"Lifting" kites for aerial photography

[Wombat]

I know absolutely nothing about kites, apart from the fact that the last time I tried to fly a really cheapo one I made a hash of it.

I want to be able to lift a GoPro camera sufficiently to photograph a friend's "country estate" in France, so if I could manage to get up a couple of hundred feet that would be great.  I've spotted a thing that looked like a kitesurfing foil thingy, but much smaller, which said it was powerful, but fast.  Fast is the last thing I want, I want slow and stable.  Any suggestions?  Budget is not huge, as its a bit of a whim rather than a lifetime's occupation, but it would be good to achieve it.  I had thought of a helicopter, but one big enough to lift a GoPro would be very expensive, and I have visions of splintered bits of helicopter splattering themselves across the French countryside...  Its also got to be able to pack into a Skoda Citigo without taking up the entire available space.

[Jaded]

For a quadcopter you'd be looking at c £1k, unless you were happy to self build and calibrate etc.

[Jurek]

A single line delta with a wingspan of ~4m is what I've used to loft an SLR camera. The longest spars for which were ~2m.
They'll stay in the air on the sort of day when most people say 'Let's not go kite flying today, there's not enough wind'.
They'll soar on a thermal. Like a scaled down hang glider.
They're the most stable kite I had, when I had a fleet of around 14 kites with five or six varieties.
Mr. Gates should be along shortly as, I seem to recall, he has had some success in this area - although I've no idea what sort of kite he used.
I have seen the pictures though.

[rafletcher]

A box kite is what you want - used to lift radio antennae several hundreds of feet in the air my the military is times past.

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Original-WW2-Military-Gibson-Girl-Survival-Box-Kite-/231146533905?pt=UK_Collectables_Militaria_LE&hash=item35d1683411

[clarion]

Codys are designed specifically as lifting kites, and there are various versions available.  They look very cool, too.

Personally, I'd go for a delta (like Jurek) or a double/delta conyne (pilot)

[clarion]

Shopping for Codys

[Jurek]

Given enough cody's in a train, you can get somebody up there in a gondola.
Indeed, they were used for military reconnaissance at one time. 

[hbunnet]

Google for "sled kite" you can make one from a black bin bag, two garden canes and some tape.   Very stable.

[MikeFromLFE]

I think that Cody's were designed specifically for the type of photography you are thinking of - stable, but capable of great height.
Certainly you do want a box kite of some description as it will give you a stable platform, and sufficient mounting points for cameras.

I tried building a Cody-type kite back in the early '80s - the only place I could finish off the stitching was by hanging it from the lights in the (rather large) laboratory I was working in in the Royal London Hospital! Flew it (once only before it broke up) in a kite competition on Primrose Hill

[fuaran]

This looks like a good place for buying them: http://www.kapshop.com/
Seems its about €100 for basic lifting kite, plus you need some sort of rig to hang underneath, for attaching a camera.

[Jurek]

Unlike a Cody, there's very little to break in a delta when it crashes.
And anything that does break on a delta can generally be repaired in the field.
A Cody has a far more complex / fragile / vulnerable construction.

For those interested in such things, Samuel Francis Cody, the flamboyant showman from Texas responsible for the kite which bears his name was unrelated to William Fredrick Cody alias 'Buffalo Bill' whose hugely successful Wild West show SFC had seen and admired.
That's not to say that thanks to the coincidence of their names, a close physical resemblance, and Bill Cody's affectation of shoulder length hair, beard, moustache, stetson, fringed buckskins etc, Samuel Cody quite deliberately nurtured confusion in the minds of the public - some of them genuinely believing that they were watching 'Buffalo Bill' himself. Or at least the son or brother of the famous cowboy.

[Jurek]

Codys are designed specifically as lifting kites, and there are various versions available.  They look very cool, too.

Personally, I'd go for a delta (like Jurek) or a double/delta conyne (pilot)

I used to have a conyne - it yaw'd horribly.
Could never get the thing to fly straight.
Wasn't one I made.

[Wombat]

Thanks folks, some damn good leads there.  At the place I intend to do the main effort, there is a fair bit of space, and also a fully equipped engineering workshop, with lathes, and CNC milling machines, laser cutter for wood, and a 3D printer! 

I'm just hoping that any crashes that will inevitably happen, are not such a high velocity that the GoPro can't take the G forces!  We have to fly something when we go there, last year it was Pascal with a ducted fan f86 sabre, which was a disaster, and me with a really basic foam R/C plane, which was merely mostly unsuccessful, rather than disastrous.    At least this time we will be hoping for a bit of wind, instead of hoping for dead calm.  Hopefully i can get it sorted by July.  I suspect I may find out the true range of the wifi on the gopro!  I know it struggles with being 3 floors away in an ancient stone building, but maybe it'll work at max kite height.  If not, it'll be back to the old fashioned way of firing it up manually before we take off.

[Jurek]

Top tip.
Spend some time flying your kite of choice in a variety of conditions, before attaching the camera.
Just so you're in a position that you know what to expect from it and how to respond, when 'it' happens.
Stating the obvs , really.

[clarion]

Definite top tip there, Jurek.  Patience definitely pays.

And your point about deltas v box kotes is absolutely right, too, though an extended Cody can lift much more efficiently.

A double Conyne is a lot more stable than a single one.  Pilots tend to veer all over, but a well-trimmed double is pretty much nailed to the sky.  I regret giving mine away.

A sled kite is a simple option, but may not have the lifting capacity for a camera.  Although a larger soft sled would work reasonably in some conditions.

[woollypigs]

What about this ball camera? http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-25926300

[T42]

If all else fails you can make a kite-shaped kite out of 100-litre bin bags, bamboo and duct tape.  I made one like this 20+ years ago: about 6' tall and 4' across and a 12' tail weighted with 6" nails.  A kite this size is probably powerful enough to need light nylon rope for a string: I used too light a line and last saw the thing a couple of hundred yards up and heading out of the area, no sign of falling.  I then consulted my civil liability insurance and found that it specifically excluded damage caused by model aircraft & kites. Never heard anything of it again, though.

[Euan Uzami]

A mate of mine puts go pros on remote control helicopters and planes, I'll find out his web site for you

[nicknack]

I used too light a line and last saw the thing a couple of hundred yards up and heading out of the area, no sign of falling.  I then consulted my civil liability insurance and found that it specifically excluded damage caused by model aircraft & kites. Never heard anything of it again, though.

Anyone else think "Wasp Factory"?

[Valiant]

If you end up making one, I have quite a few metres of red parachute/kit material you can have. It makes the kite go higher and faster as anyone will tell you.

[frankly frankie]

A kite this size is probably powerful enough to need light nylon rope for a string:

Whatever kind of reel or winding gear you use, has to be completely indestructible.  A solid drum-shaped billet of aluminium would not be OTT.  Anything less can crush as you wind the line back on under tension, causing a sort of magnified boa constrictor effect.

[air dancer]

Have a butchers at what Archaeologists use. They use them for getting clues from the land before setting the diggers on it.

HTH

[clarion]

You don't want fast for a lifting kite.  But power/weight is important.

[andygates]

Just spotted this thread!  I use a generic one-string soft foil about 1.2 x 1.4 metres - the kite-photography standard is something like a Sutton Flowform.  The idea is to put up a stable sky-anchor, none of this flying about nonsense.  I made a sort of bat'leth from scrap wood as a winder; it's tedious but simple.

My little rig carries a point-n-shoot on a home-made gimbal (about the same weight as a gopro).

Codys are ... pretty.  And fiddly.  Suffice to say if Cody had access to ripstop, he'd have made lifting foils.

Rig: https://secure.flickr.com/photos/andygates/7321973426/
Looking down: https://secure.flickr.com/photos/andygates/7339117530/