PICT0039 (Patreon)

I post highlight videos of me flying at my best, but actually I'm a relatively timid pilot. I'm not able to just take one pack and bomb the hell out of a new site, or a race course, damn the consequences. Typically, when I fly a new site, basically the entire first flight session is me getting a feel for it. Where the safe lines are. Where the hidden obstacles are. What everything looks like from every angle. Building up a spatial model of the site in my mind so that when I'm flying, I know what to expect, and I know where my "outs" are if I get into trouble.

Here's a video I shot a few days ago of me feeling out a new line at my house. I noticed this gap in the trees once while flying over the stand of trees and though how cool it would be to drop into it. The problem is that my typical exit line from that stand of trees is pretty tight. 

First, I fly up through the gap from the bottom, because it's easier to see upwards when your camera has uptilt, and you can go slowly. This just basically assures me that the line is more or less clear.

Next, you'll see me examine the entry to the gap, feeling for how I want to come into it. The safest way to enter the gap is to look straight down and drop into it; the problem with that is that you're going very fast and have to improvise your exit line. I want to "improvise" as little as possible behind the sticks of a $300+ RC aircraft. Or, to put it another way, I want to improvise in a creative way that makes the flight more fun and awesome. I don't want to improvise in order to avoid crashing.

Then I do some flat, spiraling drops into the gap. I know that I can do this maneuver relatively confidently, and I know exactly what the bottom of the gap is like because I fly through that line lots from the ground. So I feel safe dropping down into the gap even though I can't see where I'm going. After dropping straight in, I eyeball my possible exit lines. I know what the exit lines are, of course, but they will look different coming in from the top vs. coming in from the bottom.

Finally, I drop straight in, nose-down. I take the safest, most open exit line, which actually doesn't look all that exciting, honestly, but it left my heart pounding, I assure you.