Plan it. File it. Shoot it.Plan it. File it. Shoot it.

New in September

Before take-off.

What the studio checks about your shoot before you fly, layer by layer: every fact with its source and its date, and what it does not know, said out loud. It advises; the last word belongs to the authority and its official viewers.

During the beta everything is open, on every plan. When the beta ends, each feature stays in the plan its label names.

The shoot’s traffic lightNine layers in one status, each with its source and its date.The shoot and the flight in 3DTerrain, buildings and UAS zones with their name and band, at your height.Visible trafficExperimentalAircraft with ADS-B, and gliders and paragliders with FLARM.Weather aloftChoose the model; wind aloft, shear and density altitude.The light of the shootGolden and blue hours, sun and shadows in your window.GNSS satellitesGPS, Galileo, GLONASS and BeiDou, hour by hour, with their DOP.Mobile coverageThe ministry’s official map, centred on your point.

The shoot’s traffic light

Nine layers in one status, each with its source and its date.

What it does

Brings together in one status what our sources say about your shoot: paperwork, UAS zones and controlled airspace, the NOTAMs that reach your time window, protected areas, weather, geomagnetic activity and satellites. It adds the distances from buildings that Spanish rules set for each assigned aircraft (with the Cadastre’s footprints), the populated areas that count for the A3 subcategory and the infrastructure zones ENAIRE publishes.

What it does not do

It does not grant permission to fly. If a layer could not be checked, it says so and does not count it as clear. Critical infrastructure is not public and is not in our sources; the courtyards and recreation areas the rules also protect are not in the Cadastre.

Which plan

• Traffic lightGratis
• Distances from buildings, A3 and infrastructureGratis
• NOTAMsGratis

Sources

ENAIRE · MITECO · Cadastre · NOAA · Open-Meteo · CelesTrak

The shoot and the flight in 3D

Terrain, buildings and UAS zones with their name and band, at your height.

What it does

A 3 km square around the take-off point: terrain, buildings, ENAIRE’s UAS zones named with the band they publish (the ones that hold the take-off point, stated over the map), your operation at its planned height and the sun at the time of the shoot. In the analysis of an imported flight, the track over that scene and a height profile that says between which minutes the aircraft was inside each zone’s outline and on which side of its band.

What it does not do

It is a visual reconstruction, not a measurement: a building’s height is an estimate from its floors, and a limit above sea level is placed using the terrain. Whether a zone reaches your height is still stated by the operations map. It is not loaded on a phone: the same facts arrive as text.

Which plan

• The shoot in 3DGratis
• The flight in 3DFrom Piloto
• Cadastre heightsFrom Piloto

Sources

ENAIRE · OpenStreetMap · Cadastre · Terrain Tiles (EU-DEM)

Visible trafficExperimental

Aircraft with ADS-B, and gliders and paragliders with FLARM.

What it does

The aircraft that broadcast their position within 15 km of the shoot and below 10,000 ft: ADS-B through adsb.lol, and FLARM or FANET (gliders, paragliders, hang gliders) through the Open Glider Network. It refreshes every 10 seconds, only while the layer is switched on.

What it does not do

It is situational awareness, never separation: many aircraft do not broadcast their position or no receiver hears them. The altitude is the pressure altitude or the device’s own GNSS, not the height above your drone. No registrations or call signs, and nothing is stored.

Which plan

• Visible trafficGratis

Sources

adsb.lol (ODbL) · Open Glider Network (ODbL)

Weather aloft

Choose the model; wind aloft, shear and density altitude.

What it does

Choose the forecast model and see, hour by hour, the wind at the published level just above your maximum height, the shear against the wind at 10 m and the density altitude. The judgement on the shoot’s window stays on every plan.

What it does not do

The thresholds are generic multirotor ones, not your aircraft’s, and the shear warning from 5 m/s is a threshold of ours. Density altitude is information: it is not judged. If a model does not publish a column, that is said rather than taken as fine.

Which plan

• Forecast, judgement, wind aloft and shearGratis
• Model choice, density altitude and AEMETFrom Piloto

Sources

Open-Meteo (ECMWF and other models)

The light of the shoot

Golden and blue hours, sun and shadows in your window.

What it does

Civil dawn and the end of civil dusk, sunrise and sunset, the golden and blue hours, and for every quarter of an hour of your window the sun’s elevation and azimuth, with where the shadow falls and how many times the height it measures. An astronomical calculation, for any date.

What it does not do

It does not count terrain or buildings on the horizon. It informs and does not decide: whether the flight is at night is for you to mark.

Which plan

• Light of the shootGratis

Sources

NOAA astronomical calculation (Meeus)

GNSS satellites

GPS, Galileo, GLONASS and BeiDou, hour by hour, with their DOP.

What it does

How many satellites of the four constellations stay above the elevation mask at your point, hour by hour, and what their geometry is like (PDOP, HDOP and VDOP). With the surrounding terrain, also the ones the mountains hide.

What it does not do

It counts satellites by their orbit, not by their signal: it does not measure interference, jammers or reflections, and we do not know which systems your aircraft tracks. The PDOP 6 threshold is ours, not a regulatory one.

Which plan

• Open skyGratis
• With terrainFrom Piloto

Sources

CelesTrak (GP orbits) · Copernicus GLO-90

Mobile coverage

The ministry’s official map, centred on your point.

What it does

If you need a network at the point (RTK, live streaming, telemetry or downloads), you note it on the shoot and we remind you on its record, on the field checklist and in the flight manual, with the link to the official 5G and 4G map centred on your coordinates.

What it does not do

It is the coverage the operators declare, on the ground and outdoors: it is not a measurement and says nothing about the signal at height. We do not store its data: the ministry’s viewer opens.

Which plan

• Link to the official mapGratis

Sources

Ministry for Digital Transformation · data as at 30 Jun 2024

Real screens of the studio, in Spanish, over demonstration shoots at public places: the Magdalena peninsula (Santander) and the Casa de Campo (Madrid); the 3D, over a demonstration flight at Cuchía (Miengo), with the real ENAIRE zones. The traffic is drawn over a recorded adsb.lol response.

The LOWLEVEL app

LOWLEVEL on your phone and on your iPad

It installs on iPhone, iPad and Android and links to your studio with a code the studio issues: no second password. What you check in the field is read on the phone; creating and editing stay in the browser.

The day, before you set off

Today’s shoot with its checklist, the documents that expire soonest and anything this phone still has to send. Lines you tick with no signal are saved on the phone and sent automatically when the connection comes back.

“Fly here”, wherever you are

ENAIRE’s UAS zones at the phone’s own position, what each one requires in its own words, the forecast for the hour, aerodromes and protected areas. Every reading carries its date, and ENAIRE’s own viewer still has the final word.

The walk to a spot

You record the walk from where you park, with the phone in your pocket and the screen off. When you stop, the route is uploaded to the spot’s card for whoever comes next.