The vast majority of optical assemblies in drones are used for surveillance in the visible and infrared as well as LIDAR systems for numerous applications including landscape surveying, agricultural applications and traffic monitoring. Seattle Photonics has worked on a number of these systems assisting  with the development of the payload avionics, optical assemblies, and  optomechanical hardware. Low mass and low power consumption are key parameters for our designs. Also often of importance for drone systems is their use in nighttime hours, so fast optical systems are often required for ultra-low light situations which lead to the need for high light gathering capacity. These optical systems are also required to be ruggedized for weather, particularly wide temperature ranges.