A Multidrone Approach for Autonomous Cinematography Planning

This paper proposes a multidrone approach for autonomous cinematography planning. The use of drones for aerial cinematography is becoming a trend. Therefore, the aerial cinematography opens a new field of application for autonomous platforms that need to develop intelligent capabilities. This becomes even more challenging if a team of multiple drones are considered for cooperation. This paper introduces the novel application of planning for cinematography, including the challenges involved and the current state of the art. Then, it proposes a first version of an architecture for cooperative planning in cinematography applications, like filming sport events outdoors. The main features for this architecture are the following. The system should be able to reproduce typical shots from cinematography rules autonomously, shooting static and mobile targets. It should also ensure smooth transitions along the shots, implementing collision avoidance and being aware of no-fly zones, security and emergency situations. Finally, it should take into account the limited resources of the drones (e.g. battery life).