Hi Stuart @stubbyd if your friend wants a drone for weddings then the Mini 3 Pro is the way to go, plus she’ll need the usual flyer/operator id. Also commercial insurance is required and a lot of wedding venues do ask to see this. I shot weddings last year at the same venue 3 days running and they asked to see it each time. As important as commercial insurance is permission for TOAL as you are on private property. 99% of wedding venues we work are fine and always give permission, some of them are in FRZ’s so I also need to get permission from the relevant ATC. There has been a few wedding venues that do not allow the use of drones on their property, but most couples who book them know that anyway (word gets out on social media). A venue close to me used to say no drones because they were next door to a nursery school, even though the nursery was closed at weekends when most weddings took place.
I do both professional wedding photography and videography.
As a photographer I’d say only a very small amount of my wedding photos are shot on a drone, mainly some location shots and I also use it to do a big group photo of all guests (saves me hanging out windows, hanging off fire escapes or climbing on to roofs as you can’t photograph 150+ guests at ground level, you just can’t see them all). Also, there just isn’t the time to use it more.
As a videographer though, it’s the total opposite, we use drones for a lot of our footage. There tends to be two of us filming and one uses a drone while the other is filming with ground based cameras. You can’t film a wedding with just a drone, you have to combine it with all the other footage shot on the day which includes the ceremony, speeches, dancing etc. Which means professional video cameras, high quality audio mics etc. We use tripods, monopods, gimbals, drones, small run ‘n’ gun video cameras for outdoor stuff, plus larger Sony pro video cameras for the ceremony, speeches etc.
We also get asked a lot at wedding fayres do we use drones but it’s for the video side of my business, very few of my photography clients ask this. If your friend is only going to use a drone with her photography I’d say it would only be for a small percentage of all her wedding photos. However an aerial photo of a castle/stately home etc. can give the opening page of a Storybook Album the WOW factor.
So to get back to your questions:
Yes to all except the flight plan, you don’t need one. CAA registered only needs to be a flyer/operator id if flying sub 250g. I also have an A2 C of C, though I don’t need it for sub 250g it’s handy when some venue manager asks to see my ‘licence’. Clauses I have in my contract are around when we can and when we can’t fly i.e. weather, flight restrictions etc. For permission I email venues in advance and then get an email back as my permission.
I also fly a Mavic 3 Classic but only tend to use it for some of the location shots at some of the more remote Scottish venues we work at. To be honest though, the Mini 3 Pro is more than up to the job.