There’s a sweet scene in Star Wars: Clone Wars where Arc Troopers are assaulting a city. Not knowing where the bad droids are, the commander tosses up a floating ball-like camera platform and sends it out on a recon mission. The result is a birds eye view of every nook and cranny where an ambush could happen. A sweet idea that could have great uses in today’s techno efficient military, police surveillance, or even search and rescue. That’s a similar idea behind the Aeryon Scout, fly in the air and give a real time birds eye view via live wireless video feed.

The design is simple. Four rotary propeller engines housed in multi colored foam hoops with a miniaturized camera platform housed underneath. The Aeryon Scout flies along guided by it’s radio control operator into areas where it’s either impossible or too dangerous to get an accurate picture of what lies ahead. The Scout can also fly autonomously via either GPS navigation or courtesy of map-based navigation software. The Scout can reach of ceiling of about 1500 feet, has an operational range of about 3 kilomters and can stay aloft for as long as twenty minutes. In addition to a hi-resolution still and video camera, the Scout’s payload options include a High resolution visible light sensor, Near IR and low-light sensor, Micobolometer (thermal imagery).

But at a whopping price of $30-50,000, it seems that the camera angles aren’t the only thing that’s way outrageously lofty here.

Hat Tip: Gizmo Watch