been seeing ads for a few of these platforms that basically connect drone pilots with clients who need one-off jobs. dronebase or whatever they're called now, there's a few others too. the concept makes sense to me but i keep hearing from people that the pay is pretty low and you're basically competing with everyone in your area which drives prices down.

i did one job through one of them a while back, it was a real estate shoot and they paid like 80 bucks for it. took me two hours including drive time, editing, upload, all of it. felt pretty bad honestly. but i know some people swear by them as a way to build a portfolio and get reps in when you're starting out. just wondering what the current situation is like because i feel like the market for this stuff has shifted a lot even in the past year.

yeah those platforms are basically a race to the bottom at this point, at least for the standard real estate stuff. $80-120 for a full shoot is just not sustainable if you're trying to make actual money. i used dronebase pretty heavily when i was starting out and it was fine for getting comfortable with client communication and deliverables but i made a conscious decision to stop using it once i had enough of a portfolio to go direct.

the better move imo is to use those early low-pay gigs to get testimonials and sample work and then approach agencies and brokerages directly. even offering a first shoot at a discount directly is better than going through a platform because at least you own that client relationship. some of those platforms also have weird clauses about exclusivity for certain regions so worth reading the fine print before you commit to anything.

wait which platforms are you talking about exactly? im just getting started and trying to figure out where to even find work so any names would help. also does it matter what drone you have for these gigs or do they not care as long as you have 107