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The Passport foldable drone makes for a fun travel companion
My first drone flight experience was with the DJI Phantom 2 Vision, and as much as I appreciated its advanced capabilities at the time, I longed for something more compact -- a device so small that I wouldn't need to carry a separate bag or case for it, preferably without sacrificing performance. Eventually, a Chinese startup called Zero Zero Robotics released the $599 Hover Camera Passport, which comes in the unique form of a foldable cage while packing cool features like body tracking, face tracking and orbiting. I got to spend some time with the Passport over the past few weeks, and eventually it got to the point where I rarely leave home without it, lest I find time to take it for a quick spin.
The foldable, fully-enclosed Passport drone is yours for $549
Foldability is all the hype in the drone world these days, as is the case with the GoPro Karma and the DJI Mavic. But before these two were announced, we already heard about Zero Zero Robotics' Hover Camera 4K drone that is truly foldable and also fully enclosed -- in the sense that you can grab hold it any way you want without getting cut by the propellers, plus you're less likely to cause havoc in a room. That's a rarity in today's drone market. Today, we bring you the good news that this nifty little machine -- under the new name "Passport" -- is finally launching for $549.
Hover Camera is a safe and foldable drone that follows you
"Follow me" is an up-and-coming feature on consumer drones, and then you've also got those that are foldable for the sake of portability. Very few devices carry both advantages, but Beijing startup Zero Zero Robotics has already gone further with its Hover Camera. As the name suggests, this drone is mainly for aerial photography and videography, but what makes it even cooler is the fact that its propellers are fully enclosed by a strong carbon fiber frame, thus making it the safest drone we've ever played with. As you can see in our hands-on video after the break, you can literally grab it whenever you like without sacrificing any of your fingers to the drone gods.
Qualcomm teases its chip for drones with autonomous navigation
We've known about Qualcomm's drone ambitions for a few months now, but it looks like the company is ready to demo the goods. Ahead of CES next week, the chipmaker teased features of its Snapdragon Flight drone platform. If you'll recall, Qualcomm is aiming to do for drones what its done for phones. And that starts with putting camera and communications tech on the same board. Perhaps most notably, Snapdragon Flight offers and autonomous navigation mode. This means when you're done filming, you can push a button and the UAV will return to the launch pad, avoiding any objects that block its path.
Qualcomm wants to do for drones what it did for smartphones
We've said it before, and we'll say it again: Qualcomm wants to be everywhere. So it's not too surprising to see the company delving into drones with its new Snapdragon Flight platform. Based on its Snapdragon 801 processor, Flight aims to simplify drone development by giving companies a single board for dealing with drone communications and camera technology. That's pretty similar to Qualcomm's strategy in the smartphone arena. Of course, 4K video is front and center for Flight, but Qualcomm also includes support for a variety of sensors and its "Quick Charge" technology. Flight is powered by a 2.26Ghz quad-core processor and Adreno 330 GPU, and it also has dedicated video encoding and dual image sensor support (for depth-sensing cameras). Expect to see the new platform hitting drones early next year -- the first customer is Chinese drone maker Yuneec, according to Fast Company.
