Manchester at night, October 2021

19 Likes

But … which one to enter in the Lights competition? :thinking:

3 Likes

The one with the lights? :wink:

1 Like

Cant, you go and live somewhere else :wink:

1 Like

Number 7 for me

Fantastic shots, can see lots of those high rise buildings when launching my Mavic 2 Pro from over here in Stockport.

1 Like

The only problem is some of them are so tall they’re hard to photograph from a 120m ceiling!

Out of interest, as I’m intending to do the same thing in Brum with some practise flights in daylight after work today, but may be forced to hang around till dark as the weather forecast for rest of the week looks pretty dire either wind or rain wise.

How did you find keeping an eye on drone and the general public around you in a city centre. Photos look pretty quiet, I guess because it was a Sunday.

I was thinking of taking off on the top floor of some multi story car parks, but don’t know how sound a plan that is. Especially as the app will think my ground position is 0foot, so I really wouldn’t know exactly how high I am!

Any tips for finding a good TOAL spot in a City Centre?

Great images :+1: :clap: :clap:

Might have been because they’d just been hammered by Liverpool and they were all at home sulking!

In London I could understand that being the case, but in Manchester itself! :wink:

Ah, ha ha, ha ha ha ha.

I was going to helpfully respond to your other query, but now … :angry:

Sunday is my preferred night, for obvious reasons. One issue in a city centre is it’s difficult to find a spot where you can have good VLOS of both the drone and any hazards at ground level. At least on a Sunday evening there is less chance of a crowded street.

For these photos I used two TOAL spots.

One was in a deserted elevated car park with a great view of surroundings, but no view down into the streets. I know the area well and there are large areas where the drone can hover without being above anybody, or at least hardly anybody. I’ve considered using the top floor of a multi-storey but have avoided it in case car park security turn up. I wouldn’t worry about the height, I’d just make a reasonable estimate of the car park height and take that off the flight ceiling.

The other was parked in a relatively quiet street, quiet enough to TOAL from the footway, although I’ve done the same from the car roof before. There were a handful of people around, but nobody approached me.

On another occasion I’ve taken off from a spot that was kind of a cross between a mini-park and a dark alley. That was too dark for me to go down last night! I’ve also taken off from a bench beside a quiet, well-lit canal area.

There’s a real tension between finding somewhere with the best VLOS, which means being out in the open to see ground hazards; and somewhere with the safest TOAL, which means being away from the public so you don’t get disturbed by drunks (or put at risk of being mugged for the drone), but also means if someone does approach you there may be nobody else around if you do get hassled.

2 Likes

Amazing! Don’t see skylines like that around here, tallest things are churches, everything else is bungalows :joy:

1 Like

Thanks, some useful advice and guidance. Just found out the car park I was going to use to get my shot, is now closed! FFS

And yes, drunks and potential muggings were my main concern. Especially when alone.

1 Like

To be fair, it’s only recently that Manchester has gotten like this. The first of the four Deansgate Square towers (the first group of photos above) were only finished in 2018.

Amazing colours, great photos.

1 Like

Permission from the boss to post this here. My edit of @kvetner stunning CityScape. Don’t get to see much in the way of this dan ere, everything is very flat.

3 Likes

Manchester never looked that pretty when I was working there 20 years ago :blush:

1 Like

Amen to that. Wait…'89/'90…30 years ago. :scream:

1 Like