I thought it might be fun to do a driving 360 degree time lapse. The drive home from Clearwater fit the hour long requirement. I crossed the Courtney Campbell Causeway passed by Tampa International Airport, downtown Tampa up onto the elevated Crosstown Expressway into Brandon and Valrico.
For you photo gear geeks, I know who you are, here is the how.
Suction cup attached to center of hood, shoe lace with slip knots attached to camera and other end taped down. Go Pro is attached to my egg timer time lapse thing-a-ma-jig.
I never pay much attention to the odometer in my work truck. Until the other day. There it was, staring at me. 66663? Are you superstitious? Me? Not really, but who really wants to drive Satan's mile? I'd rather not. Maybe I watched the Omen movies one too many times. But it was standing between me and some really good barbecue for lunch. So with hands firmly on the steering wheel I carefully dodged a road filled with soccer moms in escallades on cell phones, pickup truck contractors scribbling on bits of paper while on cell phone, a virtual blizzard of potential energy zipping by me.
66666 arrived just as I reached the take-out window.
The olfactory joy of barbecue sitting in my passenger seat distracted me enough to forget the odometer all the way back to work. I made it. Lunch was wickedly good. Superstitious? Nope, not a bit.
******UPDATE*********
The firmware update fixes the 9999 problem. If you have a GoPro Hero HD (not the 960)
you need to download and apply the newest firmware.
It will also give you great new features.
Here is the latest firmware update link.
Good luck.
****** UPDATE ********
The new HD GoPro Hero firmware is ready!!!!!
I downloaded it today and installed it on two heros.
The process is easy and fast, here is the link.
I will be testing the new firmware and will check to see if 9999 is history.
Will post review of firmware later.
******* UPDATE ********
9/11/2010
YES!!!! It is working. I just finished running a long time lapse that straddled the 9999 file number and it worked without a glitch. The file numbers jumped from gopro9999 into a new folder starting with gopro0001.
***********************
First, I have to say I love the Go Pro Hero cameras.
They are one of the coolest new camera gadget fun toys of the last decade.
But, if you have seen the file number above, you can join me in the camp
of frustrated fans. GOPR9999 is for me what dropped calls are for Apple i-phone 4 users.
Drop head ........ shake slowly.
I think Go Pro rushed the HD Hero to market too fast. There are a couple software
issues with the new HD Hero cameras, but I could care less about all of them but
GOPR9999. Why? Cause I use the little Heros for time lapse.
Let me rewind for those of you new to the subject, I have experienced this problem with two Go Pro Hero HD cameras.
When your camera reaches the file number GOPR9999 or the 9,999 frame the camera malfunctions. The camera stops taking photos, and starts creating empty file folders until it reaches folder GOPRO999. At this point the camera shows a display but can not be turned off without taking out the battery.
I guess the root of the problem centers around the cameras inability to reset the file counter into another folder or its inability to reset to zero at all.
What about a solution? Word is that there is a firmware update on the way that will fix this and the other problems. The firmware is already past due so what can you due till then?
Well, I have been able to get the camera to reset back to file number 9500ish with the battery out. That will be good enough to shoot video but once you reach file number GOPR9999, the time lapse function of your camera is done.
I guess many owners have not encountered this problem because they have not shot 10,000 pictures. As a rabid timelapser, I shot 10,000 shots within weeks of getting the HD Hero.
So there I was, packing up my last two Egg Timer Timelapse Thing-A-Ma-Jigs. Sending them off to a perfect stranger. O.K. maybe not perfect. You know timelapse sickness when you see it and poor Philip Bloom has a full on case of it. When he made a request for some of my timelapse smack how could I refuse a fellow addict. Days later as my meet-up haze had cleared I realized I had an empty place in my life, my favorite homemade photo toys were gone.
What had I done?
What could I do?
Head back to the bench ...... bend, drill and grind out some new Thing-A-Ma-Jigs.
A year ago I made a diy video on how to make an egg timer time lapse unit. Now I have an update to bring this high tech instrument one step closer to perfection.
I'd like to think of this as an open source project, so if you have any modifications please drop me a line or a comment below. I'd also love to see your version of the Thing-A-Ma-Jig if you build one.
Its one of the most popular questions I get on my Youtube channel. The first time I tried to get this shot I attached the camera with a clamp to my seat back tray. It worked, but not great. I noticed another passenger geeking out with a GPS attached to the window with a suction cup. I guess he was tracking our every move from thirty thousand feet. On my next flight I slipped the suction cup mounted camera up on the window just before take-off. It worked great. I set the standard definition GoPro Hero camera to time lapse mode one frame every two seconds.
For the final video I sped the time lapse up to smooth it out. I find that with most time lapses its better to over shoot. In post its much easier to speed a shot up then to slow one down.
Unfortunately, this was one of the last times I flew Southwest Airlines, they just canceled all direct flights form Tampa to Dulles so I will be headed back to United. Cool video, their loss.
