Dance of the Nano Drones

Although drones are usually associated with high-tech uses, a trio of crowdfunded entrepreneurs hopes to humanize the use of UAVs through the power of dance.

Dronies is one of many UAV projects currently on offer at the crowdfunding site IndieGoGo.

Marketed as the “most simplified versions of autonomous flyers that do not need external sensors, GPS or even onboard IR/RGB sensors,” a Dronie is a tiny quadcopter that can dance in the air to synchronized music from a smartphone “base station.”

“In essence they are nano-sized flying robots that can air dance to music,” said Ali Raheman, who along with colleagues Frederico Fonseca and David Bell are co-developing the concept drone.

Raheman said the original intent was to design a more serious-minded network of autonomous drones that could carry payloads. The trio realized that they could market drones that would show the fun side of UAVs in an attempt to acclimate society to the presence of pilot-less drones.

“Humanity is destined to share human spaces with civilian drones. It’s imperative that drones operate independent of continuous human supervision and are endowed with decision-making that enables safe collision-free self-navigation through their flight path trajectories from take off to landing, pick up and drop off payloads, flock with peers, and be independent of continuous human supervision.”

The group plans to raise $10,000 to distribute the first iteration of the “world’s first nano-size autonomous Dancing Drones that dance to music, can be choreographed for playing and social sharing with your peers.” If they raise $100,000, Raheman and company will move Dronies into a more elaborate mode in which the tiny drones can entertain audiences with indoor “air dance shows.”

Raheman says the dance-stage of Dronies is a means to a more world-changing end.

“If we exceed $2 million, our stretch goal gets pretty ambitious. We design special versions of Dronies that can flock in formation of 100s/1000s to form recognizable patterns in air such as the peace symbol,” he said.

One could say that all they are saying…is give drone peace a chance.

Check out the IndiGoGO video: