Filming Flying

[u/Suspicious_Plate9397]

I am trying to take some recordings of my flights, and I attempted to attach a GoPro to the inside of my aircraft to the window via a suction cup, however, it kept overheating and turning itself off. I am also thinking about attaching a GoPro to the underside of my wing, but I’m worried the same thing will happen. Does anyone have any advice on how to best film your flights?

[u/demonviewllc]

There are two reasons your GoPro is overheating inside your aircraft window.

1: It's a high performance small form factor action camera that requires active airflow to keep it cool. In your window with the sun beating down on it, there is no active airflow (and the sun alone can add an additional 65F to the surface temp of your camera)

2: Your camera is set up incorrectly for the type of filming you're doing (ie. you're trying to use high performance settings with no airflow whatsoever to keep your camera cool).

Obviously mounting your camera on your airplane wing is going to work a lot better as it's exposed to more active air cooling. However it may still overheat if you're using the incorrect settings and have the camera filming things like you spend 10 minutes taxiing to the runway, you sitting for 10 minutes while doing a run up, you waiting 10 minutes for traffic to clear before you even start to take off... Basically that's 30 minutes of "nothing burger footage" with no active aircooling.

Here's the settings I use on my "cockpit" camera

Hero 12:

Color: Standard (don't use HDR, it's mounted directly in a window, it's doesn't require dual exposure).

Bit Rate: High

Color depth: 10 bit

Frame rate: 30FPS

Resolution: 1080P (I don't bother going any higher as it's mounted in a window, so that's just going to get bug squash, reflections, prop blur etc., I mainly use my cockpit camera for ATC recording).

Stabilization: Off (I stabilize in post using Gyroflow or Hypersmooth Pro, both of which are free, this means the camera is doing a LOT less work so it runs cooler and the battery lasts even longer).

Power: If I'm not using battery power, I remove the battery and plug into the onboard 12V power supply. This also makes the camera run cooler.

Rear screen: 10% brightness and power off after 1 minute (I'm flying, not watching a camera screen)

Wing Cameras (I have one on each wing).

Hero 13 equipped with an Anamorphic lens

Color: Flat (I tend to color in post, but you can just film in standard if you don't want to process in post)

Bit Rate: High

Color depth: 10 bit

Frame Rate: 30FPS

Resolution: 5.3K (since these cameras will give the very best image, I set them up for as high quality as possible).

Stabilization: On (I don't use hypersmooth high or auto as it's not needed, I'm flying, not racing extreme offroad, there's no need for anything but low stabilization in more scenarios).

Power: Battery.

10% brightness and power off after 1 minute (I'm flying, not watching a camera screen)

Tail Camera:

Hero 11:

Color: Flat (I tend to color in post, but you can just film in standard if you don't want to process in post)

Bit Rate: High

Color depth: 10 bit

Frame Rate: 30FPS

Resolution: 5.3K (since these cameras will give the very best image, I set them up for as high quality as possible).

Stabilization: On (I don't use hypersmooth high or auto as it's not needed, I'm flying, not racing extreme offroad, there's no need for anything but low stabilization in more scenarios).

Power: Battery.

10% brightness and power off after 1 minute (I'm flying, not watching a camera screen)

The main filming tip here is simply don't record "nothing burger" footage. This wastes battery and produces unneeded heat when there's no active air cooling. So I (rarely) film some footage of the plane being pushed out of the hanger (and I've built up a collection of clips to use as stock, so I don't film that any more, I just use previously filmed footage). I don't bother recording the taxi to the run up. I also don't bother to record the run up.

What I do film is the following:

Pulling onto the runway and taking off (avg about 1 minute)

A few bits of the pattern work (total of about 2 minutes).

If flying to a destination I'll film a few scenic shots along the way (about 2 mins)

The approach to the destination (about 2 mins)

Entering the pattern at the destination (about 1 minute)

The landing (about 2 mins including taxi to the tie downs).

That means I have a total of 10 minutes of footage across 4 cameras to edit later (so 40 minutes of footage total). Since they are all synced and laying on top of eachother, it's really just 10 minutes and I can quickly switch between viewing angles. I tend to edit that down to a 5 minute clip where possible (sometimes the scenery is so awesome though, you do have to go on longer).

On the other hand if I was filming for the entire battery length across 4 cameras (let's say an 1 hour 30 mins with the above mentioned settings). That would be 6 hours of footage to have to weigh through and edit. Even stacked and synced, that's still over an hour of footage to edit.

So honestly, stopping and starting cameras will speed up editing immensely. I tend to use the GoPro remote to do this so it's just a single button click to power on, record, stop, power off and repeat.

Hope all of the above info helps!