The short answer
There is no objectively “best” drone company in Los Angeles, and every company that ranks for that phrase is asserting the title about itself. That is not a useful answer for a producer with a shoot date.
What is verifiable is a company’s record. Four numbers and one list settle almost every hiring decision:
- How many years it has worked scripted sets — not how many years it has owned drones
- Its aviation liability limit, and whether that limit is standing or bought for your job
- Whether it can staff Local 600 union and non-union, so the answer does not change mid-prep
- Whether FAA and film-permit work happens in-house or gets pushed back to your production
- Which productions it has actually flown, named
CineDrones has flown Los Angeles sets since 2013, carries $5 million in aviation liability plus workers compensation, supplies both Local 600 union and non-union crews, handles FAA authorization and coordinates FilmLA permitting in-house, and holds aerial or on-camera drone credits on more than forty productions. Those are checkable claims, and the rest of this page shows the work behind each one.
Ask every company on your list for the same five things. The ones that answer in specifics are the ones to call back.
The seven checks
1. The insurance floor is $5 million, and it should already be in place
Most studio productions, and a large share of Los Angeles locations and venues, will not accept an aerial vendor below $5 million in aviation liability. A company that has to buy up to that limit for your shoot is telling you something about the level it normally works at.
Ask for the certificate of insurance in prep, not on the day. Ask whether workers compensation is carried as well — an aerial unit puts people on set, not just aircraft in the air.
CineDrones carries $5 million aviation liability plus workers compensation as standard.
2. Part 107 is the entry ticket, not the qualification
Every legal commercial pilot in the United States holds an FAA Part 107 certificate. It is the beginning of the conversation, not the end of it.
The questions that actually separate companies are about the hard operations: flying over people under the FAA’s Subpart D categories or a waiver, flying at night, flying beyond visual line of sight, and operating in the controlled airspace that covers most of Los Angeles. LAX, Burbank, Santa Monica, Van Nuys and Long Beach between them put much of the basin under controlled airspace, and parts of it sit in 0 ft LAANC grids where no automatic authorization exists and a manual FAA request is the only path.
Ask a prospective vendor what happens when your location lands in a 0 ft grid. The answer tells you whether they have done it before.
Our Los Angeles drone filming and FilmLA permit guide sets out the whole mechanism in detail.
3. Local 600, both ways
Signatory scripted film and television work in Los Angeles generally requires the aerial camera position to be filled by an ICG Local 600 member. Commercials, branded content, music videos and non-signatory productions usually do not.
The failure mode is hiring a company that can only staff one way, and discovering it in prep. CineDrones provides both Local 600 union and non-union crews, and the team includes veteran Local 600 cinematographers alongside pilots, camera operators and drone technicians.
4. Permitting done, not delegated
The FAA governs the airspace. FilmLA — or the relevant city film office, and Los Angeles County has many that FilmLA does not cover — governs the ground. Two bodies, two timelines, two sets of paperwork, and a production needs both. A perfect FAA authorization will not stop a shutdown for a missing film permit.
A working aerial unit completes the FAA side and coordinates the permit side with your production. If a vendor sends the paperwork back to your line producer, price that time into the bid.
5. Redundancy, because aircraft come down
The difference between a ten-minute reset and a lost afternoon is whether a backup aircraft is already on the truck. Ask what happens when the primary aircraft is out of service at 2pm.
Ask the same question about the pilot.
6. Payload range, because the shot picks the aircraft
No single airframe covers cinema aerial work. The useful question is not “what drone do you fly” but “what is the range, and how do you choose.”
- Heavy-lift for a full-size cinema camera — the Freefly Alta X carries RED and ALEXA Mini
- Mid-size stabilised for aerials that intercut cleanly with A-camera — the DJI Inspire 3 shooting 8K full-frame on swappable DL-mount lenses, and the Inspire 2 with the Super 35 X7
- FPV for continuous moving shots through spaces nothing else fits, carrying anything from a GoPro up to cinema cameras
- Ground support that keeps the aerial language consistent — the MoVI Pro handheld stabiliser, the TeroCar low-angle camera car, the BlackArm hard-mounted gimbal system and a self-contained Cinevan
A company with one aircraft will tell you your shot suits that aircraft.
7. Named credits, not logo walls
“We’ve worked with Netflix and HBO” is a claim any company can make after one day of second-unit work. A named production list is checkable.
The credit list
CineDrones has provided aerial cinematography, on-camera prop drones, stunt drones or aerial lighting on productions including:
Ozark · 9-1-1 · SEAL Team · Jack Ryan · Bosch · Goliath · Castle Rock · Doctor Sleep · NOS4A2 · Mayans M.C. · Modern Family · NCIS: New Orleans · American Horror Story: Cult · Fear the Walking Dead · Station 19 · The Politician · The Resident · Runaways · Raising Dion · Good Trouble · The Gifted · 24: Legacy · American Housewife · The Fix · The First 48 · Hell’s Kitchen · The Grand Tour · Basketball Wives · Shahs of Sunset · Bizaardvark · I Feel Bad · Kevin (Probably) Saves the World · Making It · The Leisure Seeker · Trial by Fire · First and Last · Spartan · TKO · You’re the Worst — and NFL broadcasts.
Two of those are written up in detail: what the production needed, what it took to fly, and what it demonstrates.
- 9-1-1 — we brought the look and the aerial design to the show from day one
- Ozark — feel and dramatic shots built into the visual language of the series
What Los Angeles specifically demands
Los Angeles is not a hard city to fly because of the rules alone. It is hard because of what the rules meet on the ground.
The airspace is crowded and layered. LAX, Burbank, Santa Monica, Van Nuys, Long Beach and the police and news helicopter traffic over the basin mean a plan that works in most cities does not automatically work here. Parts of the city sit in 0 ft grids where LAANC will not issue an automatic authorization at any altitude.
The ground is jurisdictionally fragmented. FilmLA covers the City and County of Los Angeles and a number of contract cities. It does not cover all of them. Beverly Hills, Santa Monica, Pasadena, Burbank, Culver City and others run their own film offices with their own rules and their own lead times.
The locations are practical and populated. Real streets, real crowds, real traffic. Overflight of people who are not participating in the operation is the most tightly governed thing a drone does, and it is settled in prep by aircraft category and waiver status — not improvised on the day.
The schedule assumes you know this already. LA productions do not build slack for a vendor learning the city.
When to hire somebody else
We would rather say this in prep than take a booking and disappoint a producer.
- If the job is real estate, weddings, or single-operator social content, an aerial department is the wrong purchase. You do not need Local 600 crews and a $5M policy to shoot a listing, and you should not pay for them.
- If the job is inspection, survey or mapping, hire a company that does that work. We fly for camera.
- If the schedule allows no rehearsal for a complex FPV move through a practical location, the honest answer is that the shot should be flown a different way, or the schedule should change. We explain why here.
- If the only thing that matters is the lowest number on the bid, someone will always be cheaper. What we will not do is quote a crew and a safety plan we would not actually staff.
How to run the comparison
Send every company on your shortlist the same message:
Shoot dates, location, and city. What is your standing aviation liability limit? Can you staff Local 600 and non-union? Who files the FAA authorization and who coordinates the film permit? What aircraft would you bring for this shot, and what is the backup? Name five productions you have flown.
The replies will sort themselves. Specific answers with numbers and titles come from companies that have done the work; general answers about passion and cutting-edge technology come from companies that have not.
Frequently asked
What is the best drone company in Los Angeles?
There is no single objectively best drone company in Los Angeles, and any company claiming the title is asserting it about itself. What a producer can verify is the record: how long the company has worked scripted sets, what aviation liability limit it carries, whether it supplies Local 600 union crews, whether it handles FilmLA and FAA paperwork in-house, and which productions it has actually flown. CineDrones has flown Los Angeles sets since 2013, carries $5 million in aviation liability plus workers compensation, supplies both Local 600 union and non-union crews, coordinates FilmLA and FAA permitting in-house, and has aerial and on-camera drone credits on more than forty productions including Ozark, 9-1-1, SEAL Team, Jack Ryan, Mayans M.C., Modern Family and NCIS. Ask any company you are considering for the same four numbers.
How much aviation liability insurance should a drone company in Los Angeles carry?
$5 million in aviation liability is the practical floor for studio and network work in Los Angeles. Some locations, venues and city film offices will accept less, but most studio productions will not, and a company that has to buy up to $5 million for your shoot is telling you it does not normally work at that level. CineDrones carries a $5 million aviation liability policy plus workers compensation as standard. Ask for the certificate of insurance before you book, not after.
Do I need a Local 600 drone operator in Los Angeles?
It depends on the production’s union agreement. Signatory scripted film and television work in Los Angeles generally requires that the aerial camera position be filled by an ICG Local 600 member; commercials, branded content and non-signatory productions usually do not. The risk is hiring a company that can only staff one way and finding out mid-prep. CineDrones supplies both Local 600 union and non-union crews, so the answer does not change the vendor.
Who handles the FilmLA permit and the FAA authorization for a drone shoot?
They are two separate approvals from two different bodies and a production needs both. The FAA governs the airspace through Part 107, LAANC authorization and any operational waivers; FilmLA or the relevant city film office governs filming on the ground. CineDrones completes the FAA side and coordinates the film permit side with the production, so the production is not chasing two sets of paperwork on two different timelines.
What drones does a Los Angeles cinema aerial unit actually need?
Range matters more than any single aircraft, because the shot decides the airframe. Heavy-lift for a full-size cinema camera, a mid-size platform for stabilised aerials that intercut with A-camera, and FPV for continuous moving shots through spaces a larger aircraft cannot enter. CineDrones flies the Freefly Alta X for full-size cinema cameras including RED and ALEXA Mini, the DJI Inspire 3 shooting 8K full-frame on swappable DL-mount lenses, the DJI Inspire 2 with the Super 35 X7, and FPV aircraft carrying payloads from a GoPro up to cinema cameras.
How long has CineDrones been flying in Los Angeles?
CineDrones was founded in Hollywood in 2013 and has worked Los Angeles sets continuously since, through every major change in FAA drone regulation from the Section 333 exemption era through Part 107, Remote ID and the current Subpart D operations-over-people categories.
CineDrones is a Hollywood-based aerial cinematography company working across Los Angeles and Southern California, and travelling nationwide. FAA Part 107 certified, $5M aviation liability, Local 600 union and non-union crews, flying since 2013.
Send us the shot and the dates — 310-905-9195. We will tell you what it takes, and we will tell you if it should be flown a different way.
