Alexmos controller) films even in high winds. Amazing. I'm between the YUN-1 versus the AG400DD Any thoughts?

[@helidaho]

Great job as always, you sure do make red rocks look really good! :) Curious, did you ever loose your video signal going in and out of those rock spires?

[@toddsher2112]

Much better picture quality, but worse battery performance. Also a little buggy. It occasionally freezes up on me and I have to reset it by removing and re-installing the battery. Hero2 was rock solid performance with no bugs. But I still choose Hero3 for the image quality, protune software & compression, RAW colorspace, plus lighter and smaller footprint.

[@christopheklein7198]

Hi! Great video! I've got also the Yun1 gimbal. I was wondering how you succeed you get such as good quality. In fact, I always have got some woobles on the pitch... Did you made a stabilization in a software? I noticed that you had the same problem in one of your first video with this gimbal. Thanks!

[@GoProBro]

Wow Great video! Do you do a lot of color correction, stabilization, quality editing in post? Thanks!

[@toddsher2112]

Yes, I operate the camera tilt from my radio.

[@Soldier53flyer]

Amazing! great job. How do you like the GoPro 3 black compared to the GoPro 2?

[@Stonecrusher45]

Todd, what would you think about following some mountain bikers with the camera? I could set up some very cool locations for you.

[@josephcderer]

nice - what were you flying...

[@themadrobot]

watch the shadows

[@toddsher2112]

You should never fly FPV through a GoPro, not as a primary camera at least. The Hero3 has such bad battery problems, that if your camera shuts down in flight you'll lose your multirotor. Everybody I know recommends against it. You could use it as a secondary camera with a camera switch to toggle to it for framing shots.

[@JanuszWidlaENERGOWID]

O.K

[@toddsher2112]

That's on my list of things to do! Message me your contact info and let's set something up!

[@danishnative9555]

Nice, but be respectful with your drones/quad-copters. This is a community of old hippies and ham radio operators.

[@TheDickeroo]

Spectacular is not sufficient to describe your FPV work. Did you build this flying wing yourself?