News
At the start of 2023, we developed multiple software modules.
Bezienswaardigheden van boven, admin module
In 2022, Valkyrie Video Productions created an inventory of interesting tourist points within the municipality of West-Betuwe. These points were then filmed with a drone and can be found on the website Bezienswaardigheden van boven.
All information on these tourist points is stored within our database. The database can easily be adapted with our admin module. Since we are working with Mapbox there is no limit to the number of tourist points we can input into our database.
DroneSora will be our tool to easily calculate a SORA. This can be done with the rules of SORA 2.0, but also with the rules of SORA 2.5. This last version will officially be approved at the end of 2023, however, given the lead time of a specific permit application, we also recommend drawing up the SORA according to v2.5. The DroneSora application works very simply. At the start, a number of questions are asked, and based on that the tool calculates the entire SORA. If the result is not what you expected, simply change one or more answers and calculate it again. The result can be exported to a Word document so that they can easily be modified.
Due to the growing number of applications, the need came to address security at login. A Single Sign On / oAuth 2.0 server has been installed and more and more applications are continuously being linked to it. The advantage is that you only have to log in once to switch between multiple applications. Ultimately, applications will call each other through API calls and share data.
February 2023 - Holding the Drones again receives multiple SBB recognitions.
7th of February 2023 CREBO 25297 "Technicus engineering", level 4
20th of February 2023 CREBO 26041 "Vakexpert Geo, Data & Design", level 4
December 2022 - Drone2Go Sprint 17
This sprint revolves around failsafes for drones. These can be separated into hardware and software.
Hardware:
Floating drone
The assignment was to design a drone that could land on water in an emergency, float for a while and preferably take off again. Despite the weather conditions (it was freezing) we succeeded in a simple way. See the video below.
Redundant drone
The assignment was to design a drone in such a redundant way that almost all parts are allowed to fail (to a certain extent, of course) without causing any danger. The drone had: 8 motors, double 4in1 ECS, two batteries, and redundant transmitters). Only the flight computer and the GNSS receiver were carried out singly. Below you can see the video where a wing is removed from an engine each time.
Means to limit impact
Flying a heavy drone above buildings or people remains a scary idea. To eliminate this, we have attached an impact limiter to the drone. A parachute. If certain values are exceeded (height drop or angle exceedance) the motors stop and the parachute pops out of its tube. The drone then lands acceptably softly. In our test, the drone was still completely intact even though it fell from a height of 80 meters. See the video below.
Software:
Safe flying starts with good administration. It is important to keep track of the use of each drone and drone component. Propellers and batteries in particular are critical factors for a safe flight. In 2023 we will write the supporting software for this.
Preparing for a flight is also important. This concerns the checklist for a considerable time before and the checklist just before the flight. We also hope to have this software ready in the second half of 2023. An important part of the flight preparation is the static deconfliction. See the news item further down.
During the flight, the pilot can use our DroneRadar24 website. You can find that article below.
In 2022, a lot of energy has been put into DroneRadar24. This is a website where as much current information as possible can be found about flying objects (currently still in bèta). The website has several target groups.
Interested in what's flying in the sky
Qualified authority to find out details of UAV (not possible for 1)
Drone pilots/operators to monitor manned aviation and other drones
General Aviation pilots to see where drones are flying
There will be a specific user interface for each target group. These are still being developed.
November 2022 - Holding the Drones expands.
Our workforce has been expanded by three employees. There is so much programming work to do that three new employees have come to work in the ICT department. Have fun programming in this challenging environment, Michael, Zhane, and Niels.
Drotics can perform drone shows with various objects attached to the drones. Not just light shows, because in July 2022 we provided the opening act of the European Baseball Championship 2022 in Enschede. For this, we have adapted our show drones in such a way that a large flag could be hung underneath. For each participating country, a drone flew with the country flag to the position on the playing field. Finally, a drone flew the game ball to the pitcher's plate. See the video below.
Progress in the field of UTM software was not halted either. Software has been written for static deconfliction. This means that you can enter the coordinates of your flight, and the software will calculate exactly how you must fly in order not to collide with static objects (buildings, trees, lanterns, etc.), but also taking into account restricted flight zones (N2000, no. fly zones, low fly zones, and routes, etc). The software returns a detailed set of coordinates that can be uploaded into the drone. These coordinates can also be used in our UTM software to reserve airspace.
Valkyrie Video Productions was founded to visualize our drone shows from the air. But that's not all. We can be hired for all kinds of drone video recordings (fruit cultivation, brokerage, company events, etc.). In June 2021 and 2022 we visualized the "Battle of the Boats" (a boat race between secondary schools in the Rivierenland region) with a drone.
We have developed our drone hotel to put drones in places in the country that are ready to go at any time. This is a drone box that can accommodate rescue drones (police, public water management, AED drone, etc.), but it is also a place for drones to charge or spend the night for a period. Unfortunately, there is no UAV charging standard yet, so they need to be made hardware capable. A module is available for a number of UAVs. Our drone hotels also form the basis of an advanced reception and positioning network. All drone hotels can be controlled and monitored completely (in a super safe way) via the internet.
DroneHotel prototype 2022
February 2022 - New employee in the IT department
Within Holding the Drones there was a need for a Technical IT employee. Someone who can make the link between hardware and software. We found this in Victor. His first assignment is to fully automate the DroneHotel to be built.
January - February 2022 - Holding the Drones receives multiple SBB recognitions
12th of January 2022 CREBO 25199 "Media manager", level 4
3rd of February 2022 CREBO 25343 "Engineer Elektrotechnical systems", level 4
To promote our Drotics drone show activities, we had a promotional video made.
Drotics first outdoor droneshow
August 2021 - Drone2Go Sprint 10
For this sprint we designed our first automatic/AI-controlled drone, to recognize the names of boats and then make a 360 shot (Drone2Go). During the flight, a Rijkswaterstaat employee could watch in real time and assess the images simultaneously. After the flight, the photos and images are transferred in 4K to our image cloud so that they can be requested later.
Holding the Drones, AI drone with stereo-vision camera, powerful onboard NPU processor, 4K camera and 4G connection.
March 2021 - Drone2Go Sprint 7
Holding the Drones is participating in Drone2Go for the first time. This is a test trajectory of the joint emergency services under the leadership of Rijkswaterstaat. It is part of Dutch Mobility Innovations (DMI).
In Sprint 7, the intention was that a drone automatically flew to a certain incident point and streamed a video of the incident to a Rijkswaterstaat employee. This enabled the employee to immediately gain insight into the incident and take action. Below you will find the video of our solution.
January 2021 - Holding the Drones is a member of the NEN standards committee for Drones
If you develop something, you better do it according to the standards right away. That is why Holding the Drones has become a member of the standards committee for drones of the Dutch Standardization Institute (NEN).
We are one of the active members in European (prEN / CEN) and international (ISO) UAV standards, which gives us influence in the development of the standards. In addition, we are the first to be informed of developments.
Below is the European list of CEN working groups and topics:
prEN 4709-001, Product requirements and verification *
prEN 4709-002, Direct Remote identification
prEN 4709-003, Geo-awareness requirements
prEN 4709-004, Lighting requirements
prEN 4709-005, General product requirements for different UAS classes operating under declaration **
prEN 4709-006, Means to Terminate Flight, requirements and verification
prEN 4709-007, Technical specification and verification methods for the accessories kits to transform class C3 UA into class C5 UA
prEN 4709-008, Verification method for the Geo-caging function
* Open category (C0 up until C4) / ** Specific category (C5 and C6)
In 2020 and the spring of 2021, aside from Corona, we worked very hard on our first outdoor drone show. There was a lot to research. Among other things:
Showdrone
frame
motors and ESC
flight controller
GNSS (GPS)
control hardware
controllable lamp
Ground equipment
real-time transmitter system
operating system
show control software
In this period so much knowledge and experience have been gained with hardware that we can say that we have become quite an expert. We also learned a lot in terms of software. During this period the following has been achieved:
control a DJI Mavic Air drone with its own software using the Windows SDK
control a MAVLINK controllable drone through a browser
first attempt U-space U1 software
October 2020 - Holding the Drones receives SBB recognition for apprenticeship for Software Developer Level 4
As of October 14, 2020, Holding the Drones is a recognized apprenticeship for CREBO 25604 "Software developer", level 4.
The Amsterdam Drone Week started on December 4, 2019 for the second edition. Of course we visited them too.
On the 17th of October 2019, we were invited to Eurocontrol in Brussels to attend the final presentation of SESAR PODIUM. That was our first real contact with UTM/U-space. Soon after, UTMEurope was started.
For the rest of 2018 and 2019 we have been busy making a first version of a show drone, writing the connection software, and, using Blender, the show software. Due to permits, the first drone show was held indoors.
Busy programming. The drone show is just a few weeks away.
Group photo with the modified indoor drones. Below the YouTube video of Drotics' indoor drone show.
Holding the Drones was founded in 2018 and originates from Alien Automatisering. In early 2018, we became fascinated with Intel's drone shows. In mid-August 2018, Intel held a drone show above the IJ in Amsterdam, which our team went to. From this came "Drotics droneshows", now part of Holding The Drones.
