GoPro Experiences

Woland

Has anyone got experiences or advice they can share about using a GoPro with Isadora?

mark_m

I have a GoPro Hero Black 6, which works fine with Isadora, given the right connectivity. It only outputs in 1080, you can't get 2k or 4k out of it.
The issue with GoPros from v6 onwards is that they messed with the HDMI output / handshake protocol so IME its very fussy about how you connect it to Isadora. And also very fussy about how you connect it to anything. (it will output to, and I can record to some of my Atomos external recorders but not others!). My ancient Hero Black 3 gives much more reliable HDMI output, and is more reliable / consistent in its connectivity. Sadly the picture image is miles better from the Hero Black 6. I have heard enough negative things about the Hero 8 and the MediaMod that allows you to output by HDMI that I have decided a) not to get one and b) to look elsewhere for my next 'action cam'.

I simply cannot get the GoPro to play nicely as in input to any HDMI switcher (with an exception - hold on*) with other cameras connected to other HDMI inputs, so I have to have the GoPro 6 on a separate, dedicated input to the computer.
Best result, ridiculously, is by attaching the GoPro to a Blackmagic HDMI to SDI Microconverter then taking the SDI out of that into a Blackmagic MiniRecorder connected to the computer via Thunderbolt. I think that running it through the HDMI to SDI converter re-clocks it to an 'acceptable' signal.

My Intensity Shuttle's HDMI input and the GoPro do not play nicely together.

*I get good results when the GoPro is attached to my ATEM Mini Pro, which is seen as a webcam by Isadora. It's a proper 1080p input, with a decent bandwidth. And again, the reason why I think it works is 'cause the ATEM reclocks every input signal.

HTH. Let me know if I can help further.

Cheers

Mark (not...)

mwasser

This was a few years ago, but I did some live feed capture from a Hero 5 using both both Blackmagic Decklink and Intensity 4K capture cards (PCIe). Like Mark's experience, 4K never worked over HDMI, and I had to capture via SDI using a mini converter. I recall thinking that the issue was the 4:4:4 color, but never figured it out. Everyone I've mentioned that problem to since has complained about GoPros' HDMI output being hard to work with, and using a Decimator MD-HX cross-converter has been suggested (never had occasion to try though). I went with a different 4K HDMI camera for that project, mainly because the low-light performance was pretty bad. Additionally, at the time, Isadora's live capture really didn't like 4k video, and I wound up using spout (and blackspout) to get video from the Intensity cards into Isadora.

I also worked with a couple Git2 cameras at the time, and while they were even worse in low-light, they worked great and connected as USB webcams.

This is odd timing though – I've got a Hero 8 on order specifically to test live feed video, especially since they have a webcam driver for them now, for both Mac and Windows. I'll report back when it gets here and I can try it out.

bonemap

Hi,

Interestingly, I am currently looking at the possibility of using gopro's to capture a timelapse of an artists studio over several months. This might mean using Isadora to access the gopro controls remotely through TCP/IP for example.

If anyone has any experience of using a gopro in such a way would be great to hear about it.

Best Wishes

Russell

mwasser

Some info on the GoPro Webcam app. On a Mac, it works pretty much as advertised. There's an app/driver to install, and it only seems to work on Mojave and later, but other than that it shows up in Isadora (and skype, zoom, anything else I've tried) as a webcam. You do have to update the firmware on the camera, with a phone app or an SD card.

The Windows 10 app is in Beta, and as far as I'm able to test it it just doesn't work for me.

mark_m

@bonemap said:

If anyone has any experience of using a gopro in such a way would be great to hear about it.

Hi Russell, the GoPro 9 - just released - has some better features for timelapse than previous models. Worth perhaps having a read of the specs. However, there are much better solutions for long term timelapses than that. Search out the kind of set-ups that industrial videographers use - the guys who do timelapses of building sites over a couple of years. They can often be programmed to, say, just record in daylight hours, etc.

nick

@bonemap bit off topic from GoPro but I have been using the newish pihq camera with c/cs lens mount https://www.raspberrypi.org/pr... with a raspberry pi to make hdmi cameras - very few lines of python code to get full screen hdmi out. There are pros and cons of course - lots of lens options, but fixed focus. Lots of camera options can be fiddled with in code. Not many more lines of code to make a time lapse camera, and very customisable.