Harry's GPS Suite Forum

OK, as I've stated in other threads, I've created a local "track" in my neighborhood to use for troubleshooting purposes. Laptimer works perfectly - all the data that is collected at the actual track I go to most (Driveway Austin) is collected during runs on my neighborhood "track", as expected. So, today I did my first installment of the next step, and did some laps using my Gopro Hero4. Here's what happened:

First, here are the perinent settings in Laptimer on my ipad Mini:

Internal cam Resolution = 1280x720 - 720p HD
Multicam Control:
Discover Multicams is ON
Multicam Preset = Master
External Cam = Hero4

I turned the power to the Gopro on, and also turned on the wifi, confirmed by the upper flashing blue light. I went into the Settings of the ipad to confirm that the Hero4 was recognized by wifi, and that my XGPS160 was recognized by Bluetooth. I next went to Race, selected Timer, and pressed the Video button to bring up the video screen. A graphic showing a Hero4 appeared on the upper right corner of the screen, with a blue dot displayed on the graphic, which I assume means it is connected via wifi. I pressed the Record Auto button, which informed me the video will start recording automatically when the start/finish line is passed. So I started driving, and as soon as I crossed the start/finish line, the blue light on the Hero4 stopped flashing; instead, the lower light on the front of the camera started flashing red, indicating the camera was recording (a good sign). Also, Laptimer started collecting data.

I completed my lap, and pressed Canecl to stop recording. I next went into Analysys/lap list, and pulled up the lap I just completed. Under Video, it shows an image of an old-fashioned reel-to-reel camera, with the word OFFLINE in large letters to the left of the image. Below this is a picture of my dash, which must have been taken with the ipad's internal camera.

Next, I downloaded the video from my Gopro to my Windows desktop computer. The recording of the lap is there, but the quality is absolutely atrocious - extremely jerky, with huge pauses and delays, rendering it completely useless.

So, the obvious questions is, why is the quality of my video so bad? Is there something wrong with any of my settings? Could it have something to do with the fact that apparently both the ipad's local video and the Gopro are recording simultaneously? Before I bought Laptimer, I recorded a couple of sessions manually with my Gopro, and the quality of those videos is excellent. So, there's nothing wrong with the Gopro, but rather something with the way it and Laptimer are interacting.

The other obvious question, once I get the quality issue corrected, is how to overlay the video with the data, but I'm sure that's described in one of the documents. Ultimately, I would love to do the overlayng on the ipad immediately after completing the session (or better yet, it would be fantastic if Laptimer did that automatically...), but I know this will fill up the ipad pretty fast, so I'm going to have to buy another ipad dedicated to Laptimer use.

With MultiCam Preset set to Master, LapTimer will switch resolution to FullHD for the GoPro. The rest is simply triggering the recording on the HERO side. When setting the Preset to None, LapTimer will not change any HERO configuration and just trigger it.

I had one report a few weeks ago where the user downloaded the thumbnails video instead of the real video from the HERO. The cam always records a small size low quality video in addition to the full size video. Please check if you got the wrong one accidentally. Next try the None Preset and start the video manually like you did before. This operation will do exactly the same as pressing the button on the HERO, the recording itself is done autonomously by the HERO. In case the result doesn't look perfect, please check you HERO's settings. LapTimer does not reset all features to a working default. There are lots of HERO operations modes selectable...

Transferring the video from GoPro to iPad on site is possible using the download option available from Video Detail. I cannot recommend it however, because it is incredible slow when videos get larger. For a convenient background process like for the internal cam, external cam integration is not yet mature from my point of view. Bandwidths plus battery support, and wireless reliability is not good enough yet. So using an external cam will create great footage but comes at the price of more complexity.

Harry

I'm pretty sure I downloaded the correct file (although it is a good suggestion to confirm). The file from yesterday's test on my local track was 502.7 MB for a 2:16 minute video, or 223.4 MB/minute. An earlier video which had excellent quality that I created manually before I had Laptimer was 4,001.9 MB, and ran for 17:43 minutes, or 225.9 MB/min, so essentially exactly the same size. There was only one file from each recording; I didn't see anything that looked like a thumbnail version of the actual file.

I'll next try what you suggest and run the camera manually, and go from there.

So it is not the thumbnail. Check the HERO settings in this case. As written above, LapTimer does not too much when triggering HEROs. It has no influence on individual frames in particular. So any video quality issues for footage recorded, needs to be trouble shooter on the HERO side.

- Harry

Have you looked at the video file properties? What program are you using to play the video? It's possible that the Hero4 recorded in a format that is incompatible with your PC video player.

Well, I can say definitively that Laptimer is absolved of all guilt. I did a manual video recording of a lap around my neighborhood on my Hero4, without Laptimer involved in any way, and the quality of the video is just as bad as when using Laptimer to start the recording. It's strange that the manual recording I did a few months ago had perfect quality. I played both of them back on the same computer, to which I haven't made any changes in the intervening time. So, I'll do some searching, and if I can't find a plausible explanation, I'll contact Gopro. Of course, if anyone here has any experience with the Hero4, I'd welcome any and all suggestions.

Try the reset function, there is one to reset the cam and one for the WiFi. Try the former to get the H4 back to factory settings.

Harry

Right click the bad video file and select properties from the dropdown menu. Compare those properties to a file that plays properly. I'm betting that the frame rate and/or resolution has changed.

gplracerx wrote:Right click the bad video file and select properties from the dropdown menu. Compare those properties to a file that plays properly. I'm betting that the frame rate and/or resolution has changed.

Bingo! The good videos have a frame rate of 29 frames/sec, and the choppy ones have 59 frames/sec. All other properties are the same. I know absolutely zero about video recording (that should be pretty obvious by now ), but intuitively, I would think a higher frame rate would lead to a smoother video, where I'm getting just the opposite. In general, what are the pros and cons of a high vs. a low frame rate? At any rate, I googled how to change the frame rate, and put it back to 30 frames/s. Thanks very much for pinpointing my problem.

I haven't (not intentionally, anyway!) adjusted any of the settings on the Gopro from their factory defaults, so for those who have played around with this, are there any recommendations for the settings that would give the best picture quality for recording a car driving on a road course? As I said earlier, the quality of the video I got with the original 29 f/s setting was excellent, but if there are any other settings that could make it even better, I'd like to explore them. My camera is mounted on the diagonal piece of my roll bar, right behind me. Thanks.

It's probably compatibility with the player software on your PC that's causing the choppiness or maybe your computer video hardware. I see reports that Windows Media Player is capable of playing 60fps. I also see posts about special settings for the VLC player to get smooth playback for 60 fps. Dunno. For videos, I doubt you could tell the difference between 30 and 60 frames/sec. Movies, for example, are shot at 24 frames/sec.

I wouldn't use a resolution higher than 1080p/30. 720p is probably good enough for most things and doesn't uses as much space.

It's also not all that difficult to accidentally change the resolution setting on a GoPro.