Greetings, fellow sentient beings!

Yes, you are, and I just figured I should probably stop dividing you from the very start of my articles by saying things like: "Greetings, all ya ketchup lovers!" I don't have the right to. You could be ketchup haters reading about my ketchup so that you can hate it better, etc., etc. From now on, I turn to all of you, A.I., humans, aliens, dolphins, let me stop here but imply I mean others, too.

And I have to admit I borrowed this hailing from the Wildstar MMORPG that was. And is no more, so sad to say :( It was beautiful. This was the hailing the Free Bots used.

You know what's also beautiful but not eternal, nor time and humans (or other of the less sentient beings) withstanding?

That's right! Environment.

The mouth of Veleka River.

Looking north. With a drone. First time flying. Not the perfect time for photography but the only time I had a chance to try out the machine of a friend of mine. I don't even know the model, I am so bad with drones.

It says Camera Maker DJI
And Camera Model FC2103

Whatever

Camera settings:

Aperture F 2.8 (yeah, nice call, you drone!), Shutter Speed 1/500 sec (that call was our predetermined choice), ISO 100 (fine), Focal Length 4mm (but it doesn't feel that wide compared to an 8 mm fisheye on a cropped-sensor DSLR...I guess the size of the sensor matters a lot here or it could be something else).

Yeah, different angles. So not like what I shot from the ground (that was only to be expected)!

Still, I would like to leave some reference for you. See the color of the seawater bottom right? Let's get back to a series I shot in the shades of that cliff approximately the same time of the day and I recently shared.

I'll give it a new name here, though ;)

The Dark Side of The Black Sea

I think this one is better. No?

Anyway.

The beach of Veleka is generally...awesome. Beautiful. I've shared photographs taken there many times. I can't even find all my posts about it within a reasonable time.

So, just One More Glimpse before I continue droning on about my first drone piloting experience.

Right...Droning...

It's easy to guess why drone pilots like the location. One of the very best in the country. Where laws are still so very primitive...My friend said he had a course and a license in Denmark where he lives but here, in Bulgaria, you needed to call Air Control a month ahead of each flight and schedule your session. Photography just does not work like that but it's not about the shooting. It's about the flying.

And, real enough, I had to get the drone out of position a couple of times just within a 15 minutes interval because of aircraft interference signals. Within that time window, I managed to look around a bit and snap a couple more shots.

A look south. The beach and the resort far back.

Closing on the beach and the river.

And I might have another one but I might be reserving it for another occasion.

Flying and watching the screen was quite interesting. Having another set of eyes...in the skies...not that my regular set is up there. The additional one was. The flow was much more beautiful than single snapshots.

Landing and finding myself through my other eyes was fun and confusing. One gets used to it, I am sure, but the last approach was by far my most inaccurate play.

So that's it for now. Don't drone while on the drone! Be careful or a curious bird might eat your equipment.

Ah, let me share a piece of music that resonates with my sentiments about the environment from the beginning of the post. It's quite funny. Don't miss it.

Flight Of The Conchords — The Humans Are Dead

Maybe we could avoid that future if we behave like sentient beings. Who knows...

Your fellow sentient,

Manol Donchev