A drone video brief is a one-page document that tells a pilot or production company what the footage is for, where and when it will be shot, which shots you need, what files you expect back and what you can spend. Send the same page to every vendor and the quotes come back comparable, because everyone priced the same job. The template below has ten parts, and a completed example follows it.
Most disappointing drone shoots start with a request like “we need some drone footage of the property.” Each vendor fills in the blanks differently. One quotes an hour of stills, another quotes a two-day production, and you have no way to tell which price is fair.
What a drone brief does, and when you can skip it
A brief does three jobs. It gets you quotes you can compare line by line. It forces decisions inside your own team, such as where the video will run, before you pay for a shoot day. And it becomes the checklist you hold the delivery against.
You do not always need one. For a single home listing or a few roof photos, a short email with the address, the date and the number of photos is enough. Write the full page when the job includes an edited video, more than one location, a site open to the public, or footage that will run in paid advertising.
Start with the goal and where the footage will run
Write the goal as one sentence about the viewer: who should do what after watching. “Show meeting planners that the ballroom and the lakefront lawn work together for a 300-person event” gives a pilot something to shoot toward. “Make a cool video” does not.
Then list every place the footage will appear. A website header loop is horizontal, silent and short. A Reel or TikTok is vertical. Paid advertising changes the usage license. If vertical video matters, say so here, because a pilot frames differently when the shot has to survive a vertical crop.
Location, access and the date window
Give the exact street address of every location, not a neighborhood. Under FAA Part 107, flights in controlled airspace around many airports need FAA authorization before takeoff, and a site on park or other public land may need its own permit. A vendor who has the address can check all of that before quoting.
Add who has approved the shoot, who the on-site contact will be, and where a drone can take off and land. Our guide to preparing a property for a drone shoot covers the site prep itself.
For timing, give a window instead of a single day, plus any fixed deadline for the finished files. Three things need the room.
- Weather. Part 107 requires at least 3 statute miles of visibility and set distances from clouds, and rain or strong wind grounds most aircraft.
- Flight restrictions. According to the FAA, drones are prohibited around stadiums from one hour before to one hour after Major League Baseball, NFL and NCAA Division I football games and certain motor races. The FAA notice sets the area at a three nautical mile radius around stadiums seating 30,000 or more, so a property near one loses game days.
- Light. Say whether you want morning, late afternoon or dusk. Part 107 requires anti-collision lighting on the drone during civil twilight, so a dusk shot is a planned flight, not an extra.
Write the shot list in plain language
You do not need film vocabulary. These six names cover most of what clients ask for.
| Shot | What the drone does |
|---|---|
| Reveal | Rises over or slides past a foreground object, such as a tree line, to uncover the subject. A common opening shot. |
| Orbit | Circles the subject at a steady distance with the camera locked on it |
| Top-down | Points the camera straight down at a site layout, pool, lot or roof |
| Tracking | Follows a moving subject such as a boat, a vehicle or a person walking |
| Flyover | Makes a straight pass over the property at a steady height to show scale |
| FPV fly-through | A small drone flies one continuous take through doors and interior spaces |
FPV uses a different aircraft and pilot skill, which our drone vs. FPV guide explains. If you want an FPV fly-through, name the route: front entrance, lobby, bar, out to the terrace.
Three habits make a shot list more useful:
- Mark must-haves. If weather shortens the day, the pilot flies those first.
- List stills separately. “12 edited stills” is its own line, not a by-product of the video.
- Say who will be in frame. Part 107 restricts flying over people who are not part of the operation. If the shot includes staff, guests or a crowd, the vendor has to plan for it.
If you also need interiors, interviews or ground-level footage, put that in the same brief so one quote covers the whole video production.
Deliverables, rights and raw footage
List the files you expect, not just “a video.” A complete line names the number of edits, the length of each, the aspect ratios (horizontal 16:9, vertical 9:16, sometimes square), the resolution, the number of edited stills, and whether you need music, captions, a logo or on-screen text. Add the turnaround you need and the revision rounds you expect.
Then state the rights you need. Under U.S. copyright law the creator generally owns the work. According to the U.S. Copyright Office’s circular on works made for hire, a commissioned work qualifies as made for hire only if it falls into one of nine listed categories and all parties sign a written agreement saying so. In practice most clients receive a license, which is fine as long as it matches your plans. Write down where the footage will be used, for how long, and who else needs it. Our hiring checklist for drone pilots goes deeper on contracts.
Raw footage belongs in the brief too. Many vendors deliver finished edits only and price raw files as an add-on. If you want the unedited clips, ask now so every quote includes them.
Site rules, insurance and budget
Site rules. Tell vendors what your site requires before they arrive: quiet hours, guest privacy, areas that cannot be filmed, safety inductions, protective equipment on a construction site or security escorts.
Insurance. The FAA does not require drone insurance, but your landlord, venue or risk manager probably does. According to UAV Coach’s drone insurance guide, liability limits typically start at $500,000 and can run as high as $10 million per occurrence. Ask your insurer or property owner for the exact limit and the additional insured wording, and put both in the brief.
Budget range. Vendors scope to the number you give them, and a range tells them whether to propose two hours of aerials or a full crew. For calibration, UAV Coach’s April 2026 pricing guide puts real estate photo projects at $300 to $500, real estate video at $1,000 to $2,500, and commercial marketing video at $2,000 to $5,000 per project. Our drone photography cost guide explains what moves a job up or down those ranges. If you have no figure yet, ask every vendor for a lean option and a full option against the same brief.
Decision date. Close with the date quotes are due, the date you will decide, and the name of the person who approves.
The copy-and-paste template
Copy this into an email or a document and replace the text in brackets.
DRONE VIDEO BRIEF
Project name: [name]
Company and contact: [name, role, email, phone]
1. BUSINESS GOAL
[who should do what after watching, in one sentence]
2. WHERE THE FOOTAGE WILL RUN
[website, organic social, paid ads, screens, broadcast]
3. LOCATION AND ACCESS
Address(es): [full street address of each location]
Property owner approval: [yes, no, in progress]
On-site contact: [name, phone]
Takeoff and landing area: [where, or "need advice"]
Nearby restrictions: [airport, stadium, park, none known]
4. DATE WINDOW
Earliest and latest shoot dates: [dates]
Dates to avoid: [events, closures, deliveries]
Preferred light: [morning, afternoon, dusk]
Finished files needed by: [date]
5. SHOT LIST
Must-have shots: [reveal, orbit, top-down, tracking, flyover]
Nice-to-have shots: [list]
FPV fly-through route: [start, rooms in order, end, or "none"]
Stills: [number and subjects]
People in frame: [staff, guests, talent, none]
Ground or interior footage: [yes or no, describe]
Reference links: [two or three, with what you like]
6. DELIVERABLES AND FORMATS
Edits: [number, length of each]
Aspect ratios: [16:9, 9:16, 1:1]
Resolution: [4K, HD]
Music, captions, logo, text: [list]
Revision rounds: [number]
7. RIGHTS AND RAW FOOTAGE
Usage and term: [where, for how long]
Other users: [parent brand, brokers, partners]
Raw footage: [required, not required, quote as option]
8. SITE RULES AND INSURANCE
Site rules: [quiet hours, privacy, safety, escorts]
Insurance required: [limit, additional insured names]
9. BUDGET RANGE
[low] to [high], or "quote a lean and a full option"
10. DECISION
Quotes due: [date]
Decision date: [date]
Approver: [name, role]Example brief: a lakeside hotel reopening
This example is for a fictional project, a 120-room lakeside hotel reopening after a renovation. The figures are illustrative and are not a quote.
- Business goal: Show leisure guests and meeting planners that the renovated hotel, the lakefront lawn and the new terrace restaurant are open, so they book summer stays and fall events.
- Where it will run: Website header loop, booking page, organic Instagram and Facebook, paid social ads, lobby screen.
- Location and access: One address, 14 acres, private property, owner approval in hand. The chief engineer is the shoot-day contact. Takeoff from the east lawn. A regional airport is about four miles north, so please confirm the airspace.
- Date window: Any two days between April 26 and May 7, 2027. Avoid May 1, when a wedding has the lawn. One dusk session with every room light on. Finished files by May 21 for a June 1 reopening.
- Must-have shots: Reveal over the tree line to the hotel and lake. Orbit of the main building at dusk. Top-down of the pool and terrace. Tracking shot of the hotel’s pontoon boat leaving the dock. Flyover from the entrance drive to the waterfront.
- Nice to have: FPV fly-through from the front doors through the lobby and bar to the terrace, quoted as an option.
- Stills and people: 15 edited aerial photos. Staff only in frame. No guests on site until June 1.
- Ground footage: Six interior shots of rooms and the restaurant, to cut with the aerials.
- Deliverables: One 60-second film in 16:9 and 9:16. Three 15-second vertical cutdowns. One 12-second silent header loop. 4K masters, licensed music, logo end card. Two revision rounds.
- Rights and raw footage: License for web, social, paid social and on-property screens for three years, shared with the management company. Raw footage quoted as an option.
- Site rules and insurance: Hard hats in the north wing until May 5. No filming inside the spa. Certificate of insurance for $2 million general liability, naming the owner and the management company as additional insured, due five business days before the shoot.
- Budget range: $6,000 to $9,000, with FPV and raw footage priced separately.
- Decision: Quotes due March 19. Decision March 26. Approver: general manager.
A vendor reading this can check the airspace, plan the flight days, size the edit and price the options without a follow-up email. When the quotes come back, line them up against the brief, not against each other’s totals. A lower price that drops the vertical versions or the stills is a different job. If you change the brief after talking to one vendor, send the new version to all of them.
How we handle this at RAW Digital Group
A brief like this is what we ask for at the start of every drone project. If you do not have one, we build it with you on a short call.
Our pilots are in-house and hold FAA Part 107 certificates, and the same crew flies, shoots the ground footage and edits. We check airspace and permits before we quote a date, and your venue receives a certificate of insurance before the shoot. Projects deliver 4K video and stills in horizontal and vertical. Starting prices are published: aerial photo from $450, aerial video from $1,500 and FPV fly-throughs from $2,500, with a fixed quote before you book.
We are based in Detroit, fly across Michigan and travel out of state. Our aerial reel includes Caesars Windsor, the Detroit Opera House, Einstein Bros. Bagels, The Residences at Water Square and the Gordie Howe International Bridge. See our drone photography and video service or send us your brief.