Growing up as the son of a restaurant owner in Cape Town, South Africa, Ismail Sirdah was always a hard-working and creative individual. Helping to run a successful family business did a lot to prepare him for the future. Upon leaving South Africa and moving to the United States (Savannah, Georgia, to be exact), he got into business much as his history and family history would suggest. Now, he is running a very successful restaurant and a music promotion company. Both have been wildly successful, but Mr. Sirdah’s real passion is photography. This passion has brought him a much greater degree of notoriety than he ever would have achieved running a restaurant or promoting various bands.
So why is Ismail Sirdah more well-known than the average photographer? The answer to that is a simple one. He has gained notoriety by blazing a new trail in the field, one which has not been very well-explored before now. If you can’t guess from the title, I am talking about drone photography.
Imagine this: You are a photographer working in the 1980’s. You probably have a decent camera, although you probably paid a whole lot for it. However, aerial shots will present a great problem. Unless you are extremely rich, you probably cannot afford to buy an airplane or a helicopter with which to shoot your aerial photos. You could use a glider, but that carries serious risk and is not legal in all areas. I like a good picture as much as anyone, but it isn’t worth the risk of falling to one’s death.
Our hypothetical 1980’s photographer would have no such problem today. It wasn’t that long ago that I saw drones selling at a grocery store for forty dollars apiece. Flight has truly become much cheaper. Ismail Sirdah takes it to the next level with his custom UAV’s (the technical term for a drone), which are designed to capture images that no human could ever hope to. In the Miami area, Mr. Sirdah is known as the best photographer in the city. Why? Because he offers something that others cannot.
Read the full Patch interview: https://patch.com/florida/miamibeach/ismail-sirdah-impact-drones-miami-photography