Drone video at events, How To?

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I had a question about shooting Drone video at events.
I work for a marketing company and we are hired to record many outdoor activities.
Often it is asked by the hosting event organization that we record drone footage.

However drone regulations state drone operation should not be preformed above crowds.
If the particular organization is asking for drone coverage how do i deal with this?

Store openings, ground breakings, and new housing developments are a few typical events that come to mind and they all draw a crowd of people. More recently I was asked to record a little league opening day ceremony.
Do I simply fly in a way "around" the event and avoid doing any flyovers of people?

Or if it's stated in an invitation to members of the origination and people invited that the event will be recorded via drone, do they then become participants allowing drone flight directly above them?
In other words are drone participants only members of my crew team?
If so, for example, how does drone wedding footage exist, do they simply ignore the rules and take the chance?
 
the other day, had a solo that had just left on a distance run on a fresh battery
at 1000 feet it sent a critical battery alert
Alarmed I turned for home as fast as I could the solo fell out of the air 15 feet from home.
Several people looked at the logs and determined the battery stopped reporting current to the FC and so assumed it was not under use, it timed out and shut down
On repower the battery had 77% charge

We are complacent about this technology, but had that happened out over my flight it would have fallen 200 feet onto what ever was below it.
Scary thought, I understand why that regulation is in place, and its only a matter of time before someone gets seriously hurt
 
CNN's waiver is also very restricted. Limited to max 21 feet agl over ppl and max weight of 1.37 lbs. Just in case something goes wrong like you suggest might and probably will.
 
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You can offset the drone from the main crowd and make it look like its hanging over people. Cranes and towers should be used for over the head shots. I just used mine at the Spam Jam here in Hawaii. Most of the shots near the crowds were junk. The shot from a far orbiting or fly past (not over)were the best.
 
I've done a wedding for a friend already, and though I didn't fly directly over people, I was in close enough proximity to cause worry. I set up a specific area of flight with the closest point of non crew contact being about 10 feet away at 5ft altitude. Before taking off I set up a weighted tether to the only non antenna/compass leg on solo as a failsafe.

If you use the tether method, it needs to be weighted to keep the string from bouncing into contact with the rotors during all flight stages. You've also gotta be methodical and fluid with your controls to avoid contact with the tether.

I used 50 lb test fishing line of the bright neon green variety along with a bright orange painted rubber core sinker about 3 feet away from the attachment point (can't remember the weight). Everything went perfectly, l did land in motion though to keep tension on the line.
 
Thanks everyone for the responses.
It appears orbits and fly pasts are the way to go for the foreseeable future when crowds are involved.

As a side note and a word of caution (this is what spurred the question in the first place) much like the person who said they had the battery malfunction which caused their drone to drop from the sky...

When I was beginning to setup for that little league opening day event, a hawk did not appreciate the drone in the sky and as soon as i put it up into the air, the bird attacked it causing it to crash to the ground. All propellers broken, body cracked, and camera gimbal bent beyond repair. Luckily I was far back from the crowd when it fell.
 
If you can live with the 720 video, you can use a nano drone with camera for the job. Many nano cam drone weight less than 100g with battery . Even it drops from 30 ft, it will not cause an incident. If you need higher resolution, wait for the camera of nano drone get to 4k quality
 

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