Go pro?

[MrPstv]

Afternoon.

 

 

Some reviews ideas please.

 

We are looking at buying a decent camcorder and i am leaning towards the Go Pro, the question is which 1?

[Domino]

what're you using it for?

 

As a traditional camcorder the gopro's probably not a great idea. they've great uses for specific situations though

[dry]

What are you going to use it for? If you're shooting lots of moving scenes outside then I'd say go for a Go Pro or similar device.

 

If it's going to be used to film the kids on a tripod performing a play or similar, you'll find the fish eye effect of Go Pros and the white balance etc too frustrating- in which case it's better to go for either a cheap DSLR with lens/bridge camera or other handheld camcorder.

[MrPstv]

It will be used in and outside school, i want to move away from the locked down formats that some camcorder manufacturers tend to use.

 

Has to be easy to use.

Easy to transfer the videos and pictures.

Robust.

[MrPstv]

What are you going to use it for? If you're shooting lots of moving scenes outside then I'd say go for a Go Pro or similar device.

 

If it's going to be used to film the kids on a tripod performing a play or similar, you'll find the fish eye effect of Go Pros and the white balance etc too frustrating- in which case it's better to go for either a cheap DSLR with lens/bridge camera or other handheld camcorder.

 

Ok,

 

I didn't realise about the fishy eye ting.

[VeryPC_Anthony_L]

There are fewer and fewer consumer camcorders on the market now. Panasonic have a range are well priced and well equipped for the money Camcorders | Panasonic UK & Ireland

 

If you want to try a go pro type camera, there a lots of copies. Sony make a model called the AS20 which can is pretty good for the money Action Cam | Waterproof Action Cameras for Underwater Sports | Sony UK

[dry]

Ok,

 

I didn't realise about the fishy eye ting.

They are great if you're throwing yourself off the side of a mountain or launching it in the air at a festival as the wide field of view gives the illusion of greater speed (the mind judges speed based on movement of objects in your periphery (so I've been told!)) but the field of view is achieved at the cost of slight lens distortion (fisheye) at the extremes of the image, so no good for things where you want a life-like representation iykwim

 

Having said that, GoPros are very good quality. There's a techie in a school up north who uses one to film his disassemblies of laptops etc and he gets great results. Check him out on Youtube- Jake Billing. Not sure if he's on here or not?

[MrPstv]

Is it worth going for 4K?

[zag]

Have a go pro for home use, not sure it would be any good in school

 

4K is pointless at the moment really, I always turn the settings down to 720p

[Arthur]

4K is pointless at the moment really

Not completely pointless.

 

If viewed at full size, a 4K image is twice as wide as a full high-def image. Because it’s bigger than the screen it’s on, you have a lot of flexibility in post-production that you can’t get from 1080p footage.

 

You can implement a digital pan that makes it look as if the camera is moving when, in reality, the image is sliding digitally. This gives you complete control over the speed and direction of the movement. The downside, though, is that it lacks the change of perspective that accompanies a real pan. You can’t slide underneath objects or reveal hidden ones.

 

You can also crop the image and, as long as it remains at least the size of 1080p footage, it will remain HD. If you crop normal HD footage, it must be downgraded to standard definition or the video will turn out blurry. In interview settings, clever cropping can create the impression that there are multiple camera angles from a single camera. (Source)

 

... the other advantage to working in a 1080p timeline with 4K footage is that you're able to crop or stabilize the frame however you need to and still end up with a high-quality 1080p result. At the moment this is one of the huge benefits to 4K, that you can do a lot to the image and retain detail for a beautiful 1080p finish. Even if you're not going to be showing your work in 4K, having that extra resolution to play around with can be extremely helpful. (Source)

[ZeroNeg]

I have a gopro 4 in school. Just remember you will need an external mic as the one in the case is muffled when filming school plays ect. The quality is great and the fish eye gets the full hall width in so that is useful. Teachers find it difficult to use as they want point and click ( as usual ).

To be honest it is over kill and it cuts into 20 min segments also. Any more questions let me know.

[dhicks]

I didn't realise about the fishy eye ting.

 

The effect is noticable for objects at close range, but it's not too bad for things a bit further away. Also, Go Pros do come with their own software which will remove the fisheye effect from footage if you want, although it will sacrifice some field-of-view for that. I have a Go Pro Hero 4 Black capable of 4k - I've filmed stage productions with it, but it isn't great indoors. I also have a third-party lense on it - it turns out to be difficult to get good-quality 4k-capable lenses. It does also heat up rather when running in 4k mode - for a 2 hour show it got almost too hot to touch in one spot.

[ZeroNeg]

Just out of intrest what software are you using @dhicks for making dvd's ?

I find after filming in 4k i loose all the quality when editing and burning to dvd.

[Arthur]

I find after filming in 4k I loose all the quality when editing and burning to dvd.

Couldn't you create Blu-rays or data DVDs containing 4K/1080p MP4s instead or better still upload it somewhere?

 

Video DVDs are just too low res.

Edited November 20, 2015 by Arthur

[MrPstv]

The effect is noticable for objects at close range, but it's not too bad for things a bit further away. Also, Go Pros do come with their own software which will remove the fisheye effect from footage if you want, although it will sacrifice some field-of-view for that. I have a Go Pro Hero 4 Black capable of 4k - I've filmed stage productions with it, but it isn't great indoors. I also have a third-party lense on it - it turns out to be difficult to get good-quality 4k-capable lenses. It does also heat up rather when running in 4k mode - for a 2 hour show it got almost too hot to touch in one spot.

 

Come on spill the beans what software are you using?

[dhicks]

Just out of intrest what software are you using @dhicks for making dvd's ?

I find after filming in 4k i loose all the quality when editing and burning to dvd.

 

GoPro's own bundled software is actually pretty good for editing - it's actually free to download and use, even if you don't have a GoPro:

 

http://shop.gopro.com/EMEA/softwareandapp/gopro-studio/GoPro-Studio.html#/start=1

 

We use Adobe Premier CC for video editing at the school, although I use Premier Elements at home as it's rather cheaper. I try and avoid having to burn DVDs for parents / pupils, instead we place videos on our VLE. Those were orignally hosted directly on the VLE, but now we're hosting on a Vimeo Pro account, which is proving very capable. Since Spetember we've had a dedicated member of staff to do video / camera work, so I haven't done much since the last set of end-of-term plays over the summer.