I don't know if you've seen the AppleTV screensaver videos yet, but they're fairly stunning. Apple used drones and helicopters to capture 50 (as of now) videos from the around the world, encompassing New York City, San Francisco, China (Great Wall), London, Dubai, Hawaii and Los Angeles and they're pretty stunning.

Benjamin Mayo has created a page with most of them listed (http://benjaminmayo.co.uk/watch-all-the-apple-tv-aerial-video-screensavers) as well as a direct link to download to watch them on your computer or via your favorite browser. If you want to take it a step further (and have a Mac), John Coates has created a screensaver, Aerial, that can let you use these videos as your lock screen background.

So why do I post this?

While I've been in tech for a long time (25+ years), drones have not really interested me. I've got kids, wife, life, etc and just kinda skipped it. Didn't need "another hobby", right? However, I kinda get lost in the aforementioned AppleTV screensaver videos occasionally so when I was reading through a NewEgg email recently I spotted a deal for a Refurb Phantom 3 Standard for $349. I figured for that kind of money, even if I don't like it I could give it to the kids to play with and not feel bad about what little I spent. Yeah, famous last words....

I know you've all been here, so you probably know how it's progressed. I live in wheat fields and it's a flippin' blast to go screaming around with it. I can hit the ceiling and see the forest/wheat patches going on forever, or I can zip off to the field edges to watch the deer pop out in the evenings. I run through my 3 batteries in a heartbeat just cruizing around, seeing the world from 250m above the ground. I bought a few accessories (the camera filters are the best so far), but I have to admit, for $350 this is a fabulous piece of technology DJI has made. Just amazing.

Uh... those vid's ROCK!