Course Flyovers

[lobthewedge]

My brother in law is a professional photographer and is considering getting a licence to use a camera drone. As an addition to his 'bread and butter' jobs he was looking at approaching golf clubs to produce hole by hole flyovers to be available on club websites.

He is not a golfer, never set foot on a golf course, so is looking for a club/course to use as a guinea pig to see what kind of footage he can get and also get an idea of how much it would cost him to produce in terms of time and editing etc.

Do the good people of forumland think this is feasible, have any of you any experience of this and am interested to know what those of you involved in the running of clubs would pay for something like this?

Cheers

 

[drew83]

I know there are sites that offer this already. Swing by Swing is one.

Also, clubs have the course guides that offer a drawing of the holes, but some do have photographic images in their books.

I don't see any reason why clubs would not want this service, but it's possible he may be a little late to the party. It may well be that some courses, through maturity or groundwork have changed & they would like to get updated pictures so it is always worth a try.

 

[MendieGK]

our 2nd course has had it done - http://www.theplayersgolfclub.com/

Personally i think its a bit gimmicky - 'what does it add?' is the question i would be asking myself. Golf course websites arent the greatest of things anyway, so i doubt their would be much money floating around to get something like this done.

 

[fundy]

our 2nd course has had it done - http://www.theplayersgolfclub.com/

Personally i think its a bit gimmicky - 'what does it add?' is the question i would be asking myself. Golf course websites arent the greatest of things anyway, so i doubt their would be much money floating around to get something like this done.

Disagree Sam, done well they give an excellent perception of a course youre heading to play that you havent before.

Friend of mine has the sort of business set up you are talking about, he did a few holes at our course as a test.

Where I do agree with Sam is not sure how many clubs will be willing to pay much for this (expect you'll only be aiming at the top 10-15% of clubs)

 

[drew83]

I reckon it's going to be a simple case of firing off a number of emails to clubs nearby, explain the service offered & simply ask if they would be interested.

As it will be a sideline anyway & not a make or break product, even a 10% hit rate would be worth it! As long as costs are covered per "shoot" and not making a loss.

 

[garyinderry]

Not only are they useful for course videos but also give a photographer a perspective he cannot achieve for photos without one.

Certainly an investment worth making īmo.

 

[Rooter]

My home course has had it, i think its an excellent idea if you are trying to attract visitor green fees.

http://www.youtube.com/embed/Qp_Lke_-c68?rel=0

 

[Canary_Yellow]

I think it will appeal to the more commerical golf courses out there rather than the members clubs.

I'd get in touch with the ones local to you in the first instance.

 

[MendieGK]

My home course has had it, i think its an excellent idea if you are trying to attract visitor green fees.http://www.youtube.com/embed/Qp_Lke_-c68?rel=0

Thats really well done, the bloke looks a bit like Tommy Fleetwood too!

 

[rksquire]

Think it's great, play in a monthly society and in preparation try to find out a bit about the course - it's surprising how poor the quality of course information there is out there (there are exceptions obviously).

 

[duncan mackie]

I agree with the recurrent theme of the responses in general - such things need to be done well; at which point they are both useful to visitors and valuable to the clubs.

of course, to do it well you need the weather and the course condition on your side

 

[ADB]

Rooter's course looks really good, like that flyover. What I find poor are the computer generated image ones....having just looked at the Old Thorns website it really doesn't capture the course IMO.

 

[drew83]

what would be good (& I doubt this will be possible) would be a better idea of topography. is it hilly? is there a big dip/mound to manoeuvre around? etc

 

[Keeno]

My brother in law is a professional photographer and is considering getting a licence to use a camera drone. As an addition to his 'bread and butter' jobs he was looking at approaching golf clubs to produce hole by hole flyovers to be available on club websites.

He is not a golfer, never set foot on a golf course, so is looking for a club/course to use as a guinea pig to see what kind of footage he can get and also get an idea of how much it would cost him to produce in terms of time and editing etc.

Do the good people of forumland think this is feasible, have any of you any experience of this and am interested to know what those of you involved in the running of clubs would pay for something like this?

Cheers

I think any golf course which is trying to sell itself should get one done, depending on the cost obviously.

The first thing anyone does when looking at a course is check out the website for pics. I know ours uses very poor pictures and it doesn't look like a good course at all tbh.

I found a flyover for Playsport in EK on Youtube and the course looks tremendous.

 

[MadAdey]

I think it is a great idea, if clubs area willing to pay what your friends would charge for this. In this day and age we all want to see a course before booking a round there, but it is amazing how many websites show nothing but a couple of pics and the scorecard. I've not gone to courses before just because the website didn't really sell the course.

Get your local course to let him do them a freebie so he can have a go at doing one and see how long it takes. It's better to have a really good one done to send to other clubs so they can see see at they would be getting.

 

[HomerJSimpson]

Surely it'll be worth getting some idea of whether clubs are interested in the service before buying the drone. Seems a big investment if there won't be a way of recouping the money. A few emails, and maybe an advert (no idea of costs) in somewhere like Golf Club News etc would be the simplest way to start in my opinion

 

[Fish]

I wouldn't want my club to do it personally, it would be saying to me that they are attempting to attract more visitors, I'd rather the investment put into better course maintenance like bunker renovation or a greens upgrade (USGA).

Its OK for those courses that expect and need a larger footfall of visitors but not at mine thank you...

 

[Rooter]

Thats really well done, the bloke looks a bit like Tommy Fleetwood too!

Thats James, he is a good lad playing a bit in various UK tours this year, +3 i think...

 

[Rooter]

I wouldn't want my club to do it personally, it would be saying to me that they are attempting to attract more visitors, I'd rather the investment put into better course maintenance like bunker renovation or a greens upgrade (USGA).

Its OK for those courses that expect and need a larger footfall of visitors but not at mine thank you...

Then how do they attract new members? My club is a members course, yes visitors and societies help with profits, I think anyway the guy doing the video was new and it was his first one, so did it for free iirc. was a few years ago i think.

 

[Fish]

Then how do they attract new members? My club is a members course, yes visitors and societies help with profits, I think anyway the guy doing the video was new and it was his first one, so did it for free iirc. was a few years ago i think.

Quality of the course & set-up seen and experienced by playing it, anyone who lives in the area knows it quality and if considering membership the club will offer courtesy of the course, they don't need to watch a video! A flyover video is for reaching to those much further away who wouldn't be members so its solely to obtain revenue by attracting societies, so as I said, no thank you.