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\u201cIn just a few years\u2019 time, they\u2019ve become both requisite filmmaking tools and regrettable freighters of clich\xe9. Drone shots are easily recognizable not because drone cameras have a single, easily definable use, but because nearly everyone\u2019s using them the same way: god\u2019s-eye view of a landscape, smooth gliding (heaven forbid there\u2019s a jerk or rattle), low-grade wow factor, cut,\u201d Eric Hynes writes in his essay about drones in the July/August issue of\xa0Film Comment. \u201cYet perhaps we shouldn\u2019t blame the tool for how it\u2019s being used, especially since we\u2019re still in the early days, and since potential applications are still being explored within both documentary and fiction.\u201d There\u2019s great potential in drone photography, for sure, but how are filmmakers harnessing its power for good, and not just for awesome? In this week\u2019s Film Comment Podcast, I discussed drones in cinema with Hynes, an FC columnist and Curator of Film at the Museum of the Moving Image, and a bona fide cinematographer, Ashley Connor (Madeline\u2019s Madeline), and hashed out the good, the bad, and the ugly of this curious airborne invention.