This page describes the radio control transmitter that I re-packaged, to make it smaller and more portable, and more suitable for kite aerial photography (KAP).

Kite aerial photography (KAP) is a form of aerial photography, where a camera is suspended from a kite line to allow aerial photos to be taken, with the camera either being triggered by an intervalometer, or controlled and triggered via radio control. My KAP camera rig uses a 6-channel radio control transmitter and receiver to control the camera, allowing me to rotate and tilt the camera while it is airborne. Depending on which camera I use, I can also remotely trigger the camera shutter.

Read my Introduction to Kite Aerial Photography guest post on DIYP for more information on the how and why of KAP, and have a look through some of my KAP photos.



As I have taken my KAP gear on a couple of domestic and international business trips, I wanted to make it more portable. The transmitter is quite bulky, and the protruding joysticks don't make it easy to pack. Some of the re-packaged KAP transmitters posted on the KAP forums provided inspiration and ideas, including:

• 2.4 GHz transmitter goes to the chop shop
• Dave's Chopped Spektrum
• Customized Turborix
• custom Arduino KAP transmitter (more details in this forum thread)
• forum thread with various completed results

My primary aim for re-packaging the transmitter was to make it smaller and lighter, and thus more portable. A secondary aim was to make it easier to operate one-handed.

To achieve this, I decided to:

• use 8 x AAA batteries instead of 8 x AA batteries
• custom-build a smaller case
• use a removable antenna
• remove un-used circuitry and controls

DIY Photography has published a guest post by myself, which takes an introductory look at kite aerial photography (KAP).

The DIY Photography website is a great resource for information on DIY light modifiers, building a home studio, as well as various photography techniques and camera hacks.
The DIYP site is run by Udi Tirosh, a professional photographer. He emailed me some time ago, asking if I was interested in writing a guest post about KAP, so I jumped at the chance.

Head over to DIYP to read my Introduction to Kite Aerial Photography guest post.

KAP self-portrait

Southern River, Western Australia
Canon PowerShot G5 @7mm, 1/1600 sec, f/4