Video Cameras For Motorsport Use

[R31Nismoid]

It'll just be missing the clean "write" at the end or invalid characters that make the file corrupt due to the sudden cut off in power etc.

Using a program as above will sort it Bris, I wouldn't be paying for a service given the free programs on the net you can download that basically run themselves.

Bring them around here if you want and I'll give it a crack if you CBF'd trying (im O/S in 2 days, you'll have to wait till mid June)

[LotusGTR]

Guys, just got back from a Tassie trip and have many a movie to upload to youtube. Trouble is the first file (which is typical) is nearly 2gb and about 15 mins long and YT is telling me it's going to take 400 minutes to upload. Seems clunky to me. Is there a smart way of doing this? Maybe file compression before uploading?

Thanks.

[Marlin]

Buggered if I know mate...... But how was the drive?!?!

[LotusGTR]

G'day Ben. I took your precise routes both south and then west / north and it was awesome. Absolutely awesome. Best drives of my life. I did about 1300 klms overall and the old girl turned in 14.5l/100 which is amazing. Highlight was the Hobart to Strahan drive which I managed to get done in 3 hours and 18 minutes on wet roads. I probably overtook about 6 vehicles in than time which is around 300 klms.......Drove as fast as conditions allowed the whole way.

In the end I missed Hellyer Gorge as the passenger side zorst fell off after which it was excruciatingly loud and all I could do was limp it home to Dev with my 'spirit o tassie shared berth' ear plugs in. I drove for about 30 klms with the zorst dragging on the tarmac as the road was too unsafe to pull over and it was tipping it down. In the end I pulled over the it fell off about 20m behind where i came to a halt. I walked back to it was it was a steaming mess that was half ground away. Had no choice but to kick it into the ditch and keep moving on. Part of the Porker has now been returned to the earth! Mechanic said it wasn't that well supported and the harmonics on the GT3s kinda blast the zorst to pieces in the end which I guess after about 5 hours of flat out driving was what may have happened! I also inadvertantly ran over some road kill in an early part of the trip and I figure that might have done some damage too as it made a hell of a din going under the car. I also had a bit of a tank slapper trying to pass someone in second just after I ran it over. I figured the rears were covered in mammal goo!

Very grateful for the advice and can confirm the route is a winner. Only downside is that due to the light and weather the first couple of hours of driving off the boat was in the dark.

Will post vids once I can work out a quicker upload than 400 fkn minutes per file.

[ssxRicho]

Dashware is easy to use, have to pay for it. But it works..

Else elements premier or you could try your hand at Windows Movie maker, but that is hit and miss.

[Marlin]

G'day Ben. I took your precise routes both south and then west / north and it was awesome. Absolutely awesome. Best drives of my life. I did about 1300 klms overall and the old girl turned in 14.5l/100 which is amazing. Highlight was the Hobart to Strahan drive which I managed to get done in 3 hours and 18 minutes on wet roads. I probably overtook about 6 vehicles in than time which is around 300 klms.......Drove as fast as conditions allowed the whole way.

In the end I missed Hellyer Gorge as the passenger side zorst fell off after which it was excruciatingly loud and all I could do was limp it home to Dev with my 'spirit o tassie shared berth' ear plugs in. I drove for about 30 klms with the zorst dragging on the tarmac as the road was too unsafe to pull over and it was tipping it down. In the end I pulled over the it fell off about 20m behind where i came to a halt. I walked back to it was it was a steaming mess that was half ground away. Had no choice but to kick it into the ditch and keep moving on. Part of the Porker has now been returned to the earth! Mechanic said it wasn't that well supported and the harmonics on the GT3s kinda blast the zorst to pieces in the end which I guess after about 5 hours of flat out driving was what may have happened! I also inadvertantly ran over some road kill in an early part of the trip and I figure that might have done some damage too as it made a hell of a din going under the car. I also had a bit of a tank slapper trying to pass someone in second just after I ran it over. I figured the rears were covered in mammal goo!

Very grateful for the advice and can confirm the route is a winner. Only downside is that due to the light and weather the first couple of hours of driving off the boat was in the dark.

Will post vids once I can work out a quicker upload than 400 fkn minutes per file.

That's farking awesome, glad you enjoyed it Nick! I was smiling as I read that

[PHaT MR30]

Hi Nick, Glad you had a great run around the apple isle!

Best free program to use is something like Free Video Coverter http://download.cnet.com/Koyote-Free-Video-Converter/3000-2194_4-10805335.html?tag=main;dropDownForm (click the direct download link).

Then convert it to a format such as MP4 (MPEG4 codec), ensure the size is appropriate (IE HD 1280x720) and FPS is 25-30. Play around with the bit rate to get the quality right.

You will need to stuff around for a while to find the right ratio for size vs quality, but then the file should only be a few 100 Mb at worst.

[Birds]

Just bought an LCD "bacpac" for my GoPro...my god...how it transforms the camera for usability. All GoPros should come with this. Very impressed with the quality and size, a bargain @ $120. No more guessing when it's recording or using pythagorean theorem to estimate camera angle.

Latest firmware also supports the WiFi (read: live streaming to devices like iPhones) and (I think) remote control (read: mount camera externally and stop/start from inside the car) attachments that are due out later this year.

I'd like to see more done with the sound, GoPro 2's external mic compatability should therefore be interesting...but I guess if you really want a good sound track, you should use a seperate device for recording that and overlay it later in the video editing software.

[LotusGTR]

Hey Tim. Thnaks for that. What is a typical bitrate? The software is defaulting to 1248kbps. Is this a good start point?

[PHaT MR30]

See how the quality vs. file size goes but I would suggest 4000-8000. Try at 2000 and go up in steps of 2000 at a time.

Its a pain with video's as different sources and file types respond differently Ive found.

[LotusGTR]

Hey Tim. Thnaks for that. What is a typical bitrate? The software is defaulting to 1248kbps. Is this a good start point?

I got this now. I've been fiddling around the conversion software and the bitrate is completely proportional to the file size. 2,000kbps seems to give a good enough resolution for the small youtube screen and a reaonsably small file size and upload time.

Thanks again. I'll post up some vid I've got later today. I'm a little disappointed in the audio but try to work through this.

[LotusGTR]

This is about 1 hour into the drive from Hobart to Strahan. Haven't bothered to work out exactly where I was. 10:15 there is some good oversteery action. You'll have to turn the sound up as I had the mic on a low level due to the loud zorst. Still distorts....Poor sound at the end is me opening a window as I was boiling hot after the hills run!

[byebye]

I live in Tasmania and haven't driven that road! i should of tagged along in the GTR!

[emts]

GoPro wifi bacpac finally up and working today.

what a fkn drama

there is about 30 steps that have to be followed in exact order to get it to work the first time.

testing distance at PI tomorrow now to see how it goes

then time to get the smartphone to work with it!

[billywhiz]

Hey we've got to get one of these, WRC chase cam anyone?

"AR Drone 2 0"

Wonder what AASA/CAMS would say about one of these flying over the track shooting video?

[No Crust Racing]

I've been cobbling together a little system for myself and have just started testing it.

For $45 delivered I grabbed a Kodak Playtouch HD - http://store.kodak.com/store/ekconsus/en_US/pd/PLAYTOUCH_Video_Camera/productID.200992300

Even on the WXGA setting of 480 the quality is quite good. IT also does 720 @ 30fps, 720 @ 60fps for slow mos, and 1080 @ 30fps.

Battery life is listed as around 110-120mins when recording at 720 @ 30fps, I'm expecting more when using the lower quality WXGA setting which should be fine for YouTube clips.

I've worked out that a 4GB SD card should be enough data for a track day, but for the extra 50 cents I'll just grab an 8GB (testing with a spare 1GB atm). It has a USB arm built in so it can be charged on the fly, Winton also has powerpoints and I've got a USB car charger so topping it up won't be an issue if it's needed.

Initial testing is good, though I'm not sure how the audio will fair in track applications or outside of the car. When tested in an adjustable phone mount in the work car it picked up a lot of noise from the mount vibrating, but I guess that's to be expected. For around $5 though you can buy a Sony Stereo External Mic off eBay, which seems to be quite popular for people running these types of cams.

I bought an adjustable suction mount off eBay for under $5, it's on the way so can't comment on quality on that yet. I'll start out by doing in car footage so if the mount fails it won't be a huge dilemma. If it proves to be trustworthy I'll attach it to the outside of the car, though I'll likely knock up some kind of protective case as well, or a tether to the car.

I grabbed some universal screen protectors for $1, as the unit is touch screen, and I cut one down and put it over the lens.

I've dug up my old Nokia E52 and have RaceChrono installed on that and have dabbled with a program called RaceChrono2AVI which allows you to generate gauges from gps mapping data and overlay those onto your in car footage. This will at least give me a track overlay with position and speed. The internal 1Hz GPS is not accurate enough though so I'll likely buy a QStarZ 10Hz unit and connect that via Bluetooth as that's a proven combination.

So all up I'll have spent under $150 (though I already had the phone) and should be able to get some OK footage with basic data on top that will show split times etc.

At the moment I'm still testing all this as I'm in the process of fixing the car but I'll post some footage when I have run it all at the track.

Edited September 5, 2012 by ActionDan

[SCR48]

Hi Guys

Just picked up a GoPro 2 a few weeks ago for powercruise and have noticed the terrible sound quality that these things have when mounted outside the car. I noticed that they can take an exernal microphone. Anyone found a good external mic for them as it seems GoPro dont make one. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Or any tips on how to improve the sound quality.

NOTE:I am using the backing cover with the holes in it, too much wind noise it what im refering to.

[benm]

Do you want to mount the mic outside or inside the car?

I bought a $10 mic from Jaycar to test with my Contour+ and did 1 lap of the block using the cam's mic mounted outside the car than another lap with the jaycar external mic mounted inside wrapped around the passenger door handle and the sound was 1000% better.

[No Crust Racing]

Here's an example of the cheapo setup I was talking about with RaceChrono data overlayed.

Basically all settings on low on the camera, encoding etc

[No Crust Racing]

YouTube has done something weird to the clip, some anti-shake feature, and it now has a fish eye effect in some parts which is not there in the uploaded file. I'm working to sort that but the site is currently undergoing maintenance.