GoPro 10 with add-ons for Zoom and mph start/stop - can it be done ? - would buy today

[swbca]

@Horton recently posted a GoPro 10 box opening. I would love to replace my phone for Pylon videos but haven't been able to find information about a narrow focal length and start/top based on boat speed. My older Galaxy phone zoom works ok with the rear-main camera with the wakeye app and stops and starts with mph, but the video is choppy. Good enough to see what the skier is doing, but not easy to watch. Each frame is near-perfect with no motion blur, but the frame count drops down to about 10 frames per second caused by the high-speed panning of the trees in the background as the skier crosses the wake.

 

Most important is a focal length that provides a field of view like the Terry Winter screen shot below. GoPro has lens add-ons but haven't been able to find sample images that would reveal how the field of view might be on a boat pylon.

 

If a narrow focal length similar to this screen shot can be done on a GoPro with add-ons, please share the details. and, anything on start/stop based on boat speed ?

PLEASE NOTICE - the total image width is only slightly more than double the gate width at 28 off. Not concerned about the vertical field of view. On my screen the gates center at 3.5" and the total image at 7.5" with skier in gate at 28 off.

[Horton]

@swbca

The GoPro can zoom in far enough. No issue there.

 

The speed trigger functionality is beta software. To use it you have to download a different firmware version. When it works it works great but it is finicky. If you are not tech inclined I would suggest it's not difficult to have your driver turn the camera on and off.

[503Kento]

You might want to look into the backbone mod for GoPro for the ultimate in lens flexibility. https://www.back-bone.ca/gopro-mods/

I don’t have personal experience with it but I’ve got several 35mm lenses I’d love to use on my GoPro.

 

I’ve found the speed trigger mostly reliable on my Hero 7. It’s failed a couple of times but a camera restart gets it going again.

[cacman]

I have the 9. It works great with turning on and off at programmed speed. Easy to do on line to make a QR code. There is no shake and picture is great. If you zoom in to much camera can not follow you perfectly using orbit. If you have someone holding camera zoom in works great. After you record you can use software to zoom in and picture is pretty good. I use the second to the widest and skier is never out of picture. It is plenty good for evaluation of technique.

[swbca]

@Horton Is this from your GoPro ? If so did you crop the image for use in this ski review ? I am guessing this is a little narrower than your GoPro's native image.

[swbca]

@cacman @503Kento I have a friend who machined a pair of additional vertical pegs for the Orbit that are positioned to make the orbit follow the rope with less free play between the orbit and the rope. The reduces the problem of having the skier ski out of the camera view by a few degrees.

 

Can you guys post a full frame screen shot of one of your videos ? I am sure many skiers would like to upgrade from their phones if they knew a GoPro could have a field of view good for Pylon slalom videos.

[Horton]

@swbca no the above image was shot with a Nikon DSLR

[cacman]

 

[swbca]

@cacman Thanks for posting the screen shots. Is that zoomed or the default wide angle ?

[cacman]

second from widest.

[swbca]

@cacman This is the full frame from the main-rear lens of a 5 year old Samsung Galaxy phone. Same 35off rope length as your image . . . trying to see if I can get a GoPro to have the same narrower field of view. I am not sure why the skier doesn't ski out of video with this Orbit setup. Maybe it's because I learned to always ski with a tight line being too weak to catch slack when skiing short line.

 

I have heard of narrower angle lens attachments for GoPro, but never seen a sample video.

 

 

 

[Mastercrafter]

@swbca here’s a no-crop still frame right off a GoPro 7 with a bit of digital zoom (on the camera). It’s not quite your TW framed image but not horrible either. I'm at -15.

 

Please excuse the skiing. First couple of passes through the course.

 

 

[swbca]

@Mastercrafter Looks good to me except for the gloomy weather.

 

1. Is the recording done with the digital zoom or is it something you can have the camera do after the video is recorded ?

 

2. Is the zoom calibrated on a dial or slide bar or is it just guesswork each time you zoom ? In other words if you like it zoomed in 50% can you select that value for each session or just guesswork ?

 

The fact that you are on a longer line and don't appear as a spec in the distance shows that your zoom is working very good. I am glad you posted this !

[Mastercrafter]

Welcome to Michigan. That was early April though, so I cant complain. This zoom was done before hitting record. There's a slider on the side of the screen, I can't remember if it shows a percentage or not. I've never had it "not work". I usually zoom in most the way, then angle the camera so the back of the boat is just in frame, like you see.

[swbca]

@Mastercrafter With this digital zoom feature, why do all the GoPro slalom videos I see make it look like the skier is on a 100' rope ? As I said, I'm glad you posted this.

[cacman]

I can zoom in but when I get to 35 off or shorter I start loosing the skier at buoy. With the right software you can zoom after you video.

[Mastercrafter]

Here’s the full video. Maybe there are issues with losing the skier at shortline. The Wake Eye I use has adjustments to pan past the skier, Ski Doc may not.

 

Also let’s take a moment to appreciate the great 28mph Prostar wake ?

 

https://www.instagram.com/p/CN1HlV9hSYl/?utm_medium=copy_link

[swbca]

@Mastercrafter What year ProStar ? I loved my 1986 ProStar that had a wake like an Everglades Air Boat, but according to experts, tracked like an Air Boat (compared to the newer boats).

 

[Mastercrafter]

Mine is a 2015.

[skibug]

I have a GoPro9 and have zero issues with the add on speed triggers, they work flawlessly. I use standard setting, wide, with 1.3 zoom. From 28 in it is great. If you want to zoom in post recording, you can do that with several media players. I do view my videos on a large computer monitor.

[skierjp]

@Horton maybe we can get Horton to put his Go Pro on his Ski Doc and show us what it looks like for 22 through 39. If it looks decent I would buy one.

[swbca]

@skibug Do you use the digital zoom that @Mastercrafter described ? His screen shot looked good to me . . getting skier close enough so its like sitting in the boat. I know digital zoom softens the focus, but that isn't visible in his down-sized BOS image.

 

This is a full frame from my phone's video. At 35 off the Orbit is following the skier through the turns OK. Is your view similar to this or does the skier appear closer or further away ? I want to switch to a GoPro because my phone doesn't handle the fast action in the video very well, but I don't want the wide angle I usually see with many GoPro videos.

[swbca]

@skierjp @Horton That's a great suggestion. It might help a lot of skiers make the switch from phones to GoPros. I would like see how much zoom you can use on a GoPro and still have the Orbit follow the skier through his turn. I don't want videos wider angle than my phone video directly above . . . . . where Orbit has no problem following skier's turn at 35off.

[skibug]

@swbca I use the digital zoom. Below is a normal zoom still from the video, the other is the post recording zoom from the video player.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[OldboyII]

After they will put option of speed trigger in the main menu, next minute I make an order ))

[Martin]

@skibug so the beta labs has speed trigger based on speed set up? Or just on and off when in motion/no motion? If that works well ill get the hero 9 black that beta is compatible with.

[skierjp]

Just want to see what Go Pro looks like at the different line lengths without any editing

[MichaelWiebe]

We're still on a GoPro Hero 3+, and the below is the narrow setting. That's the one we've been using for years. We have the Ski-Doc Orbit for mounting.

We are upgrading to the Hero 9 now, and will be testing out the narrow and zoom settings. We have the remote control start/stop with the 9, so the driver can wear it like a watch and start / stop at the green balls. After testing that, we'll try the GPS speed triggers. Hope this helps. And we appreciate suggestions for the Hero 9's best ski video settings.

 

[swbca]

MichaelWiebe

Is the narrow setting a digital or optical change ?

[MichaelWiebe]

Good question. I’m not the expert. Below are Hero 9 pictures. The heading says “lens”.

The zoom is digital, and is a different setting.

 

[skibug]

@Martin yes, speed triggers, just like wake eye. Starts on whatever speed you set and shuts off on whatever speed you set. One caveat, on the trigger, which is in the form of a QR code that is generated, there is a toggle button for "repeat" which you want toggled on. Otherwise it will only trigger on and off once. Repeat will trigger every time the set point are reached.

[skibug]

@Martin also, you can print out the QR code or use an app on your phone called QRControl. I think GoPro Labs points you there as well.

[Martin]

Thank you! Ill go grab hero 9 and try it!

[jpwhit]

Not sure my input is going to help you with a ready-made solution, but I had the same goal of having a fairly zoomed in video recording solution. I wasn't satisfied with what I could find off the shelf and ended up building a semi-custom solution. But some of the things I figured out may help.

 

I played around with both the Orbit and Wakeye mounts in conjunctions with phones, GoPro's, and other types of video cameras.

 

For mounts, when you use a camera that can optically zoom into the skier, I found the Wakeye mount to be far superior at keeping the skier in the frame. It allows the adjustment of the camera pivot point to be offset from the rope pivot point. This means the camera pivot angle isn't 1:1 relative to the rope angle. You can get more camera pivot as the skier gets out to the ball. With the Orbit mount, you just can't use as much camera zoom as you can with the Wakeye mount and consistently keep the skier in the frame. With that said, it would be nice if the Wakeye mount was little better in the durability department.

 

In terms of cameras, I'll keep it simple. After a lot of testing, I found an old-style camcorder produced the best results by a wide margin IMO. Especially considering that in my solution, I took advantage of the camera's optical zoom to use different pre-set zooms based on rope lengths. And I'm not taking about an expensive camera. I just bought a used one off of ebay for about $30. What's important is that it's true 60fps or higher.

 

For the GoPro, I was using a Hero 8 in my testing. And the digital zoom helped, but I always felt like the native fish-eye characteristics of the optics were too much of a negative. And yes, I'm aware you can turn off the fish-eye characteristics in the menus, but that is only so effective. For example, with the GoPro watching the gates, the optical distortion makes it look like the skier is going to miss the gate. And while that's not really that important, is the best way I can think to explain the distortion. On top of that, even with digital zoom, it just didn't compare well to a good old camcorder.

 

So, the final setup I've been using for the last 3 seasons, is a standard Wakeye Mount, a cheap JVC 720p 60FPS camcorder, a custom-built GPS control electronics that automatically starts and stops the camera and controls the camera zoom, and automation software that I wrote that fully automates the process of post processing the video and uploading it to a cloud-based solution so I and the others in our club have easy access to our videos.

 

It would be fairly easy to duplicate my setup sans the control electronics.

 

Here's a picture of my setup.

 

 

And here's a snippet of sample video of my opening pass at 34mph - 22 off. No coaching please, Terry Winter and I are fully aware of what I need to work on next from a coaching perspective :wink: And I just grabbed a video that was handy without trying to find my best effort. When you imbed a youtube video in the forum it shows it in a fairly small window. You'll get a better feeling for the video if you copy the link and look at it in youtube natively.

 

 

 

[swbca]

@jpwhit Its impressive what you have done.

From your experience would this Low End Nikon be workable ? It shoots HD 1080p Video Recording at 60 fps, is very light weight and has an equivalent 35mm Focal Length zoom of 27 - 82 mm. I am sure it would be great for hand held, but what would happen on a pylon mount ?

 

I already have this camera but have never used it because the phones are too convenient for general use and travel. Obviously would have to manual start and stop.

 

My concerns, its very light weight but would the snapping of slack line be too much for the camera mount on the Orbit with this larger camera, or too much shock for the camera ? Would the hi frequency vibration I feel in the pylon tear it apart ?

 

I'm thinking I would continue to use my phone with the Wayeye app for every day practice, and use this on occasions when I want high production quality.

 

Believe it or not in only weighs 7 ounces with the lens.

 

[jpwhit]

I have a Canon 5D M3 DSLR and I did a fair amount of experimentation with it. Of course, the video quality itself is fantastic, but the weight of my camera made it unworkable. I don't think the durability of the camera is a concern, the issue is more the mount itself. When the skier falls with a heavily loaded rope, the mount takes a huge hit. The more weight on the mount, the more stress it takes. I did have to repair a fair amount of mount damage during my experimentation with the DSLR. But my DSLR is much heavier, so hard to say with yours.

 

There is also little day to day practical matters that you may or may not care about. For example, the more the camera weights, the more issues you have with the alignment of the camera shifting each time a skier falls. With my setup, I often record more than a hundred passes a week across the club members. So little practical issues become much bigger issues than if you record a handful of passes a month.

 

With the optical zoom of that camera, and the weight, I think you may end up fairly frustrated with the Orbit's ability to keep skier in frame. But it sounds like you have everything, so seems like you have nothing to lose by experimenting with it.

 

[swbca]

There are endless varieties of camera vibration dampers. This is a minimal $20 model. Its hard to see in the picture but it has the 1/4" thread top and bottom. Ever tried anything similar when using a heavier camera ?

 

RE your comment about the snap when someone holds on to the hope in a fall . . It easy to image the mount on the bottom of this plastic camera being breaking the camera body.

 

At least as the skier I never do that and I don't bother trying to catch a lot of slack. Already have a whiplash injury from catching slack that required surgery.

 

[swbca]

@skibug what kind of pylon mount are you using ? There are many comments about a 35off skier skiing out of the picture with an Orbit mount and too much GoPro zoom.

 

My phone image below has a narrower field (more zoom) than your image, but my 35off skier is still closer to the center of the frame that your 35off skier. My Orbit has rotated about 20 degrees further left than the mount you are using. It looks like a 38off skier would still be in the frame. . . . can anyone explain this.

 

It looks like we might be on the same lake, but you have a much sunnier day.

[skibug]

@swbca I use a ski-doc orbit. The pic above is recorded at 1.3x on the gopro and then I have zoomed in some more on the media player I use. This one (below), from the earlier post, has no media player zoom. I have ZERO issues with the orbit following skiers all the way to 41' off (I have not had the opportunity to have someone try it at 43' off :D ). I am not sure what the issues are for others not having success.

 

[skibug]

@swbca here is a still from the gopro at 38' & 39' off. The image at 38' off was before I was using the 1.3x zoom of the gopro during recording.

 

 

 

 

[swbca]

@skibug It looks like the rumors about the skier going wide of the camera on short line are over-stated.

 

I guess its about time to shut-up ski. Except I want to try my Nikon camera.

[jpwhit]

If you're happy with that wide of a camera angle, then you're right you're not going to have an issue. But look at where the skier is in those last 2 pictures relative to the center of the frame. I'm using at least 3x the zoom of those pictures. At that zoom, skier would be out of the frame.

[Martin]

Picked up used hero 8 and updated to beta. Speed trigger works great!

[skibug]

@jpwhit, Can I ask why you are concerned about the camera angle and zoom? Do you see some major advantage to being zoomed in that close? Additionally, is it the level of zoom that is making your video "choppy"?

[skierjp]

For 38 and 39 that is too far away. I would expect that to be maybe a 15 off distance.

[skierjp]

Also, if that’s 38 and 39 shouldn’t the skier be further up on the boat? Maybe it’s the lens.

[skibug]

@skierjp it is definitely 38 and 39. Why do you say it is too far away? What is it that you think you are missing? I am just curious. Sometimes, if you are too zoomed in, you can miss some overall perspective of what is really going on.

[jpwhit]

@skibug, I care about the zoom because the more optical zoom the more detail you can see. I've found that with better detail myself and folks I have providing video coaching have been able to see and identify more complete advice on how to improve.

 

I only care about angle to the extent that as you zoom in more, the angle matters more and more to keep the skier fully in frame.

 

On quality of the video, what I see looking at the native video is completely smooth and much more detailed than what is reflected on YouTube. YouTube seems to be the only option for embedding a video in this forum. When I first uploaded the video to YouTube it looked descent. Now it looks terrible. Not much I can do about that as far as I'm aware. That's completely under YouTube's control.

[swbca]

@skibug @skierjp @jpwhit

Addressing the different options discussed in this thread. GoPro with zoom, a phone, a movie camera or a light weight DSLR/video camera.

 

There isn't one setup for everyone. Different skiers want different capabilities and convenience.

 

1. A GoPro with Zoom and a smart phone are both good for analyzing your skiing. They are both convenient for daily use. The GoPro has better video quality. Comparing the screen shots in this thread, the phone used below has the 35off skier in closer view than the 38/39 skier in the GoPro images shown above. I would like learn more about using a GoPro with a 3rd party optical zoom lens attachment . . . it might be the perfect solution for skiers

 

2. Some want a slalom video where you get a near "Normal" life-like perspective of the skier and the action. @jpwhit has a video from a video camera posted above. It provides the flexibility of a closer view of the skier. Its less convenient to use than a GoPro or phone unless you are an electronic engineer like jpwhit.

 

3. A few skiers may want to get a closer than "Normal" view like seen in all televised sports. or close-up action segments for personalization of the subject and for dramatic effect. A light weight DSLR with video can do this but is less convenient to use. There are also the mechanical limits on panning for very short line that put limits on how "close up" you can be for training videos.

 

No one solution is best for everyone Look at the screen shots posted in this discussion and figure out what you want and how much money and time you have to spend on the setup and how much convenience counts. I am sticking with the Wakeye controlled phone and my DSLR camera for special occasions.

 

Old Samsung Galaxy S5. with Zoom and speed trigger controlled by Wakeye app. No problem with vibration and works with the main rear camera. Lens has a narrower view than all newer phones. Buy on ebay for around $70.

 

DSLR with optical Wide / Telephoto zoom & 60 frames per second video. Can be zoomed out for skiing analysis and zoomed in for closeups. Not convenient for all your practice sessions but good for special occasions. This is 28off cropped from a single video frame for the family photo wall.

[Cnewbert]

GoPro Hero 9 on SkiDoc Orbit, Linear lens, 1.4x digital zoom, 28 off. If I were a better skier getting higher on the boat I’d be out of frame. Not sure of the result with a shorter line getting higher and wider. Maybe the two would offset and the skier would remain in frame at 1.4x. But certainly a greater zoom ratio (2x max with this camera) would not work unless somehow the camera could track the skier more directly.