The use of drones for audiovisual purposes poses legislative problems that are currently unsolved.
Immersed in current crises and in the revolution in technological media that affect the audiovisual sector, the appearance of drones as a cheaper option than other traditional ones to include their use in an audiovisual production with specific plans collides frontally with the legal situation of use of these devices.
Following the opinion of the specialist lawyer Jaime Rodríguez Díez , of Diez & Romero Abogados, the pirouette carried out by the State Aviation Safety Agency ( AESA ) when defining the concept (remotely piloted aircraft) marks the way in which they are regulated , under the legal regime of aircraft, therefore prohibiting their professional and commercial civil use. This means that, de facto, the only drones allowed are those for military use and recreational use in the spaces designated for it.
This situation, waiting for a specific regulation, which seems to be developing at present and which would be of imminent approval, is given to avoid cases such as the one that occurred in the United States with Raphael Pirker, an operator who managed to cancel a sanction for using a reckless drone while recording at the University of Virginia. The reason for that victory in the courts was that the use of these devices for these purposes was not expressly prohibited.
How to regulate the use of drones
This regulation means that, as a consequence of it, there is a total paralysis of the industry, which is losing millions of euros invested in these devices and their respective audiovisual material, as well as a multitude of projects and lost jobs .
The problem is that the new regulation that the sector eagerly awaits seems that it will not be very flexible in the requirements for the use of drones for audiovisual projects, since the intention is that they fulfill, among others, the possession of a pilot license for aircraft or helicopter, be registered in the Aircraft Registration Registry, be in possession of the Airworthiness Certificate (for drones with maximum take-off mass greater than 25 Kg) or receive express permission from AESA For each use, which with regard to the possibility of a communicated act, takes part of the flexibility that drones offer when covering unforeseen events or events (news, last hours, specials, etc …) where the reaction time by part of the media is essential.
Therefore, when it comes to having a drone for audiovisual use or purposes, let us first take into account in our production the legal requirements for the use of these devices that, despite the obstacles, are here to stay.
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