This past weekend at the 68th annual Yorkton Film Festival (the longest-running film festival in North America held, coincidentally enough, in Yorkton, Saskatchewan, Canada), Java Post Aerial Photography was very pleased to help present a seminar on UAVs - unmanned aerial vehicles, commonly called "drones" - and their uses as film and television production tools.

The presentation was co-hosted by Java Post's owner and certified UAV pilot, Jack Tunnicliffe, and by our long-time friend and colleague, director/cinematographer/photographer Tom Davidson.

Java Post Aerial Photography is an experienced, fully certified and insured UAV operator, recognized by Transport Canada with an open Special Flight Operations Certificate (SFOC) for the Prairie provinces of Saskatchewan, Manitoba and Alberta.

In addition, we are also Transport Canada-certified to conduct flight operations at night, and our open permit from Transport Canada also provides Java Post with special permission to fly within the otherwise-restricted 9-kilometre aerodrome operating radius. This is a feature not offered by many other UAV photography companies.

Below are some photos of Jack and Tom's presentation, courtesy of the Yorkton Film Festival organizers.

On display at the presentation were some of the UAVs in the Java Post Aerial Photography fleet. Depending on the project, different UAVs provide different advantages.

Jack (in white t-shirt) gives some curious festival attendees a tour of the UAVs on display.

Part of the presentation was a flight demonstration. The seminar was held in a closed-down curling rink, so Jack was able to launch Java Post's DJI Inspire 1 UAV inside the building, before piloting it out a loading door and up into the skies.

Here's Jack just before sending the UAV out the loading door. For this flight demonstration, Jack piloted the UAV and co-presenter Tom Davidson used a separate controller to operate the UAV's on-board camera.

Special thanks to Richard Gustin, who was our observer/spotter for this flight, making sure that everything was clear at the loading door so we could safely move from inside to outside and vice versa.

The video at the top of this web post shows a few clips from the seminar's flight demonstration.

Our DJI Inspire 1 UAV in flight.

The seminar attendees turn their gaze skyward. "Look! Up in the sky!" "It's a bird!" "It's a plane!" "It's an effective creative tool for film and television production, when flown responsibly within Transport Canada regulations by experienced UAV operators!"

Jack also keeps his eyes on the UAV. Transport Canada regulations require the UAV pilot to maintain visual, line-of-sight contact with the aircraft at all times. And, with the exception of regular eyeglasses, that sight line must be "unaided", meaning that piloting your UAV through binoculars or first-person-view (FPV) goggles (where you are just looking through the on-board camera) is not allowed.

A nice close-up of the DJI Inspire 1 UAV as it returns to the launch site.

Back on the concrete floor of the curling rink, safe and sound.

The flight demonstration completed, it was time for questions and answers.

There were lots of great questions from the attendees, who - being film and television producers and creators - were very interested in this new and growing technology.

Tom (left) looks on as Jack drives a point home about UAVs.

And the questions just keep coming.

Tom's gesture looks like he saying: "Okay, okay...no more questions!" However, as the Q-and-A session went on 90 minutes past the scheduled end of the presentation, we assume that no one's question was turned away.

"What? That's it? No one has any more questions?," Tom seems to say.

Well, we guess this means the presentation has concluded. And so has this web post.

Our thanks goes out to all the festival attendees who came to our presentation, our co-presenter Tom Davidson, and the organizers of the 68th Annual Yorkton Film Festival for inviting us to be part of the festival workshops.

For more examples of the kinds of work done by Java Post Aerial Photography, CLICK HERE.