Drone views of DOW Chemical and DOW Diamond (Midland, MI) Tri-City Droneography 2024-02-14 | Drone views of DOW chemical plant, DOW Diamond, and Dow’s East End building located in Midland, MI. Video shot on DJI Air 3.
Sanford Dam 04-12-2026 Posted the night before the gates close Tri-City Droneography 2026-04-14 | I apologize for being absent over the last few months. Life got a little busy, and I guess I got sick of flying in the cold weather. Nonetheless, here is some video from April 12. Wish I would've got it uploaded sooner. I'm hoping to get some quick videos of the lake as it fills throughout the week(s). After that, I guess I'll start following the Wixom Lake projects a little more closely as this project has finally come to a close.
Sanford Dam November 19, 2025: Dirt on the berm Tri-City Droneography 2025-11-20 | Hard to believe how much work they have got done in the week or so since I was last out there. The concrete that was previously roller compacted is nearly all covered in dirt.
Sanford Dam — Late September through October 2025 Tri-City Droneography 2025-11-03 | Been a while since I’ve posted a video. Was working on a project for one of the local companies showing progression on the berm being built for the dam. Fisher Contracting is using a process called roller compacted concrete to build up the berm on the north side of the dam.This video shows some of the footage of the 5 or 6 days / nights I was able to get out and film.I unfortunately had to speed up some of the video to try and fit more in a reasonable amount of time. I originally had 20 some minutes of video without using all of the footage I collected over the last month.
Sanford Dam — September 25, 2025: Continued work on the berm, emergency spillway, and gates Tri-City Droneography 2025-09-27 | ...
Sanford Dam 09-02-2025 Tri-City Droneography 2025-09-03 | Looks like gate #3 is set, and a flurry of work is being completed on the earthen berm.
Sanford Dam — August 4th, 2025 — One gate installed and continued work on the berm Tri-City Droneography 2025-08-05 | Been a busy summer, so unfortunately, I haven’t been able to get down to Sanford Dam much (or any of the other dams at all).When shooting video with the drone, you get hyper-fixated on making sure the shot is smooth, and that you’re not going to crash into anything, all on a relatively small screen. I didn’t notice until after the fact that there was a cement truck up on the berm. Wish I had noticed, so I could’ve hovered around to show what they were doing better.
Sanford Dam — July 11th, 2025 Tri-City Droneography 2025-07-14 | Plenty going on around the Sanford Dam with work being done around the earthen berm. Not super happy with how this video turned out. I hadn’t flown a waypoint mission in quite a while, so decided to let the drone fly itself after setting the route. The speed was set too low for them mission, so I decided to speed up parts of the video in post.
Sanford Dam — June 20th, 2025: Work on the north side of the dam is ramping up Tri-City Droneography 2025-06-20 | Sorry for the month in between videos! Had some other projects that I’ve been working on as well as a relatively busy personal life.Lots of work happening on the north side of the dam! I’ll try and keep posting regularly as this project is nearing completion.I’ll eventually shift my focus to the Edenville Dam’s as this project wraps up.
Cranes setting the Poseyville Preserve Pedestrian Bridge Tri-City Droneography 2025-05-19 | Some of the biggest cranes in the State of Michigan being used to set the new pedestrian bridge over the Tittabawassee River in Midland, Michigan
Sanford Dam — May 13, 2025: Lots of work happening all around the dam area! Tri-City Droneography 2025-05-14 | The temporary bridge has been removed, disassembled, and hauled away. The breached area where the water has flowed through the last few years has been filled in and sheet pile has filled the gap that was once there. Crews are moving lots of earth, and even some work on the spillways. With the Four Lakes Task Force getting their win in court, construction seems to be full steam ahead to make the new projected timeline of this project.Four Lakes Task Force believes this project should be “substantially completed” in spring of 2026, although that doesn’t mean that the water will be refilled at that point. Water cannot fill the lakes until after spring due to hibernating species in the area. When it is time for water to flood the basin, the lake should be filled in 4-16 days. This information was provided in an article from the Midland Daily News dated April 24, 2025.—- This video and my last was shot in 4k60. Curious if anyone can tell the difference between 60fps and 30fps, which is what I’ve historically posted.
Sanford Dam — April 25, 2025: The Temporary Bridge Hoisted Off It’s Base Tri-City Droneography 2025-04-25 | The temporary bridge that allowed construction equipment over the breached area of the dam has been lifted off its base and is ready to be dismantled.Not much else happening at the dam while I was down there. wasn’t sure it was worthy of a video update, but I haven’t posted in so long that I felt obligated to upload.More to come soon at Sanford and some other fun projects that I’ve been invited to help with.
Sanford Dam Hyperlapse: One Year of Construction In Under Five Minutes Tri-City Droneography 2025-03-11 | Drone hyperlapse video showing the last 13 months or so of construction at the Sanford Dam, which was destroyed in historic floods in 2020. Sanford, located in Mid-Michigan, was one of four lakes affected by the floods. The dam failure affected many communities in the area, causing millions in damages.The Four Lakes Task Force has since taken the job of rebuilding and eventually maintaining the dams in the chain of lakes.I’ve been slowly compiling these hyperlapse videos over the last year with plans of putting them into a compilation style video. With the uncertainty of the funding of the dams and continued construction, I figured this would be a good time to show how far the building has come.These videos were shot on a DJI Air 3. It’s evident in the first few videos that I was learning what the best methods would be to capture a hyperlapse showing all of the movement at the construction site, while still moving the drone. After a month or two, I feel like I got the hang of it.
Sanford Dam — March 10, 2025 Tri-City Droneography 2025-03-11 | Water is flowing back through the spillways of the Sanford Dam. Still a surprising amount of work going on despite the ongoing litigation with the Four Lakes Task Force. I expected work to be paused 2-3 weeks ago, but crews are still pressing on.
Sanford Dam — 02/20/2025 — The last of the up stream cofferdam removed, and a new cofferdam begins Tri-City Droneography 2025-02-21 | The service road / cofferdam on the upstream side of the dam is being shoveled out with the river running back through it’s original path.Crews begin installing sheet pile to the north of the dam, cutting off where the river flowed after the 2020 breach.
Sanford Dam — February 5th, 2025 — Water flowing back through the dam. Tri-City Droneography 2025-02-06 | The sheet pile cofferdams have been removed both upstream and downstream of the dam, allowing some water to flow through the low level water outlet. There is still a large amount of water running through the breached area of the dam.
Sanford Dam — January 23rd, 2025 Tri-City Droneography 2025-01-25 | Work is finishing up around the main structure of the dam. Soon the cofferdams will be removed and water will flow back through the dam.
Sanford Dam — October 3rd, 2024 Tri-City Droneography 2024-10-04 | 4K Drone video shot on DJI Air 3 showing the rebuild of the Sanford Dam, which was destroyed in 2020 after catastrophic floods and a series of dam failures. Crews are working diligently to rebuild the spillway areas of the dam before funding is set to run out in a couple of months and all operations halt.
Sanford Dam — September 16, 2024 Tri-City Droneography 2024-09-16 | My posts seem to be getting more and more spread out. But with the summer coming to an end, I should have more time on my hands soon. Also, less videos just due to the fact that this stage of the process is slower going, with less obvious changes on a week-by-week basis.
Sanford Dam — July 25, 2024 Tri-City Droneography 2024-07-25 | Continued work on the Sanford Dam, which was destroyed in the flood of 2020.In this video, contractors continue work on the Dam’s spillway area.
M30 Bridge Construction Update — July 17, 2024 Tri-City Droneography 2024-07-17 | Drone video showing the progress being made with the M30 bridge project in Edenville, MI. For those not from the area, this bridge was destroyed during the 2020 dam failures in Midland and Gladwin Counties. In 2020 a temporary bridge was placed over the area where the Tittabawassee and Tobacco Rivers met. This bridge was taken down in early 2024, allowing for this permanent bridge to be constructed.
Sanford Dam — July 1, 2024 — 4k drone footage shot on DJI AIR 3. Tri-City Droneography 2024-07-02 | Aerial drone footage shot on July 1st, 2024 showing the rebuild of the Sanford Dam in Midland County, Michigan. The dam was breached during record flooding in 2020 and has been under construction for a couple years since.This video shows contractors pouring concrete and settings forms for the new spillways. The old spillways were demolished a couple months back..
Sanford Dam — June 20, 2024: Spillways are starting to take form. Tri-City Droneography 2024-06-21 | 4K drone video shot at the Sanford Dam construction site on June 20th, 2024. I ordinarily prefer to get video while crews are working on the dam. Unfortunately, with my schedule that just wasn’t possible this time around. However, since there were no workers on site, I was able to use that to my advantage and get some up-close videos of the dam. I ordinarily get the “close” videos by using the telephoto lens on my DJI Air 3, but today actually flew through the construction area.
Drone views of Harbor Springs, Michigan (2024) Tri-City Droneography 2024-06-02 | 4k aerial footage of Harbor Springs, Harbor Point, and the Little Traverse Lighthouse shot on DJI Air 3. The lighthouse was built in 1884 and was manned up until 1963. The lighthouse sits at the end of Harbor Point, which is a private, gated community. Without an invite, a drone, or a boat, the lighthouse proves to be a very difficult site to visit.This was another rushed video, only had 15 minutes to play while the family was playing on the playground down by the beach in Harbor. The telephoto lens on the Air 3 compresses the background in a neat way and make it much easier and safer to get some “closer” shots. This video was a mix of using both lenses on the drone.
Sanford Dam May 29, 2024 Tri-City Droneography 2024-05-29 | Aerial drone footage showing continued work on the Sanford Dam in Sanford, Michigan. Contractors are working diligently on the spillway area of the dam and also appears that they are working on what I assume will be the emergency spillway on the far side.
Drone Video of The Mackinac Bridge & Sturgeon Bay Tri-City Droneography 2024-05-23 | Got to do a little bit of videoing while visiting home. I was fortunate enough to have my family with me when flying the drone, but this is also made me rush things, because I didn’t want to have my head buried in the remote and miss out on family time.4k drone video shot on DJI AIR 3 showing the Mighty Mac followed by the best beach in all of Michigan, Sturgeon Bay. Definitely not my best videoing, but still figured I’d post.
Sanford Dam — May 6, 2024 Tri-City Droneography 2024-05-06 | Aerial video shot on May 6, 2024 showing continuing work at the Sanford Dam. Crews appear to be finishing concrete work on the dam’s old tailrace, pounding more sheet pile into the bed rock around the construction site, and starting work on the dam’s spillway. Leave a comment if there’s anything you’d like to see done differently in future videos. I’ve come a long way in the couple years I’ve been shooting and editing these videos, but would like to keep progressing, so any constructive feedback is appreciated.
Smallwood Dam — April 18, 2024 Tri-City Droneography 2024-04-18 | Aerial footage shot on DJI Air 3 of the Smallwood Dam. This dam is under construction from a series of dam failures in 2020 along the Tittabawassee River.
Secord Dam - April 18, 2024 Tri-City Droneography 2024-04-18 | Drone video showing the construction site at the Secord Dam in Gladwin County. This is one of four dams being rebuilt after the flood of 2020, and is the northernmost dam in this chain.
Sanford Dam — April 10, 2024 — Filling the Tailrace Tri-City Droneography 2024-04-11 | Drone video shot on April 10, 2024 showing construction on the Sanford Dam. Unfortunately, the only time I had available today was in the morning when the sun makes lighting a little more difficult for videography. Contractors have been working diligently recently with filling the dam’s tailrace. The tailrace is no longer needed due to the dam no longer creating hydroelectric power. Filling this area with concrete adds weight to the dam to prevent uplift.In hydroelectric dams, the tailrace is the channel that carries water away from a hydroelectric plant. The water in this channel has already been used to rotate the turbine blades and is channeled back into the river.
Sanford Dam - April 3, 2024 — Mostly dry in the cofferdam, and old spillway demolished! Tri-City Droneography 2024-04-04 | The old spillway has been demolished. Lots of work around the old power house and it appears that most of the water has been sealed from the area surrounded by the cofferdam. Hopefully funding is figured out so the work doesn’t stop until the dam’s completion.
Sanford Dam — March 27, 2024 Tri-City Droneography 2024-03-28 | The cement dividers between the spillways have been torn down over the last week.
Sanford Dam Construction 03/18/2024 — Drone video shot in 4k Tri-City Droneography 2024-03-18 | Drone video showing the progress being made at the Sanford Dam shot on March 18, 2024. The video was shot using DJI Air 3 in 4k 60fps.I would wager a bet that my next video of the dam will show the cement partitions in the spill way either being knocked down or gone altogether.
Sanford Dam - 03/04/2024 Tri-City Droneography 2024-03-04 | Drone video shot nearly four years after the dam failure in Sanford, Michigan. Fisher Contracting has got most of the water pumped out around the dam, allowing for further work to be completed.Video was shot on DJI Air 3. Still learning some of the new features.Let me know if there's any angle or part of the construction that I missed or you'd like to see in greater length.
Midland at night - Short version Tri-City Droneography 2024-02-25 | Short clips of previous video posted.
4k Drone video Midland, Michigan at night Tri-City Droneography 2024-02-25 | My first attempts at shooting video / photos at night. Still learning what settings to use on the camera and how to edit in post. Wasn’t going to post the video since I’ve got a lot to learn and adjust, but figured by posting I’ll eventually be able to see where I started.Since the only complaint I really get on these videos is music, I figured this video would be appropriate to combine with some absolutely terrible music. :-)
Sanford Dam — February 22, 2024 — Pumping water out of the cofferdam Tri-City Droneography 2024-02-23 | Fisher Contracting pumping the water out from around the spillways to allow further work on the dam.
Sanford Dam 02/13/2024 — Lots of work going on! Tri-City Droneography 2024-02-14 | Drone video showing the progress being made on the Sanford Dam. Fisher contracting pumping the water out near the dam to allow work to be done. - This is the first day with my new drone, hopefully the quality is a little better. Definitely no gimbal shake like on the previous drone.
Sanford Dam February 13, 2024 preview Tri-City Droneography 2024-02-14 | Preview of full video that should be posted tomorrow. Lots of work happening on the Sanford Dam! Recorded 2/13/2024
Sanford Dam 01/05/2024 Tri-City Droneography 2024-01-05 | Water routed back through the area that was breached in 2020.
Sanford Dam 12/05/2023 — Construction Resumes Tri-City Droneography 2023-12-05 | After a long break, work has begun on the Sanford Dam again. Video shows aerial footage of the rebuild of the Sanford dam that was destroyed in 2020. Crews have removed sheet pile from the area where the dam was initially breached. I was told that the water will run through this area again while crews make repairs to the dam. I’m not sure if there is truth in this or not, but we will surely find out soon. I’ll try and do weekly videos as long as there is work actively being done on the dam.Apparently it is time for a drone upgrade. In the video you can see the gimbal shutter a few times and is slightly of level at the beginning of the video.
