 I had never flown a drone before. Honestly, I didn't think I could. Takeoffs and landings are hard to figure out when you're just starting. And that's to say nothing of power lines, trees, and every other obstacle out there. Any one of which would destroy my $1,000 investment in an instant. And that's the biggest reason that, like most people, I don't own a drone. 3D Robotics hears this kind of thing a lot. It's the problem they set out to solve with Solo, the quadcopter drone they're announcing today. And sure enough, the software they built was smart enough to handle anything I threw at it. Even if you crash, Solo won't. Solo is a $1,000 quadcopter designed to capture Hollywood-style movie footage with just a couple taps. It takes off and lands with a button press. The battery, which takes an hour to charge, gets you about 20 minutes in the air. If you have a GoPro attached, either via the basic frame or a separately sold gimbal, you can stream live video to your phone or tablet. The video shows up on the Solo app, which is also where you set up your shots. And because Solo is the first drone to fully integrate with GoPro, you have total access to GoPro's camera controls. That means you can remotely start and stop recordings and change your frame rate and other settings all while you're in the air. It's all possible because of twin Linux computers, one in the drone and one in your controller, that work together to make Solo smarter than your average consumer UAV. The first era of our industry was getting robots to fly. It was super hard, but we got there. The next era was making them easier to fly. More autonomy, more GPS, you know, simpler controls. The next era, I think, is not flying them at all. Making it so that as the product gets more sophisticated, the users can become less sophisticated. Now when you're ready to fly... And I am ready to fly. Okay, this is also ready to fly, apparently. So I'm going to go make sure my settings, I can go to my vehicle settings, I can check which color I want my LED lights to be in case my friends out there flying too. I can check my performance so it's nice and chill right now. Okay, good. What I'm going to do is just like the screen tells me, tap and hold to spin the props. Good. Props are spinning. Press fly to take off. So I have exactly pressed two buttons, right? Armed, and then I press them to take off. Almost everything about flying this drone has been automated. This is a machine that just works, independently of my mistakes. When I need an emergency break, I just hit the pause button, forcing the drone to stop and hover while it waits for my instructions. I had no idea what the buttons and knobs of the controller actually did while I was flying, but thanks to the autopilot, I never really worried that a wrong move on my part would cause a crash. The autopilot is the hard thing of a drone, right? The plastics, the motors, the props, that's not that hard. The brains of the operation, the autopilot, that's what takes years of time to develop. Well, the problem was that it was developed by a team of very accomplished engineers. And for them, like, okay, you just load the list of parameters, you find this weird code name for this parameter and change it from.0023 to.0037 and submit that to the drone and re-upload it and you're gonna feel it flies better. Okay, well that needs to become settings, solo, vehicle, agility, bar, apply, right? And so it was all a matter of taking this foundation of the most advanced autopilot code in the world and then kind of like automating it. But flying isn't the only thing that Solo does automatically. It also sets up your shots for you, controls the gimbal, and smoothly moves the camera to get the shot you want. Using a mode called CableCam, I set a start and end position for the drone in space. The drone can then move back and forth along a virtual cable while the gimbal smoothly tilts up without me even having to touch the controller. Or maybe you'd rather take your next big selfie with a flying machine. So let's go here to GPS flight. Let's hit selfie. That looks good. Press right arrow to start the selfie. And do a selfie from right there. There's this nice pull away, tilt down, reveal. It's a dramatic selfie. So it gets to the end. Now it's going to automatically turn right back around. I can click this little record button so I can record this right here in the app. There it is, swooping in on us. Swooping in. Wow. I'm not afraid of you. We want to be part of what I think is the golden age of storytelling. And as you know, people have insatiable appetite for telling their own story. The only thing you're missing is perspective. One thing you can't do is go beyond arm's length. There's a selfie stick so you can go slightly beyond arm's length. And basically, we've been telling our own story within the limits of our reach. If Hollywood was telling your story, they'd go beyond the limits of your reach. The idea is that rather than you being behind the camera, rather than you being the director, maybe you should be the actor. And that's really 3DR's bet that they can create the best drone platform, not just for drone pilots and filmmakers, but for anyone who wants to capture aerial footage of themselves with a GoPro. It's easy to imagine taking a solo with me on a hike, putting it in the air, letting it follow me around and getting some cool footage of me. And the most important thing is I can just kind of forget it's up there. I can focus on my feet so I wouldn't trip like I did earlier in the day. Competition in the drone market is getting more intense. DJI just announced the Phantom 3, the latest in a line of products that has defined what a drone looks like in the popular imagination. How big of a moment is this for 3DR? Like based on what I've read, you guys are sort of like third place in sales right now. Is there a sense that you're sort of the underdog at this moment? Absolutely. Yeah, I mean we are a player, but we are the underdog player, right? And you know, how big of a defining moment it is, I mean it is the moment. I don't think that many people in the world know who 3DR is, right? An order of magnitude less than our bigger competitors out there. And I think that's all going to change very soon.
 I had never flown a drone before.
 Honestly, I didn't think I could.
 Takeoffs and landings are hard to figure out when you're just starting.
 And that's to say nothing of power lines, trees, and every other obstacle out there.
 Any one of which would destroy my $1,000 investment in an instant.
 And that's the biggest reason that, like most people, I don't own a drone.
 3D Robotics hears this kind of thing a lot.
 It's the problem they set out to solve with Solo, the quadcopter drone they're announcing
 today.
 And sure enough, the software they built was smart enough to handle anything I threw at
 it.
 Even if you crash, Solo won't.
 Solo is a $1,000 quadcopter designed to capture Hollywood-style movie footage with just a couple
 taps.
 It takes off and lands with a button press.
 The battery, which takes an hour to charge, gets you about 20 minutes in the air.
 If you have a GoPro attached, either via the basic frame or a separately sold gimbal, you
 can stream live video to your phone or tablet.
 The video shows up on the Solo app, which is also where you set up your shots.
 And because Solo is the first drone to fully integrate with GoPro, you have total access
 to GoPro's camera controls.
 That means you can remotely start and stop recordings and change your frame rate and
 other settings all while you're in the air.
 It's all possible because of twin Linux computers, one in the drone and one in your controller,
 that work together to make Solo smarter than your average consumer UAV.
 The first era of our industry was getting robots to fly.
 It was super hard, but we got there.
 The next era was making them easier to fly.
 More autonomy, more GPS, you know, simpler controls.
 The next era, I think, is not flying them at all.
 Making it so that as the product gets more sophisticated, the users can become less sophisticated.
 Now when you're ready to fly...
 And I am ready to fly.
 Okay, this is also ready to fly, apparently.
 So I'm going to go make sure my settings, I can go to my vehicle settings, I can check
 which color I want my LED lights to be in case my friends out there flying too.
 I can check my performance so it's nice and chill right now.
 Okay, good.
 What I'm going to do is just like the screen tells me, tap and hold to spin the props.
 Good.
 Props are spinning.
 Press fly to take off.
 So I have exactly pressed two buttons, right?
 Armed, and then I press them to take off.
 Almost everything about flying this drone has been automated.
 This is a machine that just works, independently of my mistakes.
 When I need an emergency break, I just hit the pause button, forcing the drone to stop
 and hover while it waits for my instructions.
 I had no idea what the buttons and knobs of the controller actually did while I was flying,
 but thanks to the autopilot, I never really worried that a wrong move on my part would
 cause a crash.
 The autopilot is the hard thing of a drone, right?
 The plastics, the motors, the props, that's not that hard.
 The brains of the operation, the autopilot, that's what takes years of time to develop.
 Well, the problem was that it was developed by a team of very accomplished engineers.
 And for them, like, okay, you just load the list of parameters, you find this weird code
 name for this parameter and change it from.0023 to.0037 and submit that to the drone
 and re-upload it and you're gonna feel it flies better.
 Okay, well that needs to become settings, solo, vehicle, agility, bar, apply, right?
 And so it was all a matter of taking this foundation of the most advanced autopilot
 code in the world and then kind of like automating it.
 But flying isn't the only thing that Solo does automatically.
 It also sets up your shots for you, controls the gimbal, and smoothly moves the camera
 to get the shot you want.
 Using a mode called CableCam, I set a start and end position for the drone in space.
 The drone can then move back and forth along a virtual cable while the gimbal smoothly
 tilts up without me even having to touch the controller.
 Or maybe you'd rather take your next big selfie with a flying machine.
 So let's go here to GPS flight.
 Let's hit selfie.
 That looks good.
 Press right arrow to start the selfie.
 And do a selfie from right there.
 There's this nice pull away, tilt down, reveal.
 It's a dramatic selfie.
 So it gets to the end.
 Now it's going to automatically turn right back around.
 I can click this little record button so I can record this right here in the app.
 There it is, swooping in on us.
 Swooping in.
 Wow.
 I'm not afraid of you.
 We want to be part of what I think is the golden age of storytelling.
 And as you know, people have insatiable appetite for telling their own story.
 The only thing you're missing is perspective.
 One thing you can't do is go beyond arm's length.
 There's a selfie stick so you can go slightly beyond arm's length.
 And basically, we've been telling our own story within the limits of our reach.
 If Hollywood was telling your story, they'd go beyond the limits of your reach.
 The idea is that rather than you being behind the camera, rather than you being the director,
 maybe you should be the actor.
 And that's really 3DR's bet that they can create the best drone platform, not just for
 drone pilots and filmmakers, but for anyone who wants to capture aerial footage of themselves
 with a GoPro.
 It's easy to imagine taking a solo with me on a hike, putting it in the air, letting
 it follow me around and getting some cool footage of me.
 And the most important thing is I can just kind of forget it's up there.
 I can focus on my feet so I wouldn't trip like I did earlier in the day.
 Competition in the drone market is getting more intense.
 DJI just announced the Phantom 3, the latest in a line of products that has defined what
 a drone looks like in the popular imagination.
 How big of a moment is this for 3DR?
 Like based on what I've read, you guys are sort of like third place in sales right now.
 Is there a sense that you're sort of the underdog at this moment?
 Absolutely.
 Yeah, I mean we are a player, but we are the underdog player, right?
 And you know, how big of a defining moment it is, I mean it is the moment.
 I don't think that many people in the world know who 3DR is, right?
 An order of magnitude less than our bigger competitors out there.
 And I think that's all going to change very soon.