Jaycar Electronics is a great place to visit. Unfortunately for me whenever I go there to buy a $10 plug or something mundane I walk out with a handful of other stuff purchased on impulse. One day I was there to buy a HDMI cable and accidentally walked out with a Radio Controlled Helicopter. When confronted by my wife about it I used one of her lines, “It was on special”.
I hooked my GoPro camera to the base the helicopter and moved into Aerial cinematography. Early one glorious morning I took my son down to a deserted beach for a surf and thought I might try and take some aerial shots of him surfing. I understood flying over the water could result in a unwelcome outcome however the helicopter cost $99 which is fine and the GoPro floats. Worth the risk I thought!
Normally the electric powered helicopter can remain airborne for around 8 mins before running out of charge. Carrying the GoPro you are down to a flight time of around 4 mins with the extra weight so I had to be extra careful monitoring the amount of time I spent over water. With the inaugural over-water flight I miss calculated. Battery life was under 2 mins so was unable to make it back to the beach.