What is the L/D penalty of outside mounted GoPros?

On Tuesday, January 6, 2015 9:34:02 AM UTC-5, PBA wrote:
I'm doing this currently and have landed with 5 hrs of extremely boring, continuous flight video of flatland soaring....I need to move to the mountains!

Serious question. Did watching the video change your enjoyment of flatland soaring? Or were you starting to get bored with it before you took the video?

Flubber,

Serious answer: I love flatland soaring and I'm not bored with it by any means. Video taping my own flatland flights has increased my passion and satisfaction with soaring immensely. I was just comparing my 5-hr local flatland soaring video to B4's edited, 1-hr, monster XC, mountain flight. Boring in comparison

Thanks for all the suggestions and ideas posted. The idea is to have possibly 4 cameras running during any given flight that I can draw footage from to tell the story of that flight. I'm just trying to continue to up the game since equipment is making it more possible to tell stories and show what we are experiencing up there in the skies better than ever before.

My biggest problem with these lipstick cams is that the field of view is still too narrow. The one that Andy mentioned is only 140 degrees. The Hero3 is 170 degrees. I am finding that wider is better for helping the audience feel they are there.

Thanks,
Bruno - B4

Howsitgoin, Bruno!
Nice videos. (and hopefully some year I can get to Nephi for one of your camps, but work always gets in the bloody way)
For a laugh, do you think anyone asked these questions when a wing-mount camera required lead weight on the other tip?
Jim

On Tuesday, January 6, 2015 8:21:17 AM UTC-8, wrote:
Thanks for all the suggestions and ideas posted. The idea is to have possibly 4 cameras running during any given flight that I can draw footage from to tell the story of that flight. I'm just trying to continue to up the game since equipment is making it more possible to tell stories and show what we are experiencing up there in the skies better than ever before.

My biggest problem with these lipstick cams is that the field of view is still too narrow. The one that Andy mentioned is only 140 degrees. The Hero3 is 170 degrees. I am finding that wider is better for helping the audience feel they are there.

Thanks,
Bruno - B4

I've had good luck with wide angle and fisheye conversion lenses (up to 180 degree FOV). Like this:

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/produc... on_Lens.html

An example video with a fisheye lens converter:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9aDJLDQ-5QU

The GoPro produces a fair amount of barrel distortion that may be less desirable on external shots with the glider wings, etc. in the frame - depends on what you are looking for. You can fix the distortion in post with the right software tools but that's a time-consuming pain.

There are all sorts of lenses with their own FOV and degree of distortion so it's easy to change.

3 GoPros out in the breeze will make your ASW-27 into an ASW-19 more or less. Use of aerodynamic fairings can reduce the drag by a factor of 3-5.

Can't wait to see what you come up with.

9B

Bruno-

Forgive the bit of thread drift....

What mount is that you have on your glareshield in your latest video? Always enjoy watching your video!

On Tuesday, 6 January 2015 18:21:17 UTC+2, wrote:
My biggest problem with these lipstick cams is that the field of view is still too narrow. The one that Andy mentioned is only 140 degrees. The Hero3 is 170 degrees. I am finding that wider is better for helping the audience feel they are there.

Thanks,
Bruno - B4

I personally don't like the wide angle shots as one gets too much extension distortion (objects close to the camera look too large relative to objects in the distance which appear too small). On top of that there is the horrendous barrel distortion to take care of.
It however does makes the video look more impressive as it gives the impression of higher speeds as distance objects grow in size rapidly before flashing by.

For me the idea setup would be a GoPro shooting at 2.7K and processed to remove the barrel distortion, image stabilized and then cropped to 1080p to reduce the FOV.
One product which can do all of the above for the price of an aerotow is ProDad ProDRENALIN http://www.prodad.com/home/products/...2316,l-us.html

Maybe someone would like to make GoPro fairings for glider pilots.

On Tuesday, January 6, 2015 6:19:33 PM UTC-7, wrote:
Bruno-

Forgive the bit of thread drift....

What mount is that you have on your glareshield in your latest video? Always enjoy watching your video!

Thanks for the kind remarks Jeffrey. I made it myself. Piece of shaped balsa wood painted black, velcro from WalMart, 1/4" screw to fit into GoPro Camera mount threaded base, pipe teflon on screw to make camera not turn on its own.

Andy - I have had mixed results with the lenses. At this point, I am aiming for the clearest quality as possible, it would be nice to see all instruments on panel clearly.

Also, thanks Surge for the software suggestion - I will check it out!

Bruno -B4

On Saturday, January 3, 2015 at 12:55:47 PM UTC-8, wrote:
I am thinking about trying to do some soaring videos. Inside the cockpit footage only is boring and I want to be more like Balleka with amazing outside camera shots. The reason why I haven't done much is concern over the performance penalty of outside cams while trying to do longer XC flights.

Anyone smarter than me (I know most of you are, other than TT) able to figure out the drag penalty of a GoPro either mounted on the wing or on the tail of a 27? It would be attached with the adhesive mount and not the larger suction cup mount in hope of reducing the drag. The GoPro in its larger case to accommodate an extra battery is 41mm H x 59mm W x 40mm D.

What I am hoping to figure out is if it is a 1-2 point L/D penalty or something more like a 4-5 point drop. Those of you who have flown with me know I need every L/D point I can get.

Here's to hopefully a lot of fun 2015 soaring videos shared from a bunch of us!

Bruno - B4
Oh yeah - and Nephi is amazing!

Bruno, Don't change a thing, your YouTube videos are amazing. Keep up the good work. You have quite a fan base.

On Tuesday, January 6, 2015 at 9:59:38 PM UTC-8, Surge wrote:

Maybe someone would like to make GoPro fairings for glider pilots.

Like this?

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0Bw1...ew?usp=sharing

9B