Live -Multi camera usage of IOS devices.
Posted: Sun Apr 29, 2012 7:02 pm
It's been sometime since I've posted on the slalom skateboard forms.
There are few things that I really wanted to see get done in the sport, one of them was an affordable timing system, another was a basic set of rules that everyone could use, and one other thing that I've always wanted to see was inexpensive video production systems with multi-cameras so we could get the angles we always needed to produce those exciting “you are there” type of shots.
The affordable timing system still has not materialized yet, but with newer and faster Apple and android devices, I do envision one materializing soon.
This past season I did the timing or the Aspen series races. We use the timing system that slaves to a master clock, each timing module communicates wirelessly to the clock, and perhaps to another master clock that exists at the base of the timing shack.
In this way without direct hardwiring, we were able to get times to the races that were accurate to within 1/1000 of a second.
Obviously, what I'd like to see is a low latency solution that meets all of our requirements for timing system. But a lot cheaper.
I envisioned using the cameras of these devices and perhaps the infrared focusing to create a line that the racers would cross to trigger a time.
Also, I've been waiting for several years for the cost of the camera phones to drop in price–at some point, they become virtually disposable cameras in regard to catastrophic damage. Certainly there are a lot of third-generation iPhones collecting dust in peoples drawers.
It's a lot of technology and processing power in a small device, with perhaps just enough battery life to run 2 races in a single day. There are a myriad of charging devices and battery extension devices that can make this possible even if there wasn't much left in the battery of an older device.
When it came to filming those hard to get shots, shots to get you excited about skateboarding, it's nerve-racking holding $100,000 video camera and skateboarding the same time–at the same speed as a pro. I know this, because I've done it, and the only thing that kept me from really getting nervous was knowing that I really was not responsible for the breakage of the camera.
4 years ago, I had an older phone, a Nokia N-95. At the time, this particular telephone came out at the same time as the 1st generation iPhone. This phone have 3G service, was able to do sling box, had a video streaming service, as well as being able to stream live to the web in real time, it had a 5 megapixel Carl Zeiss lens with a flash, and in general was a much more useful phone for me than the iPhone.
As the iPhone improved, this phone saw a lot less utility in comparison, but as a camera it still boasted really good battery life, a good screen for monitoring, and was extremely robust–I ran over it several times while snowboarding and it survived.
The thought of attaching this phone to a stick similar to a go pro camera came to mind.
But really, what I thought would be much better, would be able to control multiple phones similar to mine, and using a 3G connection, or better yet, a large Wi-Fi connection, I could connect several cameras to one video controller at one time.
This would be a poor man's multi-camera system capable of reasonable resolution.
Certainly, when we do an interview with the skateboarder, it's important to get very good camera resolution on the person's face as well of the available surroundings.
In contrast, when you mount the camera facing forwards just half an inch above the ground underneath a skateboard, the resolution is not necessarily as important. However these type of shots are very important for conveying the sensation of speed and excitement for the viewer.
This is an excellent place to use multiple IOS devices to get these sensational speed shots.
Certainly the processing power is available in the existing iPhones, the bandwidth is also available in current Wi-Fi devices, the bandwidth is also available with the new 4G LTE advanced evolution wireless protocols.
And finally, the software is available for $5.99 per operator to become a cameraman using your existing iPhone, iPad 2 or 3, and perhaps one of the iPod touches with a camera.
Because there is likely some sort of real-time timecode available with this, we might not be limited to just using 4 cameras in a single shoot. We could have multiple directors, and multiple operators, with multiple versions of the same software program to provide up to 20 operators of their cameras at any given time during the finals of our events.
I think it would be pretty amazing.
http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/collabra ... 66771?mt=8
So all you need really is multiple IOS devices running ont he same Wi-fi network...and ideally.... you don't even need a connection to the internet... just a wi-fi network. SO ....and Airport extreme mounted high- with another Airport Extreme..set it like this... (for the purposes of simplicity we will assume line of sight is possible down the whole hill.
The first airport Extreme is 25% down the hill, the second one is 25% for the end of the course.. In this way their wi-fi bubbles overlap.
There are few things that I really wanted to see get done in the sport, one of them was an affordable timing system, another was a basic set of rules that everyone could use, and one other thing that I've always wanted to see was inexpensive video production systems with multi-cameras so we could get the angles we always needed to produce those exciting “you are there” type of shots.
The affordable timing system still has not materialized yet, but with newer and faster Apple and android devices, I do envision one materializing soon.
This past season I did the timing or the Aspen series races. We use the timing system that slaves to a master clock, each timing module communicates wirelessly to the clock, and perhaps to another master clock that exists at the base of the timing shack.
In this way without direct hardwiring, we were able to get times to the races that were accurate to within 1/1000 of a second.
Obviously, what I'd like to see is a low latency solution that meets all of our requirements for timing system. But a lot cheaper.
I envisioned using the cameras of these devices and perhaps the infrared focusing to create a line that the racers would cross to trigger a time.
Also, I've been waiting for several years for the cost of the camera phones to drop in price–at some point, they become virtually disposable cameras in regard to catastrophic damage. Certainly there are a lot of third-generation iPhones collecting dust in peoples drawers.
It's a lot of technology and processing power in a small device, with perhaps just enough battery life to run 2 races in a single day. There are a myriad of charging devices and battery extension devices that can make this possible even if there wasn't much left in the battery of an older device.
When it came to filming those hard to get shots, shots to get you excited about skateboarding, it's nerve-racking holding $100,000 video camera and skateboarding the same time–at the same speed as a pro. I know this, because I've done it, and the only thing that kept me from really getting nervous was knowing that I really was not responsible for the breakage of the camera.
4 years ago, I had an older phone, a Nokia N-95. At the time, this particular telephone came out at the same time as the 1st generation iPhone. This phone have 3G service, was able to do sling box, had a video streaming service, as well as being able to stream live to the web in real time, it had a 5 megapixel Carl Zeiss lens with a flash, and in general was a much more useful phone for me than the iPhone.
As the iPhone improved, this phone saw a lot less utility in comparison, but as a camera it still boasted really good battery life, a good screen for monitoring, and was extremely robust–I ran over it several times while snowboarding and it survived.
The thought of attaching this phone to a stick similar to a go pro camera came to mind.
But really, what I thought would be much better, would be able to control multiple phones similar to mine, and using a 3G connection, or better yet, a large Wi-Fi connection, I could connect several cameras to one video controller at one time.
This would be a poor man's multi-camera system capable of reasonable resolution.
Certainly, when we do an interview with the skateboarder, it's important to get very good camera resolution on the person's face as well of the available surroundings.
In contrast, when you mount the camera facing forwards just half an inch above the ground underneath a skateboard, the resolution is not necessarily as important. However these type of shots are very important for conveying the sensation of speed and excitement for the viewer.
This is an excellent place to use multiple IOS devices to get these sensational speed shots.
Certainly the processing power is available in the existing iPhones, the bandwidth is also available in current Wi-Fi devices, the bandwidth is also available with the new 4G LTE advanced evolution wireless protocols.
And finally, the software is available for $5.99 per operator to become a cameraman using your existing iPhone, iPad 2 or 3, and perhaps one of the iPod touches with a camera.
Because there is likely some sort of real-time timecode available with this, we might not be limited to just using 4 cameras in a single shoot. We could have multiple directors, and multiple operators, with multiple versions of the same software program to provide up to 20 operators of their cameras at any given time during the finals of our events.
I think it would be pretty amazing.
http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/collabra ... 66771?mt=8
So all you need really is multiple IOS devices running ont he same Wi-fi network...and ideally.... you don't even need a connection to the internet... just a wi-fi network. SO ....and Airport extreme mounted high- with another Airport Extreme..set it like this... (for the purposes of simplicity we will assume line of sight is possible down the whole hill.
The first airport Extreme is 25% down the hill, the second one is 25% for the end of the course.. In this way their wi-fi bubbles overlap.