We’re big fans of HoverAir’s thoughtfully-designed selfie drones, which house the props inside cages, making them safe to use even indoors. Sure, they’re not as feature-packed as some of the other best drones out there, but the feature set is perfect for most people’s needs. It’s biggest problem, tough, is the lack of waterproofing, making it a tad tricky to fly outdoors. The HoverAir Aqua changes that.
Not only is the new drone able to handle getting wet and splashed on, it’s designed to float, takeoff, and even land directly on water. Whether you’re paddleboarding in a river, kayaking on a lake, or goofing around with your friends on the beach, this thing makes it easy to record footage of all your activities hands-free.
The HoverAir Aqua is designed specifically for use in and around the water, with a composite body that can resist salt corrosion and fully-sealed, nano-coated internal components to ensure it can handle all manners of water exposure. It’s designed to be bouyant, too, so the whole thing stays afloat any time it lands on water, complete with the ability to take off from there, with no need to pick it up and launch it from your palm like the outfit’s previous drones. Everything here is built to perform in the water, from the hydrophobic-coated lens with self-heating anti-fog capabilities, ceramic gimbal bearings, and corrosion-resistant titanium screws, among a whole host of other innovative elements.
In case it lands upside down on the water, by the way, there’s a turtle flip feature that allows it to jump and realign itself the right way. You control it using the Lighthouse remote, which is designed to be worn on an armband for truly hands-free use. According to the outfit, it uses the drone’s connection with the remote, along with computer vision and real-time kinematics to ensure precession tracking, which is the same impressive tech that powers their original selfie drones.
The HoverAir Aqua is equipped with a 1/1.3-inch sensor that’s capable of capturing 4K footage at up to 100 fps. Since it’s meant to be used hands-free, you’re not supposed to monitor the live feed on a phone like you would with other drones. Instead, the drone comes with a built-in 1.6-inch AMOLED touchscreen that you can use to check footage on the fly. You can also change a variety of settings directly from that display, eliminating the need to have a phone with you at all times.
It’s quite the powerful drone, by the way, with a claimed top speed of 55 kph, while being able to stay in the air at wind speeds of up to 33 knots. Other features include a light weight of just 249 grams (no registration required), electronic stabilization (SmoothCapture 3.0), 128GB of onboard storage, a flight time of 23 minutes between charges (swappable, too, if you have extras on hand), a total of 15 different flight modes to ensure you can capture all kinds of water activities the right way, and a manual flight mode for those who want to take full control of their drone (requires optional accessories).
The HoverAir Aqua is currently crowdfunding on Indiegogo. You can reserve a unit for pledges starting at $999.
