Several months ago I saw a post from DJI that they were hosting a worldwide contest encouraging members of the community to submit videos showcasing their story of using DJI Drones. I was fairly confident in my video editing skills at this point, so I whipped up a quick video and submitted it. I was proud of my creation, a less than 60 seconds narrated video using footage from multiple different adventures and professional use cases, but I didn't fully expect to place anywhere in the contest. Imagine my surprise when I woke up to an email several weeks later saying I had placed in the Top 10 contestants as selected by DJI themselves. Below you can see my submission video as well as the DJI Blog post interview I did with them.
To be completely upfront, I haven't been using DJI Drones for a decade. In fact, I only started really getting interested in DJI technology about two and a half years ago. When the Russo-Ukrainian War started in earnest in 2022, I was glued to my phone watching footage of first world combat playing out in real time. Early on in the conflict, Drones became a pivotal piece of technology for both sides of the conflict. I happened to come across a video of a young Ukrainian soldier launching a DJI FPV Drone from a moving tank. He slid the goggles over his face, flashed a V for Victory sign, and took off to act as an aerial spotter for his compatriots.
Before this video, I had no idea that there were Drones readily available for purchase that you could fly with goggles. Until now I only knew of drones that were controlled by using your phone clipped into a gaming style controller. They were finicky and hard to see on my constantly dirty and scratched phone screen, so I had mostly written them off as still being a gimmick. I purchased the DJI FPV immediately, and the start of this whole endeavor began.
The DJI FPV was a hell of a lot of fun and very useful around the farm, but when using it on a Search and Rescue training exercise I began to understand it's limitations and started doing research into what other drones were available that could be used for Agriculture,
Firefighting, and Search and Rescue. Right after getting my Part 107 Pilot's License, I settled on the DJI Mavic 3T.
The Mavic 3T quickly proved it's worth in all three fields. Mapping out an almond orchard for problem areas, locating smoldering hot spots on vegetation fires, and even finding a missing person in the dead of night.
One thing I also found out when I started gathering so much footage was that I truly enjoyed editing and creating my own videos. Before I knew it I had made this website to serve as a hub, created a YouTube channel to post my own Drone related videos on, and had subscriptions to Canva, Epidemic Sound, and higher end editing software to better make my videos. This entire turn of events rapidly made North Wind Aerial a second job.
I'd be failing if I didn't mention the effect Ukraine and my friend Cody Langford had on this whole thing as well. Over the course of the war I've befriended a number of Ukrainians and helped them raise funds for medical supplies. Working with my friend Cody and his charity, the Langford Foundation and Project Pegasus, I took a much more active roll in content creation in order to raise funds to purchase drones for Ukrainian Soldiers. So even as I thoroughly enjoyed making my videos, there was and is always a driving factor behind them in order to help others defend themselves.
Today my fleet of DJI Drones has expanded to a number I'm embarrassed to admit the size of, I own an underwater drone (QYSEA Fifish ROV), and I'm currently sitting on a DIY kit to build my own FPV Drone so I can better understand how all this technology works. I have many ideas on custom drones that I'd love to build so I feel like it's time I learn how to build them myself.
I've also been placed as the Drone Team Leader in my County Search and Rescue organization and spearheaded the acquisition of the DJI M30T to be a dedicated SAR drone. I've worked with emerging drone technologies such as NOVA and TexSar's Automated Drone Image Analysis Tool. I've gotten to share stories and tactics with multiple different agencies and community members on drone defense, emergency services, and video creation. It's rare my impostor syndrome let's me be proud of my accomplishments, but it's hard not to smile when I see how far this adventure of mine has gone.
So as I sign off on what is my first official blog post for North Wind Aerial, I wanted to give a couple of huge thank you's. First and foremost, to my wife Ashley and our two kids who put up with me, my bags of camera gear, my random antics in the name of filming, and the many late nights spent editing on the computer. My parents, who took a gamble on helping me purchase several drones for the farm to use. Their bets have paid off, but I know the random days of me having to leave to fly drones on mystery SAR calls can be tough. All the members of the Funk, as well as Melissa, Travis, John, Erin, Ty, Cody, Katrina, and Gerald, who have either directly supported me with this project in one way or another or who give me the much needed mental pick-me-ups when I start to overwork myself. I can't do this without y'all. There are far too many others to thank that I'm sure I'll get yelled at for not mentioning, but I'm trying to keep this short while already rambling too much. So thank you all as well, your support means the world to me.
Tim.
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