DJI Wookong Hexa Tang Hall Cycle Track to Morrisons in York

Yesterday was Tuesday, which means acolytle Kevin day, so we went out filming as usual.

In fact, the only time we don't film outside on a Tuesday is if it's like a monsoon outside.

Well, yesterday was pretty poor weather - windy as Hell. And not the sort of wind you can get used to either, one second it was almost calm, then the next there were like 20mph gusts, which got worse the higher up you went.

When the weather is a bit grey, I usually decide to film something industrial or a bit grim, saving the sunny days for things more picturesque. With that in mind we went to film the cycle track that runs through Tang Hall to Morrisons supermarket in York, taking in the gypsy reservation on the way. The track in on the route of an old railway line called the Derwent Valley Light Railway, which used to run from York to Dunnington - just outside York - and on to a place near Selby.

Tang Hall, despite it's posh sounding name, is actually one of the poorer areas of York and, though not exactly dangerous, I don't think I would have filmed down that lonely cycle track without my acolyte by my side.

To give you some measure of the place, we met a small group of people on their way home - a woman with a baby in a pushchair and three teenaged boys - who were all 'What's that?.. does it fly?.. eh, look at this...' then, when we were a hundred yards away, they started throwing sticks and stones at the hexacopter in the sky to try and make it crash. They were the epitome of kids these days with no respect, and, unfortunately, they were sort of what we'd expected to come across filming down there. Not that all the kids in Tang Hall are like that, just it's a pity we had to meet the ones that were only too happy to live up to the popular expectations of people in York.

Because the day was not so nice there weren't all that many people around, so no real obstacles as such. The intermittent and variable wind was a nightmare, blowing directly against the way we were moving and causing the DJI Wookong hexacopter to bounce around a lot. I was constantly fighting to keep it where I wanted it to be, which is good to test your flying skills but not so great for the aerial video. I don't think the DJI Wookong copes that well in high winds, though I could make adjustments to the software which might help. The Mikrokopter or Hoverfly Pro may have been better for this job?

With the filming I wanted to get a good, long stretch of the path in then finish off at the supermarket, so the video is quite long. I guess I would class this as another one of my archive type videos, showing snippets of people and cars etc in 2012 that people may find interesting in 30 or 40 years.

Also, because the video is a bit bouncy and not my best, I thought I'd mess about with the editing and played with the video speed here and there. For example, slowing it right down for the passing bird.