The perfect quadcopter camera?
I love my Canon mark 2 and gopro camera but it's absolutely terrible as a quadcopter camera.
The vibrations coupled with the CMOS sensor wrecks the whole image beyond repair.
Nearly all of today's cameras are made with CMOS sensors rather than the classical CCD sensor because CMOS offers better image quality and at lower power consumption... But there's a heavy cost that comes with this.
Rolling shutter.
Even with my stabilization software i can't really correct rolling shutter because the original image is distorted in the first place, thus yielding me warped stabilization that looks like an acid trip rather than beautiful aerial imagery.
CCD sensors do not have the rolling shutter because the image production process is completely different and the below video is a clear demonstration of the difference.
The only flight I had with the below optimized setting was the long shot of the yellow house.
My optimized setting- Turn autofocus in video mode off, be sure to focus on one far away object before recording... Set to scene mode, and then click on the sunset present.
If using a Mac for the upload, don't format the SD card- simply insert it in the computer and upload via final cut pro/imovie/image browser... if you copied the files over and formatted the card you can still extract the files by showing the package contents of the large avcd file and then you'll find the .mts movie file hidden away in one of the files... I used iVI for the conversion. It's $3.99
I only had to convert the files because I forgot to upload directly from the SD rather than copying the files.
The other neat features of this camera?
Panorama mode. Below is one example I snapped earlier today.
Timelaspe mode. Especially good for aerial photography.
Support for 64gb SD cards. I used my 64gb Sandisk, it took forever to fill up the card.
Now onto the bad news:
This doesn't have live out while recording. There is a supplied AV cable but as of right now the screen goes black when recording. This isn't a big deal for most people but for me I would have loved to use it as my FPV camera as well... the canon DSLR line has this ability to do this but unfortunately am supplied with harsh price tags and rolling shutter. So we'll have to wait a little longer for a new camera or a hack.
There's a ugly sensor flare when exposed directly into the sunlight. You can see the purple line in the very last shot when the sun comes into the shot. It's because of the CCD sensor and how it handles light. At the time of this writing there isn't really a solution. It's just part of the cost for ultra stabilization but to put things in perspective... I would get about 10 usable seconds on a regular flight on my 5d mark 2 and with this camera I get at least 1 minute of usable footage.
Also it claims to have 60i 1080p but I can't find the setting anywhere so if anyone knows about this please notify me but 30fps was good enough to stabilize with the CCD sensor. The original footage looked pretty shaky but since there's no rolling shutter final cut X was able to stabilize everything almost perfectly.
Finally a number of people report it not being truly waterproof... I have used it in the water a few times now and had no issues but I would suggest buying a different camera if looking to use underwater on a regular basis.
I feel like I've only touched on the iceberg of what's possible with this cheap camera.
It can't be a coincidence that this has 'quad' in its name.
I never thought I'd love a point and shoot.
My grade: A-
Pros: CCD sensor allow for crisp stabilization, 24mm leica is perfect for action sports, shockproof, gps, barometer, 1080p 30 fps, timelaspe, panorama mode, and the list goes on.
Cons: No live out during recording, 60fps is no where to be found, horrible sensor flares when exposed directly at sunlight, and the case might not be that waterproof according to some reviews.
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Developer Comment by Sandro Benigno on August 3, 2012 at 3:45pm -
Austin, I've deleted my last post to not confuses anyone. But I'll keep my opinion about the Arri Alexa which is a shame side-by-side with other of the same class. It is a perfect example of a wild, savage, jumpy and poorly trained CMOS sensor. (LOL) It produces washed images which need lots of post-production for color correction (which don't fixes the blurring of the bad noise filtering). Here is what I'm talking about:
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Comment by steve F11music.com on August 3, 2012 at 6:09pm -
What is the model camera you are referring to? I'm not finding it in your post but one of the pictures is not loading.
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Comment by Jack Crossfire on August 3, 2012 at 7:27pm -
A CMOS could have no rolling shutter by having 1080 ADC's & a lot of onboard memory. It would still be cheaper than making a CCD, but more expensive than an iphone camera until transistors get a lot smaller. As in all things, consumers just don't care about rolling shutter. Reviewers don't cover it. It's something they just accept, like unemployment & taxes. As long as it's fast enough & there's no breakthrough in ADC design or memory, there won't be enough demand to do it until a few more semiconductor evolutions.
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Developer Comment by Randy on August 3, 2012 at 7:57pm -
It's great to see this blog post because I've been looking a lot at the camera mount code and have recently attached a GoPro to my quad and I'm not getting anything like the beautiful pictures you've shown.
So the Lumix a little more expensive than the goPro according to eBay but perhaps worth it. Certainly it's small so you could use a much smaller camera mount. One nice thing about the GoPro is it does come with all kinds of mounts which make it easy to just stick it to your quad (i.e. if you don't have a stabilizing mount).
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Comment by Rory Paul on August 4, 2012 at 6:54am -
Austin
How is this camera triggered and does it have accesable AV out?
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Comment by Austin Chapman on August 4, 2012 at 7:47am -
Hey everyone,
Thanks for all the input and comments! I don't have access to a computer until Sunday but I promise to respond to all thr comments... Also I'm sorry that I ran into several formatting errors and I can't edit it right now. (buggy) But you can see the original post, properly formatted over at artofthestory.com
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3D Robotics Comment by Alan Sanchez on August 4, 2012 at 8:09am -
Hi guys, the camera is a Panasonic Lumix TS4 it doesnt seem to have AV out but it does seem to have an intervalometer mode (like the gorpo) where it can take a picture every so many seconds.
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3D Robotics Comment by Alan Sanchez on August 4, 2012 at 8:11am -
It has AV out but not while recording like Austin said in the post.
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Comment by Jonathan M on August 4, 2012 at 11:40pm -
I have been doing a lot of research lately on AP/AV flying and this is what I have come up with:
1) Kill the vibes at the source: Balance your props and motors. This can do wonders2) Isolate the camera mount with soft mounts (used in compression generally). Cinestar has a pretty slick setup (expensive), but there are a lot of other successful designs out there as well. Wire isolators, same dampers used in compression and matched for the load, grommet styles.. lots of designs.
3) Isolate motors mounts from arms. This point is a hotly contested one since it could allow your motors to move in response to aggressive maneuvers. Most people have had success with these, but if you do steps one and two correctly you will probably not need this. I have some AGL hobbies isolated mounts that i will be trying out soon.
I have seen plenty of videos from different CMOS type cameras with no noticeable vibration effects using those methods. The main issue is getting smooth stabilized video which comes from the type of gimbal, servo speed/type, gear reduction and outputs from the gimbal or flight controller. Smooth flying also comes into play.
Also, a real popular camera being used successfully by the "pros" is the Sony CX760 and it's derivatives. It has a cool lens stabilization technique that is doing wonders for smooth videos. There are plenty of examples out there.Just my 2 cents :) Your video looks great too!
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Comment by Michael Naumov on August 5, 2012 at 1:16am -
@quadrocopter: Wow! Thank you very much for info on how to activate live video out on Lumix cams!
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