Bartlett UCL200: London Intersections

We're excited to be showcasing our Drones4Good work at the Bartlett UCL200 London Intersections exhibition from 25 March 2026 until 15 May 2026.

This is a quick look around the exhibit:

We're the white display case attached to the wall. The video is somebody else's work on robots. The text on the wall as you come in explains it better:

Description text on the wall as you come into the area (click to enlarge)

This is our display case with all our drone frames

Here is one of our butterflies being flown by the students at a drones masterclass, just to show everything in action:

I can't believe that we've been running our Drones4Good workshops for 10 years now. It started with a simple premise, which was to show the good uses of drones in contrast to the military ones. This is becoming ever more topical with how drones are currently being used in Ukraine and Iran. We aim to encourage students aged 13-18 to discuss the ethics surrounding drone technology, the good and the not so good.

Then we let them build and fly some of ours. Around twenty five over excited 13 year old's flying drones for the first time, what could possibly go wrong?

A dragonfly in progress

Some more building going on

We start off with a presentation about drones, how they work, some of the more unusual applications and then how to build them.

Our demonstration drone showing the sensors real-time on the screen

The way we do the presentation is very interactive. We get them to answer questions and offer their own ideas as we go along. When we do exhibitions, we use a question like, "Can you think of any good uses of drones?" and then offer a butterfly ring as a prize to get the conversation started.

Some butterfly rings being worn at the Big Bang Science Fair

The drone frames are designed as "creatures" specifically to distance our drones from the more regular, aggressive shaped, carbon-fibre drones. We have a butterfly, several dragonflies, a honey bee, a ghost and a turtle.

Some frames, part way through a building workshop

Construction is simple. The students just have to choose a frame and stick the flight controller on with double sided foam tape. The blue cards give them some idea about which are the easier frames to build and which are the easier to fly.

Our frames, along with some statistics to help the students choose

To build them, they have to push all four motors through the holes in the correct corners, noting the colour-coded wires on the flight controller. The propellers are two types, which they will know if they listened to the instructions in the presentation or read the construction guide. The diagonals are identical and match the motors, so an "A" propeller turns one way and a "B" propeller turns the other way. They often get this wrong, which is fine as we can show them how the incorrect propeller is blowing air upwards when it should be blowing downwards. It's all part of the learning process.

A butterfly drone, ready to fly

We let them fly under supervision, with varying degrees of success. When it breaks they have to go back and rebuild, so we make sure that everybody has a go at the flying.