Various still and video images from July 27, 2019 Inaugural Run Stillwater St Croix Crossing 5K and Half Marathon. The event started at 7AM in Houlton Wisconsin with runners finishing in downtown Stillwater via new St. Croix River Crossings Bridge.
Inaugural Run Stillwater St Croix Crossing 5K Half Marathon
Click on above image to view more Run Stillwater items
Twin Cities Drone Aerial Sunrise Sunset Night Views
This page post is focused on twin cities drone aerial sunrise sunset night views including still photography along with videos. Most of the aerial sunrise sunset night views are from around the twin cities metro area there are a few from around Minnesota, Western Wisconsin and North Dakota.
New for 2021 northside of Stillwater Lift Bridge Lit Up
Hyperlapse time lapse downtown Stillwater Minnesota
Ice Maze From Construction Until Gone
Winter Week In Stillwater Minnesota Aerial Views Aerial Night View Ice Maze Stillwater Zephyr Theatre
Flying unmanned air systems (UAS), also known as unmanned air vehicles (UAV), aka Drones early morning and evening as well as night, has many challenges and opportunities.
The opportunities include capturing sunrise and sunsets from different vantage points in some cases when the air is calmer, clearer, and with fewer clouds. Likewise, there is less traffic (people, vehicles, and birds, or at least sometimes) than in the daytime, and, if configured properly, you can see your aircraft further. On the other hand, challenges include not seeing everything in the dark, other drones in the area that are not properly lit, or authorized to be in the airspace.
A challenge for hobby/recreational flyers who are not looking to go out and take photos and then sell them is getting night access to controlled airspace. For hobby and recreational drone operators whose intent is to go out and capture photos or videos to post and sell or promote, you should get your FAA part 107 certificate and then your daylight waiver. If you are already part 107, take the next step and get a daylight waiver so you can fly at night.
On the other hand, if you are looking to hire or have somebody do night time drone photos or videos, engage with a professional who is FAA Part 107.29 (daylight waiver), as well as MnDOT Aeronautics licensed, registered, insured and experienced. The key for nighttime, early morning, and evening drone flying is mitigating risk, being prepared, flying smart, and safe.
A couple of other tips and reminders include the night is considered the time from 30 minutes after sunset until 30 minutes before sunrise. Maintain situational awareness of your drone’s altitude, direction, where it is, and where it is going while maintaining a visual line of sight (e.g., not staring at your phone). Another tip is to have high visibility lights that can be seen from several miles away. The lights help you see your drone and for others to see it (if they are watching). When you are going to fly at night, or even early morning or evening, get to know the area ahead of time while it is light out, where are trees, powerlines, and other obstacles.
The reason I mention the above is that having an FAA part 107.29 daylight waiver as well as being MnDOT licensed drone operator is to demystify and provide insight into night drone flying. There is something magical about night flying; for those who have done night SCUBA diving, there are some similarities. If you want to know more about night drone operations or how to get your daylight waiver as well as airspace authorizations and related topics, get in touch with us.
Its Sale Time, Black Friday Before and Beyond
It’s here, Our Black Friday, Small Business Saturday, Sunday Savings, Cyber Monday, Townie Tuesday, Wednesday Wall of Savings and, Thank You Thursday sale is going on now. We have stock images from around, on the ground and above the Stillwater, St Croix River Valley, Western Wisconsin, Twin Cities and adjacent areas. Browse, Shop, Buy and enjoy savings of 30% (or more) on Prints, Mounts and Wall Art including Metal prints from Tuesday November 24 through Tuesday December 1, 2020 at our online store (here).
Above, early November fall colors downtown Stillwater Minnesota with call waters of the St Croix river reflections of old and new bridges. Below sunrise downtown St. Paul Minnesota.
Union Pacific Big Boy 4014 Visits Lake Elmo Washington County St Croix Valley. The UP Big Boy is one of if not the largest still operating steam locomotives in the world weighing in at over one million pounds.
Union Pacific Big Boy Visits St Croix Valley
The following video and still images show the Union Pacific Big Boy 4014 visiting Lake Elmo Minnesota in Washington County before crossing the St. Croix River at Hudson continuing on to other destinations in Wisconsin.
Click on above image to view more images of UP Big Boy 4014
Learn more about Steam power and UP Big Boy via the following links
Click on above image to view, shop and buy Fireworks Images & Prints
2023 4th July Fireworks Stillwater MN
2023 February Fireworks Stillwater MN
2022 Twinkle Party Fireworks Stillwater MN
July 4th 2022 Stillwater Fireworks Video
Here are various still and video images the St Croix River valley fireworks including Marone on St. Croix July 3rd and downtown Stillwater 4th of July fireworks. All night time still images and videos were captured by Pictures Over Stillwater under FAA Part 107.29 (daylight waiver) operating procedures (e.g. our Vampire crew, they fly at night).
July 3rd 2021 Hudson Wisconsin Fireworks (Click to buy prints & downloads)
Marine on St. Croix July 3rd
Downtown Stillwater 4th of July
Having an FAA Part 107.29 waiver enables Pictures Over Stillwater to fly 24 hours a day including at night weather permitting. In addition to having additional high-intensity multi-colored strobe lights (red, green, white) visible from 3 miles on our aircraft, Part 107.29 operations also includes having trained visual observers (VOs) as part of our night safety crew as well as keeping aircraft (e.g. dones) within visual line of sight.
In addition to our SmugMug online store, we also have a FineArtAmerica site where you can shop, buy prints, puzzles, wall art and other items.
When in downtown Stillwater, visit our partner Smith + Trade Mercantile where you can buy Pictures Over Stillwater aerial photography postcards among other items.
Proud Member Greater Stillwater Chamber of Commerce
It is 2019 Spring Flood season in the upper Midwest including Minneapolis St. Paul twin cities metro area along with western Wisconsin, eastern Dakotas and elsewhere. In the Minneapolis St. Paul twin cities metro area, there are three major rivers all of which flow into the mighty Mississippi river, not to mention numerous smaller rivers, streams, creeks as well as other runoff.
For the 2019 Spring Flood season, in the Twin Cities metro, western Wisconsin, western as well as southern Minnesota as well as eastern Dakotas, February record-setting snow fall are now melting. Besides record February snow fall, there was a lack of snow cover in the Twin Cities metro and surrounding area in early January to protect against the extreme cold, thus driving frost deeper into the ground.
With frost being four plus feet deep, snowmelt that would normally start to seep into the ground is having to run off elsewhere which results into the area lakes, ponds, creeks, streams, small rivers and ultimately the Mississippi and other large rivers.
Above via Twincities.com image via www.picturesoverstillwater.com
2019 Spring Flood Content
Note that we are FAA Part 107 certified (e.g. commercial drone operator) and MNDoT Aeronautics & Aviation Drone as well as Aerial Photography licensed, and insured, meaning our images as well footage can be used safely for various commercial purposes including by news or other organizations.
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Click Image for video – St Patricks Day Downtown Stillwater St Croix River Before Flood
In addition to our SmugMug online store, we also have a FineArtAmerica site where you can shop, buy prints, puzzles, wall art and other items.
When in downtown Stillwater, visit our partner Smith + Trade Mercantile where you can buy Pictures Over Stillwater aerial photography postcards among other items.
Proud Member Greater Stillwater Chamber of Commerce
The historic Stillwater Lift bridge went under heavy maintenance since it closed to vehicle traffic with the opening of the new St. Croix Crossing Bridge in 2017. Following are various images during the heavy maintenance including when a section of the bridge was removed to allow boats to pass while lift section was down for work.
Recently Tom Becchetti (@tbecchetti) told me about Winter Motorcycle Ice Racing on Lake Martha in Chisago City Minnesota. I had heard of, seen photos and videos of Motorcycles racing on frozen lakes or rivers in the past, however, had not seen in person. Despite being a cold northwesterly wind with light snow, Tom and me decided to meet up at Lake Martha to do some sUAS / sUAV e.g. Drone flying and capture some images of Winter Motorcycle Ice Racing.
Winter Motorcycle Ice Racing Lake Martha Chisago City.
For those not familiar, Chisago City is in Chisago County which is about half hour to 45 minutes north of Stillwater, or, about an hour (or less) to the northeast of downtown Minneapolis St. Paul areas, and just a few miles west of Lindstrom Minnesota. There are many lakes in the area which is also close to the St. Croix River valley to the east. Lake Martha is on the western edge of Chisago City north of Highway 8 and adjacent to The Northern Tavern, or, across the highway to the northwest of Chisago lake among others.
Winter Motorcycle Ice Racing Sights, Sounds, Images and Video
The following are various sights, sounds, images and video from watching Winter Motorcycle Ice Racing on Lake Martha Chisago City.
In addition to our SmugMug online store, we also have a FineArtAmerica site where you can shop, buy prints, puzzles, wall art and other items.
When in downtown Stillwater, visit our partner Smith + Trade Mercantile where you can buy Pictures Over Stillwater aerial photography postcards among other items.
Proud Member Greater Stillwater Chamber of Commerce
Dynamic Fall Weather St. Croix River Inversion Fog Dragon Breath. One of the things I enjoy about living in the Minneapolis St. Paul metropolitan area is the changing weather and seasons, if you don’t like it, wait and will change. That has been the scenario past week or so here the Stillwater St. Croix River valley eastern Minnesota and Western Wisconsin areas. So far in the past week, we have seen highs near 70 lows of freezing frost, clear and windy to wall clouds and tornadoes. We have also seen partly cloudy with calm windows high humidity between rains including inversion fog layers on the St. Croix River.
Some drone-based aerial views above and around Stillwater as well as St. Croix River valley over the past week. These include visits to Stillwater Fire Department open house, Art Fair, fall colors, St. Croix Sailing School High School Regatta in Hudson, new St. Croix Crossing bridge and much more.
From a sUAS or drone flying perspective, strong winds are a challenge and even more so are rain. However, in between those conditions, there have been some great opportunities to go upstairs and gets some different and unique perspective views that past week.
For example, check out the following video that I captured the other evening of inversion fog layer over St. Croix River valley shortly before evening severe storms arrived.
Dynamic fall weather resulted in Layer of Inversion Fog (Dragon Breath) Over St. Croix River flows south under Arcola Soo Line High Bridge towards Stillwater MN.
Some Tips, Recommendations and Reminders
Keep the weather in mind, head in the clouds and feet on the ground meaning watch the sky along with weather, while you are safe on the ground. Weather can change quickly, so be ready, plan ahead, watch forecasts and be prepared. When you contact any airports or air traffic control for the areas you will be flying (e.g. for those in Stillwater area, the downtown riverfront is controlled airspace), ask for conditions at their location to compare with your own local. If you are flying an sUAS or drone, keep your eyes on the aircraft, if using first-person view (FPV) goggles have one or more visual observers (VO).
Pay attention to surface winds along with those aloft, look around where you are going to be flying. Look at flag poles which way they are pointing, the direction of clouds, smoke from chimneys and other indicators. Also, note that winds can vary at the surface as well as a few feet to hundreds of feet up in the air. Another consideration is how the windows can be more turbulent around buildings, bluffs, hills and other structures, something to keep in mind. Note that while your drone may have automation and is fine once up in the air (watch out for fly-away during high winds), the landing may be a challenge. Likewise, not if, rather what happens when your software based automation AI enabled drone stops working and you need to land manually? How will you avoid a crash? The answer is being prepared.
Something I have noticed is that changing weather, the birds can be an indicator of when to land or get out-of-the-way if you are flying FPV mode with no VO, how will you see the birds behind or on your sides? Likewise, keep the aircraft in visual line of sight (e.g. don’t fly beyond where you can see it) so that you can recall quickly before developing weather has an impact. Also if you are using filters, adjust accordingly for example if cloudy try an ND4. Have fun, however, be prepared, be safe.
Short Recap of 2023 15th Annual Withrow Car and Tractor Show Event
2022 Withrow Area Classic Car and Tractor Show
Click On Above Image To View More From Previous Withrow Events
The 2018 Withrow Car Tractor Show was recently held being the 10th annual event. Pictures Over Stillwater was present capturing video and still aerial photography along with other sights as well as sounds of the vent. Withrow Car Tractor Show was co-hosted by Sals Angus Grill and Withrow Ballroom Event Center is a great event located between Stillwater to the east, Grant to the south and Hugo to the west. As a fundraising event, the Withrow Car Tractor Show benefits the Minnesota Military Family Foundation as well as Wishes & More organizations.
If you are not familiar with the event, view the following images and video highlights that included monster truck rides, classic trucks, classic cars, racing cars, classic boat motors, classic trucks, a tractor parade and much more. For those who attended the vent, revisit the sights and sounds of the 2018 Withrow Car Tractor Show.
New Video – Added 10/4/2018
Before and during drone based aerial videos of 2018 (10th annual) Withrow Car and Tractor Show. The event co-located at the Withrow Ballroom Event Center and Sals Angus Grill hosted about 450 classic cars and tractors (plus a few trucks, race cars, boat motors). This event benefits the Minnesota Military Family Foundation and Wishes & More.
Views from 2018 (10th annual) Withrow Car & Tractor Show including parade between Withrow Ballroom & Event Center and Sals Angus Grill. This event is a fundraiser for the Minnesota Military Family Foundation and the Wishes & More organization. Pictures Over Stillwater is a proud participant for this year event providing aerial photography and other views.
