Anyone own one of these?

[skihard]

Wondering if anyone here owns one of these and can provide feedback?

Looking at purchasing one to mount my iPhone to it.

Appreciate any feedback anyone has?

 

 

[DefectiveDave]

I don't own one, but at first glance I don't see anything to absorb shocks from the pylon. That's not to say something cool isn't hiding within the red cylinder or at the bearing though. What's it called?

[skier2788]

I have a ski doc orbit mount. It's great for the price. Nothing absorbs shock on it but you still get pretty decent video. Only complaint I have is that the cell phone holder is really cheap. It broke second time out. You can buy better ones for a few dollars off amazon. You can youtube skidoc orbit mount and see my video with my Samsung S5. It works better with a real camera.

[DefectiveDave]

Regarding shock isolation, I'm not aware of any recording platforms which come with it built it, so it wasn't really fair of me to call out the skidoc for not having anything. I use a shock isolator with my wakeye to dampen shocks and vibrations coming through from the pylon for better video quality:

 

Shock Isolator Post

 

Such a setup would work just as well with the skidoc and I'm sure you would get great video out of it. It's not totally necessary to get decent video, but I think it's worth the extra effort if you make the plunge.

[oldjeep]

The newest trakker mounts had dampeners built in

[OldboyII]

We use Orbit for a season. The only thing which I do not like is that on our old MC pilon we have to open it completely in order to go through wide pilon rim. Wakeye clamp is more convenient in this respect.

Soft simple dampener may be not a good idea because too many different shake frequeces applied to camera - motor on different RPMs, wakes, rough waters etc. Real working dampener is always set to certain narrow range of frequency.

Simple soft gasket could not work or make things even worse due to resonance effect.

We use old Sony corder with optical stabilisation and fixed focus and all is Ok.

Tip: youtube has an option of electronic stabilisation - it does a good job.

 

 

 

[John Brooks]

@Horton & others using the Wakeye, I am curious about how these work and hold up with regular use. Any tips in using them? Thanks for your feedback.

[skihard]

Pulled the pin this morning and ordered one of these mounts.

Have done some research and have seen some good things reported on it!

Stay tuned for the update! :)

[MZito]

I tried one, used a few different cameras including a GoPro. I just did not like the video quality. Great design, I hope they can reduce the shakiness I experienced.

[skihard]

Mine arrived yesterday and is already mounted. Will give it a go today and see how it works.

[Roger]

I just got one. I tried it out last night using the Vastar mount I bought on Amazon.

 

The results were a bit shaky, but I believe that was due mostly to the tall mount. I just discovered that the clamp itself has a tripod mount in it, so tomorrow I will mount to the Orbitz with just the clamp and see how that goes. See right side of this image:

 

 

[SkiJay]

FWIW, there is currently no system that damps out the shaking. Cameras with optical damping work best, but nothing is perfect.

 

I've collected a lot of pylon mounts, and they all suffer from the large low frequency shaking that happens when the load hits the skier because the rope whips from side to side, and the pylon flexes back and forth. Nothing I've tried with damping (from none to highly damped) or with tracking arm length (from none to long) has tamed the side to side rope whipping. For pylon flex, the higher the camera is above the pylon, the worse it is. Then there's all the high frequency vibrations.

 

Using digital anti-shake on phones or cameras just makes the video really wavy, and YouTube's shake/vibration reduction is even worse. I find this waviness can make a video unusable for ski-tuning purposes.

 

The only good news is that while it seems impossible to eliminate shaking with any pylon mount (unless you ski as smoothly as Terry Winter), you eventually stop noticing it while studying your technique or ski behavior for any length of time.

 

If you have to have a smooth video for something like social media, you need a person holding the camera. If you're using the video for ski-tuning or technique study, the shakes don't affect how much valuable information you can learn, especially when using slow motion or pause.

[Roger]

@SkiJay - I agree that you can't eliminate the issue. However, the mount above when used as the left picture shows allows much more vibration into the image due to the flimsy vertical arm. Tomorrow will tell how much improvement just using the clamp will provide, but I believe it will be significant. No, it won't eliminate the effect, but it should be better. I agree with your last paragraph completely.

[MISkier]

I am thinking about using this Feiyu 2-axis gimbal to smooth out the rope snap with my Wakeye. I have the video camera mount option on my Wakeye and it should screw right into the bottom. Anyone try this yet?

 

 

 

 

[skihard]

I got mine and hooked it up. The very first skier on it had some slack in the line. When it loaded it trashed the rope guide by bending the one guide over.

Needless to say I sent it back. Positive note I was treated very well by the shop I purchased it from and was refunded my money in a very timely manner.

Friend got a wake eye and it's pretty shaky too.

Best video still comes from someone holding the recording device in their hands in the observers seat.

 

[Wish]

IMHO the closer you can get the tracking connection to the pylon, the less shaking. I've been through many iterations of arm type trackers and find the sleave type that slides over pylon with a slot for the rope works best at reducing slack line slap. Far from perfect but better. If you can get the sleeve to fit with some friction when it rotates, even better. There is a fine line between to much friction and it not tracking the skier out to the ball and not enough and it shaking a great deal.

[Than_Bogan]

Bah now I need to build a vision based tracker that doesn't interact with the rope at all.

Pretty sure I could sell 'em for less than $15k. Who's in? :)

[Splasheye]

@Than_Bogan already working on it. Wide angle megapixel camera mounted on the windshield. Digitally tracks and zooms in to the skier providing video tracking and hopefully as a bonus proper speed/acceleration/location information.

 

Like most WaterSki projects I expect it will take a huge amount of time and will sell in tiny numbers at a price that doesn't come close to covering costs yet which makes people complain about how expensive it is :smile:

 

 

[Roger]

Reporting back on using just the bracket (right side of previous photo posted by me). Totally better video. There is still some shake when the skier picks up the line at the end of the turn, but there was when I tried the Wakeye product as well.

 

As for Wakeye mounts holding up, I've seen two break that were the type with just the rope guide. There are a handful here now with the shock tube guide and I haven't seen one of those break yet.

[Fast351]

I just got mine last week, with the explicit purpose of being able to mount a heavier camera on it. I have only used it once, and I'm a 15 off open water skier, but it worked good for me.

 

I mounted a Canon SL1 DSLR on it with the stock 18-55 lens, at 32mm. This gave me a good zoom ratio and I never really left the screen. Unfortunately I had the AF mode set up wrong, so I got a bunch of focus hunting, but the stuff in focus was nice and the optical image stabilization worked great (the reason I wanted a mount that could use a heavier camera). Weather permitting I will try to get out one more time this year and get the AF mode right.

 

I don't probably hit the rope like a lot of you guys though so I really can't comment on how well it would work for someone skiing short line through a course.

[A_B]

Has anyone tried a panoramic mode so the camera does not have to turn with the rope?

Is there one with wide enough coverage?

Just a thought.

[Hallpass]

True story. I was driving the boat the day Trakker number 1 made its debut. My buddy Bryan was trying to develop something called a belly board. No one but Bryan thought it was fun. Beat the hell out of you when you tried to ride it. He wanted some video to see what he looked like while riding the belly board. The first tracker was a cut up camera tripod and a coat hanger. When I saw him put it on the pylon that I said "you idiot, no one wants a belly board. People will buy that thing." He had a prototype shortly thereafter, and developed/sold Trakkers of over 20 years.

 

Moving to present day, I've wondered why the boat manufacturers don't put a wide angle camera in the stern. Would be easy to connect to the digital displays these boats now have in the dash.