GoPro for topside shooting

January 1

I am looking for a GoPro to update on my Hero2 (Lol) for boat scenes top side (RIB) and rollback in water and similar.

Ideally 10bits to stand some grading. I was looking at the hero 11 black

Is this the right choice? My camera rig is heavy and handling a gopro on a pole seems much more practical for those situations

bghazzal · January 2

It will work great for that, no worries - stabilisation is amazing since the 7 and up, and with ProTune you can set the cam to a relatively flat profile (on mine, which is a 7, it's called "native" for WB, and colour profile to "flat"), which works great for grading.

What I do in post is just start by reseting the white balance first, and then proceed to fine-tune and adjust to increase DR, contrast, saturation. Really nice.
Not as much to work with compared to a bigger camera, but still good, especially topside.

A pole mount works fine, especially with the new stabilisation capacities, but otherwise even a two handed hold directly onto the sides of the GoPro will (if not in a housing, make sure your fingers are far from the lens, so they're not in the field of view).
The great thing about a pole is that you can also dunk the camera in the water from the side of the boat, and get good footage of marine mammals and the like, and if it's long enough get good shots from above, which can be great on a dive boat.

It's funny that you should mention boat scenes, my in-laws+nieces just visited us in east Bali and I did a lot of boat-based shooting for a fishing trip on a jukung, snorkeling and also Balinese ceremonies in the evening..
For this I just had a freediving-style landyard on my wrist, then a diving coil landyard connected directly to the GoPro housing through a ring.

Compact and discreet, stable, can't lose it or flood it, just worked great.

Another slighty cheaper option you could look into for this the DJI Osmo Action Cam 4

cheers

b

Edited January 2 by bghazzal

January 2

Do I need an underwater housing if I just splash it? Say’s waterproof to 33 feet which is 10’meters

i guess it is good to protect the lens

Edited January 2 by Interceptor121

bghazzal · January 2

No need - you can even take it snorkeling, it's fine. Waterproofing was introduced with the GoPro5 and it works great.
The dive housing is good protection, and my GoPro7 doesn't have integrated mounts like the newer models, so I just use the housing (otherwise I need a frame to mount it). Newer models have some kind of mounting option on the bare cam itself I think, so you can use that to mount to stick or something else.

Not sure how it is for current models, but for older models you needed to remove the lens cover to get it to fit in the dive housing ("super suit"), but even without the lens cover the camera remains waterproof to 10m.

Edited January 2 by bghazzal

Davide DB · January 2

I left my 11s directly in a freezing river bottom for hours tons of times. No need of an housing.

However, it must be said that if you look at the orings and the locking mechanism and compare it to that of our housings, it really is an act of faith to use them without a housing.
I would use the housing to protect it from sand and salt.

January 2

Thanks guys

I will buy

GoPro 11 Black V2

3 Way 2.0

Underwaterhousing

Samsing V30 256 GB x2

Battery charger with two batteries

Anything else comes to mind?

Edited January 2 by Interceptor121

Davide DB · January 2

4 hours ago, Interceptor121 said:

Anything else comes to mind?

ND16 and ND32 filters to use in full light

fruehaufsteher2 · January 2

59 minutes ago, Interceptor121 said:

Anything else comes to mind?

A stick is hepful - i found the one from Insta surprisingly good https://store.insta360.com/product/invisible_selfie_stick_tripod

January 2

24 minutes ago, fruehaufsteher2 said:

A stick is hepful - i found the one from Insta surprisingly good https://store.insta360.com/product/invisible_selfie_stick_tripod

yes am getting the gopro 3 way that can be used as tripod and stick

fruehaufsteher2 · January 2

1 hour ago, Interceptor121 said:

yes am getting the gopro 3 way that can be used as tripod and stick

Ah, understood - "3-way" wasn't clear to me. Isn't that very short?

January 2

15 minutes ago, fruehaufsteher2 said:

Ah, understood - "3-way" wasn't clear to me. Isn't that very short?

Measures 19.5in (49.53cm) when fully extended and collapses to 8in (20.32cm)

waywardriley · January 20

I use the hero 11 basically on every dive except when teaching and I love it. I find it very hard to beat in less than 6 meters of water, even my A7S3 is struggling to beat it for wide angle in shallow water. The stabilization is sooo good on the Hero11 and I use a selfie stick (from amazon) that I can extend to about 1.5m which is really nice to get the camera closer to eagle rays or other timid animals that are scared of you. I use the GoPro brand dive housing and it's perfect. One major and often overlooked benefit of GoPro is their app and cloud storage. I have my camera set up so that when I get home from diving I just plug it in to charge and it automatically uploads all footage to the cloud and formats my SD card. Effortless and really useful when you dive daily. I only need one battery, and the one button function to turn camera on and record is so good. then one button press and the camera is off again. Love it.

Another benefit of the GoPro cloud is sharing, I just create a link for downloading the footage on the GoPro app and send to my clients. They love it and they always have the footage the same day of diving with basically zero effort from me.

To prevent loosing it I use this Gear Keeper retractor thing, Whenever I'm using the GoPro I unclip it, then when I'm done I reclip it. I don't like using it while on the tether because it's too short and limits movement, not perfect but it works.

My favorite settings for 99% of diving is:

All of underwater portions of this YouTube short was filmed with Hero 11 with the settings shown above.

This is the Joby pro (aluminum) tripod and I really like it for the GoPro. It's also sturdy enough to use with my Sony cameras topside.

A neoprene protector is good if you dive a lot.

Edited January 21 by waywardriley
added favorite settings & photos

waywardriley · January 21

On 1/2/2024 at 1:33 AM, Interceptor121 said:

Do I need an underwater housing if I just splash it? Say’s waterproof to 33 feet which is 10’meters

i guess it is good to protect the lens

The front lens is just a flat piece of glass and it's replaceable, so I wouldn't worry about that. But I really like the dive housing, make sure to buy the official GoPro brand and not a knockoff chinese one. Several friends here in Mexico did that and flooded theirs. Also if you join GoPro subscription you get better prices directly on GoPro website than I could find at B&H or my normal buying spots. And the subscription is so good with unlimited storage and only $25 for the first year.

After owning the Hero11 for exactly one year I have 1200+ videos on my GoPro cloud and hundreds of dives on with zero issues. It's a great camera.

Edited January 21 by waywardriley

January 21

15 hours ago, waywardriley said:

I use the hero 11 basically on every dive except when teaching and I love it. I find it very hard to beat in less than 6 meters of water, even my A7S3 is struggling to beat it for wide angle in shallow water. The stabilization is sooo good on the Hero11 and I use a selfie stick (from amazon) that I can extend to about 1.5m which is really nice to get the camera closer to eagle rays or other timid animals that are scared of you. I use the GoPro brand dive housing and it's perfect. One major and often overlooked benefit of GoPro is their app and cloud storage. I have my camera set up so that when I get home from diving I just plug it in to charge and it automatically uploads all footage to the cloud and formats my SD card. Effortless and really useful when you dive daily. I only need one battery, and the one button function to turn camera on and record is so good. then one button press and the camera is off again. Love it.

Another benefit of the GoPro cloud is sharing, I just create a link for downloading the footage on the GoPro app and send to my clients. They love it and they always have the footage the same day of diving with basically zero effort from me.

To prevent loosing it I use this Gear Keeper retractor thing, Whenever I'm using the GoPro I unclip it, then when I'm done I reclip it. I don't like using it while on the tether because it's too short and limits movement, not perfect but it works.

My favorite settings for 99% of diving is:

5.3K | 60fps | FOV: Linear | Hypersmooth: on | 10-bit | Bit Rate: High | WB: Auto | Sharpness: Medium | Color: Natural | QuikCapture: on | Screensavers: Never | Beeps: off | Auto cloud upload : On | Auto clear SD card after upload: on |

All of underwater portions of this YouTube short was filmed with Hero 11 with the settings shown above.

This is the Joby pro (aluminum) tripod and I really like it for the GoPro. It's also sturdy enough to use with my Sony cameras topside.

A neoprene protector is good if you dive a lot.

I used that solution around 10 years ago wrapping the gorilla on my arm but underwater for timelapse the goeillapod is made of plastic and you get a screw adapter. Now I have a ball mount for the housing but I think is unlikely that I will take it underwater

waywardriley · January 21

6 hours ago, Interceptor121 said:

I used that solution around 10 years ago wrapping the gorilla on my arm but underwater for timelapse the goeillapod is made of plastic and you get a screw adapter. Now I have a ball mount for the housing but I think is unlikely that I will take it underwater

This one is the aluminum "5K", and it's really good. I had the plastic one and broke it the second time I used it.

https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1359596-REG/joby_jb01508_gorillapod_5k_kit.html?gad_source=1

Edited January 21 by waywardriley

January 21

4 minutes ago, waywardriley said:

This one is the aluminum "5K", and it's really good. I had the plastic one and broke it the second time I used it.

https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1359596-REG/joby_jb01508_gorillapod_5k_kit.html?gad_source=1

No what I mean is the following

Use the gorillapod 3K and then screw in a dedicated go pro adapter forget about the ball part that will break due to salt

You do need a complete plastic one. I have the 5K but I don take it in water

waywardriley · January 21

7 minutes ago, Interceptor121 said:

No what I mean is the following

Use the gorillapod 3K and then screw in a dedicated go pro adapter forget about the ball part that will break due to salt

You do need a complete plastic one. I have the 5K but I don take it in water

Oh I see. I have only used mine in the pool, so that's good to know. there are probably some steel parts or springs in the ball head.

January 21

Just now, waywardriley said:

Oh I see. I have only used mine in the pool, so that's good to know. there are probably some steel parts or springs in the ball head.

Yes they corrode and the part goes toast

You need this

https://ulcs.com/product/gp-tri-mount-video-accessory/

You screw it on the Gorillapod 3K 100% plastic (only non plastic is the screw that you can replace)

You loose the ability to use the head but with the legs this is sufficient for timelapse use

waywardriley · January 21

3 hours ago, Interceptor121 said:

Yes they corrode and the part goes toast

You need this

https://ulcs.com/product/gp-tri-mount-video-accessory/

You screw it on the Gorillapod 3K 100% plastic (only non plastic is the screw that you can replace)

You loose the ability to use the head but with the legs this is sufficient for timelapse use

Oh, ya I already have one of those in the photo on my Joby tripod. I just don't usually remove the ball head. But in salt water I will remove the ball head like you said.

Edited January 21 by waywardriley

January 26

Quick message to say very happy with the topside set up especially the ND filters

one thing that is not good is the GoPro 3way tripod the head moves and vibrates very easy not recommended

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GoPro for topside shooting

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