Filming a boat or yacht with a drone is one thing. Capturing aerial footage of a several-hundred-metre vessel travelling at full speed in open water is another.
For more than fifteen years, Drone-Pictures has been carrying out professional drone filming and aerial photography at sea, from Marseille and across the Mediterranean and beyond. Luxury yachts, sailing boats, cruise ships, tankers, industrial vessels, semi-submersible ships and fast boats: over the years, our teams have developed extensive experience in maritime filming, including challenging offshore conditions.
Our latest assignment is another perfect example.
An Offshore Shoot off Marseille for a British TV Programme
In September 2026, we headed back out to sea off Marseille for a British audiovisual production intended for a programme broadcast on a national UK television channel.
The assignment involved capturing aerial footage of a nearly 300-metre-long cruise ship sailing at 16 knots, or around 30 km/h.
For this type of shoot, filming from the coastline is obviously not an option. We needed to follow the vessel, maintain the appropriate distance and framing, while providing a sufficiently stable platform for take-off and landing.
We therefore embarked on a RIB, powered by a 150 HP outboard engine. The semi-rigid boat had to maintain enough speed to keep up with the cruise ship while providing our drone pilot with the best possible conditions to capture the different shots requested by the production team.
The making-of clip accompanying this article gives you a behind-the-scenes look at the operation, without revealing the cruise ship footage itself. These images will be released once the programme is broadcast in the UK.
The Drone Is Only Part of the Challenge
Offshore drone filming is not simply about flying an aircraft around a boat.
Preparation and safety are essential. Weather, wind, swell, the speed of the boats, the vessel’s course and the ability of the support boat to follow that course all have to be taken into account.
The take-off and landing platform must also be sufficiently stable. Recovering a drone aboard a moving RIB requires careful anticipation and perfect coordination between the drone pilot and the crew.
Over the years, through numerous maritime assignments, our remote pilots have developed the expertise required to manage these specific challenges. Our dedicated page about drone filming and photography of boats and yachts at sea presents a selection of these projects.
From Yachts to Several-Hundred-Metre Vessels
Our maritime experience covers a wide variety of situations.
We have filmed luxury yachts and sailing boats, sometimes from a following boat, creating images for communication, charter and audiovisual productions.
We have also followed fast vessels, workboats and industrial ships. Among our most demanding assignments was filming the Maersk Pelican, following the tanker at around 20 knots from a specially adapted RIB in rough sea conditions.
Other missions have taken us around cruise ships, port vessels, cable-laying ships and semi-submersible vessels. This diversity means that we can approach a maritime shoot with practical experience of many different configurations.
The Marco Polo: Another Exceptional Maritime Assignment
Just a few weeks before this latest offshore shoot, Drone-Pictures had been working around another iconic vessel: the Marco Polo.
In July 2026, nine years after filming its arrival in Marseille aboard the semi-submersible MV Sunrise, we were commissioned to document its final departure from the Grand Port Maritime de Marseille.
This time, our DJI Mavic 4 Pro followed the Marco Polo as it was towed from the Digue du Large to the semi-submersible vessel ALMA. The complete operation lasted more than six hours, with more than thirty sailors and specialists involved.
The mission also presented an additional challenge: operating within a regulated port environment, with the necessary authorisations to access the restricted area.
These images documented an exceptional maritime operation, from the first manoeuvres by the mooring crews to the positioning of the caisson carrier on the deck of the semi-submersible vessel.
Aerial Images for the Maritime Industry
Beyond the technical challenge, our objective is always the same: telling a story through images.
Aerial photography and video can reveal the impressive proportions of a yacht, cruise ship or industrial vessel, while also showing its environment, navigation and the people involved in the operation.
For shipowners, shipyards, maritime companies, manufacturers and communication agencies, these images can be used to showcase expertise, document an operation, promote a vessel or produce an institutional film.
When conditions allow, drones provide viewpoints that would be impossible to reproduce from the shore or from the deck of the vessel itself.
For more ambitious projects, our team can also combine aerial footage with ground cameras as part of a complete film production based on drone and ground images.
A Maritime Expertise Based in Marseille
With Marseille as our home port, the Mediterranean is naturally our main playground. However, our audiovisual production work also takes us to other parts of France and internationally.
Every mission is different: a yacht sailing at a few knots, a racing sailboat, a cruise ship entering port or an industrial vessel travelling at full speed require different preparation, equipment and filming strategies.
That diversity is precisely what makes our maritime experience so valuable.
Do you have a yacht, ship, workboat or maritime operation that needs to be filmed by drone?
Drone-Pictures can assist with aerial photography and drone filming at sea, corporate films, reports, promotional content and demanding audiovisual productions.
Looking for a professional team specializing in drone filming at sea ?
Our drone pilots & cameramen and cinema equipment are ready to support your next production.
Let’s talk about it at +33 646 194 926
or via the contact form.