Deaf drone pilot films “Burning Man” festival
[Transcript] A deaf FAA licensed drone pilot from Austin, Julian Moiwai, was one of the few people who was approved to film the latest Burning Man festival in Nevada with a drone. I will show you a reel and a brief interview.
[Description of reel video: The video opens with the words, “Burning Man: Metamorphoses.” It shows a vast desert setting with thousands of attendees walking around, riding on bicycles or strange vehicles illuminated with colorful lights, walking around large sculpture and pieces of art, stunning fireworks displays that pierce the evening sky, and thousands of RVs parked in a vast semicircle “parking lot.”]
JULIAN MOIWAI:
This is my second Burning Man festival. It’s my first one using my drone though and compared to my first year, where I was seeing everything from the ground and all these people packed in front of me. Now having just seeing it through my iPad being fed footage from the drone, it was stunning to me. I was shocked by the sheer size of the Burning Man crowd. All these people looked like ants to me in the video. There was so many people, so the drone had to get really high to actually capture the size of the Burning Man festival. It was really big and really amazing to get to experience that. The challenge for me was the weather. I typically fly my drone early in the morning, around the time before or after the sunrise and the sunset also. That way I’ll be able to keep my drone cool preventing it from overheating. Noon is typically the hottest time of the day so I have to be really careful with the batteries and especially with dust. It gets on everything!
ALEX:
I wonder how long you’ve been flying your drone professionally?
JULIAN MOIWAI:
I’ve been flying these drones since 2017. My very drone that I got was a DJI Phantom 4 Pro. I was pretty clumsy with trying to fly the drone and I remember being unsteady with it, flying it all over the place and not getting ideal footage and framing. About 2 or 3 months after I got the drone, I decided to pursue licensure with FAA Part 107 Remote Pilot license. Before long, I got my first gig with other deaf drone pilots, who were also licensed, at The Villages. What we did was fly our drones at all, actually some, of the golf courses in the area. There were a lot of those and that was to provide virtual tours of these golf courses for interested visitors. It was a great experience for me and that group I started out, Aerial Productions, with Anthony Mowl. That was a great experience and it got me started before I started to do other things like art and wedding gigs. I also do corporate work in filmmaking. Now I really want to expand my portfolio to include, perhaps, real estate. We’ll see!
ALEX:
Thank you for your time, Julian! He explained that the footage he filmed will be a part of the Burning Man media team’s list of references for others who might request drone footage. You can follow him on Instagram @whatjujusaid or check out his website at https://julianmoiwai.com.
*Photo of Julian Moiwai holding drone by Toby Fitch
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Supported by:
Convo [https://convo.click/2mVhM8h]
Gallaudet University: [gallaudet.edu]