Head-mounted camera...the ultimate gimbals?

[Greenheart]

I only thought of this because I'm a cheapskate. But while the best compact action cameras seem to be very brilliant, they still seem to need some clever, powered gimbals to create a smooth level view...

...so, it occurs to me that mounting the camera on some kind of head-gear would simultaneously offer all the gimballing and self-levelling abilities of the human head, while also ensuring that the camera is always pointing at areas of interest.

Doubtless there's some serious downside, quite apart from making one look, as Blackadder might have said, like a man standing in a lake with a small painted wooden GoPro on his head. But so far, I can't see why that solution wouldn't be just as good as £400 worth of gimbals on top of the price of the camera.

Apart from the camera being knocked off or damaged, by the boom.

 

[nimbusgb]

The video returned becomes quite apparently 'head mounted'. You'd be surprised at how much you move your head about.

 

[alahol2]

Get yourself a hen. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7-nwfae4VXQ

 

[colind3782]

Professional sports cameramen, such as skydiving cameraflyers which I know a bit about, get used to keeping their head focussed on the subject and moving their body around to compensate.

 

[Greenheart]

Thanks for these thoughts. I wonder though, whether a series of short-ish sequences, edited together from not-too jerky periods recorded on the head-cam (and cutting out any really twitchy patches), mightn't be much better than prolonged footage with the camera fixed in a position which doesn't gimbal, and misses moments of interest taking place out of shot?

I suppose it would be handy to have the camera on the head capturing everything (albeit often jerkily) as it happens, and then, assuming one's hands aren't permanently occupied, the option to disconnect it quickly from the head-gear so it can be held in relative steadiness to capture specific scenes, when there's a free hand to hold it.

 

[nimbusgb]

The secret is more than one camera. The latest episode of bbc 'click' shows how they used entirely COTS mobile caneras to shoot an episode for broadcast. Worth watching.

 

[johnphilip]

The secret is more than one camera. The latest episode of bbc 'click' shows how they used entirely COTS mobile caneras to shoot an episode for broadcast. Worth watching.

OK, OK I am sucked in by your acronym knowledge, what is COTS ?
I watched several minutes of the Click show for a clue, Googled it but still no real idea.

 

[prv]

OK, OK I am sucked in by your acronym knowledge, what is COTS ?

Commercial Off The Shelf, term used by the military and other big bureaucracies that are more used to having special gear custom made for them at vast expense.

Pete

 

[dylanwinter]

Commercial Off The Shelf, term used by the military and other big bureaucracies that are more used to having special gear custom made for them at vast expense.

Pete

I love it when people throw acronyms around that few will understand

but us MOBs love a mystifying ATNU - makes us feel part of an elite group











MOB - mainly old Bloke

ATNU - Acronym No-one Under Stands


Dylan

PS head cams will look pretty ropey

- but here is a KTL filming tip.

If you slow the video down by 20 per cent the viewer is unlikely to notice and your wobble shots will look a bit less wobbly. The 20 per cent seems to help frame blending - or as MOBs say FB

 

[doug748]

I have never used a video camera at sea but on a 1960's motor bike, getting usable stuff from a frame mounted camera is a challenge. One answer is to put the thing on a helmet but you tend to shoot loads of unsuitable able stuff, as it is a bit of lottery. You also need a pretty petite camera, often without a usable screen. Quality is sometimes not the best. It is difficult to fiddle with the settings on the fly.

HASAT:

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Panasonic...231?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_3&hash=item20e8831d07

The quality might be better with this type of thing.










* HASAT Have a Shufty at This.

 

[blackdogsailing]

3 or 4 years ago one of our crew had a head mounted camera on the Round the Island race. The unedited result was full of jerky, out of focus shots. Lots of sea, sky and cockpit floors ! However, after some serious editing we did get a pretty good 3 minute video out of it. We now have 2 cameras. One mounted on the coachroof looking aft and one on the aerial T bar looking forward. Both cost under £100.

Chris

 

[Colin Regs]

I'll tell you this for nothing:

You won't find any cameras in the head on my boat, on gimbals or otherwise.

Aren't there some odd people about?

 

[Iain C]

Dan

I've done a bit of experimentation here and I agree that the headcam footage is just too jerky, and even with a wide angle lens, too focussed on one bit of the boat. This was shot on the original Go-Pro Wide a few years ago. Boat is a 12' skiff on the big rig...FFWD to about halfway through before anything interesting happens. Please excuse my crew's moustache...it was Movember.

More to follow due to only 1 video per post rule...

 

[Iain C]

The best place I've found is on the end of a pole (I used an old carbon ski pole) attached to the end of the boom. It gives a much better perspective and sense of the boat moving through the water. Please excuse my **** driving through the corners...I'd only had the boat a few weeks!

 

[nimbusgb]

That camera shake made my stomache queasy! Nice sailing though

 

[Greenheart]

Thanks Iain, I really think those are both great films - I like the way the boom end fitting means the whole boat is always in view, but the head-cam certainly guarantees capturing anything elsewhere that's of interest, and from your own perspective, it must be useful to have recorded every moment of the experience exactly as you saw it, so you can review whatever went right/wrong. I guess I'll just have to try it out. Well...I'll have to buy a camera, first.

That skiff is a mad, glorious thing. :encouragement: