Camera Drone (Subnautica)

The Camera Drone is a controllable drone that is used in conjunction with the Scanner Room. They are made using the upgrade fabricator found in the Scanner Room. When the Scanner Room is first constructed, it will provide two Camera Drones.

Camera Drones can be moved around, held in the inventory, and can be replaced if destroyed.

Uses

To use a Camera Drone, the player must go to the camera station in the scanner room, which activates the drones. In terms of control, Camera Drones operate like a Seamoth; they can go in any direction without rotating. Lights are also present for navigating at night or dark areas.

A Camera Drone features a HUD displaying depth, distance, health, and energy, which can be used for navigation and safety. Camera Drones have infinite range. However, the Camera Drone will get fuzzy around 300 meters away from the Scanner Room, it will then become very hard to see at 425 meters away, and at 600 meters away the screen will almost go black.

If a drone's health is depleted, it becomes inoperable and must be fixed with a Repair Tool in order to work again. If a drone's energy is depleted, it must be retrieved manually and placed back into its slot on the Scanner Room for recharging.

Each Scanner Room has a beacon that only drones can see, which can be used to navigate back to the Scanner Room.

Hazards

• Stalkers can grab Drones in their mouth, treating it similarly to Metal Salvage, and will chase down Drones attempting to escape, even going so far as to pull them out of Scanner Room sockets. Stalkers may even leave their respective biome and navigate a short distance to grab a Drone. This may result in a Drone getting carried hundreds of meters away.
• Crashfish, while not hostile to drones, are also a threat, and can destroy the drone by exploding.
• Lava Geysers will also damage Camera Drones periodically if the drone is within range of the lava. Brine in the Lost River will deal 2.5 damage per second.
• Building a scanner room above sea level is not recommended as Scanner Drones cannot move across land.

Recipe

→ →

Gallery

• Front view
• View from the side
• Back view
• A Camera Drone docked in a Scanner Room
• The Player holding a Camera Drone
• A Camera Drone at day.
• A Camera Drone at night.
• A Stalker grabbing a Camera Drone

Trivia

• Camera Drones used to have a max range of 500 meters. Once they reach the max range the screen would say "No Signal" and the player would have to go pick up the drone.
• Camera Drones can compromise the hull integrity of a base if they happen to hit any part of it, just like a Cyclops would do. It is advised to be careful when trying to place the Camera Drone in the Scanner Room's Camera Drone charging socket, because if the Camera Drone is moving at a fast speed and you miss the socket, the hull integrity will be compromised.
• It appears that Hostile Fauna can't see or react to the Camera Drones. (Tested only on a Reaper Leviathan so far) This, of course, does not apply to Stalkers that can grab the camera drones.
• Strangely, Camera Drones can easily be piloted inside of a Seabase, floating completely midair, if driven up through a Moonpool. This serves no actual purpose, but is mildly amusing. It can be used to easily view the player character model in the scanner room.