ABOUT OUR CHICAGO WORK
Chicago Drone Videography and Live Broadcast
Air Views Media travels to Chicago for stadium nights, arena shows and summer festivals. We haven't flown a Chicago job yet. What we bring is in-stadium live work and festival broadcasts: live drone feeds to TV and the video board from inside Truist Park for the Atlanta Braves, video-board feeds at Davis Wade Stadium for Mississippi State football in 2026, and festival coverage from EDC Las Vegas, every year since 2021, to Austin City Limits on Hulu and Outside Lands on Prime Video. We're based in Augusta, GA, and we don't need a local office to fly Chicago. Our crews travel to jobs in every part of the country. We fly stadium video-board feeds, live aerial broadcast, concerts and festivals, FPV cinematography and micro-drone fly-through tours, and we plan O'Hare and Midway airspace, Park District rules and stadium restrictions before the crew travels. See every city we fly.
In-stadium and festival experience
Chicago is a sports town with old ballparks, a lakefront stadium and two big arenas, plus one of the country's largest
summer festivals downtown. The work that fits it best is in-stadium flying and festival broadcasts, and both are where our credits are.
For the Atlanta Braves we flew inside Truist Park and fed live drone shots to both the TV broadcast and the stadium video board. For Mississippi State football in 2026 we fed the video boards at Davis Wade Stadium. Flying inside a stadium means working below the roofline, around light towers and over seats, with a feed the board operator can trust.
On the festival side, we fly EDC Las Vegas every year since 2021 and covered Austin City Limits and Outside Lands for their live broadcasts. We also flew live broadcast drone work for the T-Mobile 5G Range Show at the 2024 PGA Championship.
Airspace and permits in Chicago
O'Hare's Class B airspace covers much of the north and west of the city, and Midway's Class C covers the southwest. Downtown and the lakefront need FAA authorization for the exact site and altitude, so we check that before anything else.
Grant Park, the lakefront and many festival sites are Chicago Park District property, which has its own rules and permits for drones. Festival flying also needs the producer's approval and the event security planner's written sign-off, which our §107.39 waiver requires for flying over open-air crowds. Wrigley Field and Soldier Field carry the FAA's standing stadium restriction during MLB, NFL and major college football games, from an hour before to an hour after.
How we'd staff a Chicago job
A ballpark or stadium night gets a pilot and a visual observer per drone, flight paths agreed with game-presentation staff ahead of time, and a feed cabled to the control room so the board and the broadcast can both use it. A festival like Lollapalooza gets a bigger team: over-crowd FPV drones for close passes, a cinema drone for the skyline wides, a crew member at the truck, and a parallel content team if you want edited clips the same weekend. More on stadium video-board feeds.
Waivers and broadcast setup
Air Views Media is run by Clark Lupton, an FAA Part 107 certified pilot since 2017. Our FAA Part 107 remote pilots operate
under FAA waivers for flight over people (§107.39), over moving vehicles (§107.145), multiple aircraft (§107.35), beyond visual line of sight (§107.31), operation from a moving vehicle (§107.25) and operating limitations (§107.51). For live shows, our setup puts a COFDM camera transmitter on a micro FPV drone carrying a PROTON 4K FLEX camera, so the truck can shade it (iris, color, exposure) through Cyanview like any other camera, with feeds cabled into the truck. See our FPV live broadcast setup and FAA waiver consulting.
Chicago drone questions
Have you worked in Chicago before?
Not yet. Our live credits are national, including in-stadium work for the Braves at Truist Park and Mississippi State at Davis Wade Stadium, and festival broadcasts at EDC, ACL and Outside Lands. We travel to Chicago for the right project.
Can you fly inside Wrigley Field or Soldier Field?
In-stadium flying is planned with the team and the venue, and game days carry the FAA's standing stadium restriction, so flights need FAA approval. It's the same kind of work we did inside Truist Park for the Braves.
Can you fly over the crowd at a Chicago festival?
Yes, under our FAA §107.39 waiver for flight over people, with the event security planner's written sign-off and the Park District and producer's approval.
Can your drone feed go to our video board?
Yes. We cable the feed into your control room or truck, and your team takes it like any other camera. We've fed live drone shots to the video boards for the Braves and Mississippi State.
Do you work over Lake Michigan?
Yes. We fly a waterproof FPV drone for close work over water and can fly from a moving boat under our §107.25 waiver.
Are you based in Chicago?
No. We're based in Augusta, GA, with a second location in Lynchburg, VA, and we travel to Chicago for broadcasts, festivals and productions.
Related pages: New York · Dallas · Atlanta · Concerts and festivals · All locations
Call 706-284-8364, email clark@airviewsmedia.com or request a quote.