GoPro Hero 3 – Maximising for Mountain Biking

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Our lives are becoming viral, our actions recorded and our thoughts broadcast around the world. Modern cultures are changing faster than the human race has ever experienced in the past, and technology that featured in Sci-Fi films not thirty years ago, is quickly becoming a reality. We now live in a world where the internet is in our pockets, smart-phones are the norm and everyone has easy access to a camera… We are truly living in an age where life is visually documented. GoPro is undoubtedly the world’s leading small outdoor and sports camera manufacturer. There is no question about it, everywhere you go you see people with GoPro cameras, be it the trail centre, down the beach or jumping out of a plane on TV. Simply put, GoPro’s Hero cameras are everywhere…

GoPro – “have passionate ideas about what’s possible in this world. These passions lead them to create experiences and realities that expand our world and inspire those around us.

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Words: Dominic Simmons | Photos: Dominic Simmons/GoPro

Late last year, GoPro unexpectedly released their newest version of the ‘Hero’ camera, amply naming it the ‘Hero 3’. This new camera was a major overhaul compared to the previous two versions, mainly in size and built-in features. Whilst at it, GoPro also released two lower quality, cheaper versions in an attempt to grab an even bigger piece of the market. We won’t delve too deeply into the full specifications just now, as you can check them out on the GoPro website. What we would like to do, however, is try and help you get the most out of your awesome GoPro cameras. Over the next few months we will have various articles covering all aspects of the camera usage and whilst these are focused mainly on the new Hero 3 Black model, many of the lessons learnt can be used on other GoPro models as well. To begin with, we are going to show you how to get the most out of shooting with your GoPro camera, covering various situations and when best to use the fantastic features…

RESOLUTION AND FRAME RATE

The Hero 3 Black Edition has the advantage of giving the user a multitude of different resolutions and frame rates to shoot in. This could be the first hurdle for some that are new to the customisation of these cameras.

ResolutionHero3cropThis handy little diagram shows you the various different resolutions available with the Hero 3 Black (we will often refer to this as the “H3B” here on FJ for ease) and what they represent. To help explain, 1080p (1920×1080) is ‘Full HD’ the standard that everyone is now accustomed to with HD televisions and should be considered the standard setting. 720p (1280×720) is effectively half the picture size of 1080p. An interesting inclusion is the 960p (960×1280) setting, this has the same horizontal size as the 720p mode, but the vertical height is larger, meaning that you end up with a 4:3 aspect ratio.

Now that the HD settings have been covered, lets look at those larger resolutions… 1440p or ‘2.7k’ is an increased resolution over HD and with that you get the larger frame size. 4k is an even bigger resolution and one that many feature films are now being shot at. Incase you were wandering what that tiny ‘WVGA’ setting is in the corner; that’s Standard Definition.

The H3B is capable of shooting in various different frame rates – the usual 25/50fps and 30/60fps are available dependant on your region, but the camera can now also shoot up to 240fps. The 2.7k and 4k resolutions have a ‘Cine’ setting where the frame rates are 24fps and 12fps respectively, and have slightly different, more ‘cinematic’ aspect ratios, but this will not really be of much concern to most people, especially when the average home computers would probably fall over and die if they tried to edit a 2.7 or 4K video file!

Below we outline what we think to be the best resolutions and frame rates to use for different circumstances:

BEST IMAGE QUALITY:
You may be thinking that we will now say ‘choose 4k for the highest quality’ and you would be correct, but realistically the inclusion of this resolution is a bit silly as only shooting 15fps will make your footage look very ‘stuttery’ and generally not that nice as soon as something moving appears in the frame (Rumour has it that a firmware upgrade is due that will increase the frame rates in 4k mode, but this has not been confirmed). So, for the best image quality we would advice you use the 2.7k resolution setting. Note that unless you have a MicroSD card with a 10x speed of higher, you will have difficulty shooting in 2.7k mode. You will find that with slower cards, the camera will stop recording after about 8 seconds as the buffer becomes full. It would be useful to note that increasing the resolution, and frame rate for that matter as below, will reduce battery life, so be careful!

SUPER SLOW MOTION:
For this, we would advice people to use the 720p 120 setting. This should give you some really nice, crisp slow motion whilst still retaining that HD quality. You could go even slower to 240fps in WVGA mode, but then you lose the HD quality, and we would rather retain that any day! Be aware that you may have issues editing footage with such high frame rates though!

LONGEST RECORDING TIMES:
For the longest recording times, allowing you to store as much time as possible on the one microSD card, there are three different settings to choose from. These are 720p50, 1440p25 and 1080p25. We like to have the highest quality possible, so given the opportunity, would pick the full HD 1080p setting, although recording at higher resolutions decreases battery life…

HIGHEST QUALITY WITH SLOW MOTION:
For this, there is only really one option, and that is to use 1080p60/50. You could even use this as your standard setting, as the extra frames recorded will provide you with a smoother more flowing looking video (a bit like watching The Hobbit in 3D HFR), and you can always edit the footage after to remove the extra frames if your editing software allows that.

STANDARD SETTING:
As a standard setting for your GoPro camera, we would personally advice 1080p 30/25. This will give you fantastic quality images at the standard regional frame rate. One downside to this however, is that you can’t just slow something down if a bit looks cool, as there are not the extra frames being recorded to allow this to work properly. We are sticklers for quality here at Factory Jackson, so don’t be surprised if you see us using the 2.7k setting a lot!

Whilst recording at such high quality is great, it can have its drawbacks. For one, most online streaming of videos is done at 720p or less. This can often be determined by your internet speeds, but remember that different websites only allow certain resolutions and some add more compression upon upload than others (Facebook is bad!). Also, you may find your computer struggling to handle the highly intensive requirements of higher resolutions or higher frame rates. So, just keep this in mind, and check out the GoPro system requirements just to be safe!

Changing the resolution and frame rate is easy by simply cycling through to the ‘Settings’ menu, entering the first mode that appears which has a rectangle and some arrows as its thumbnail, then moving down to the ‘RES:’ and ‘FPS:’ options. 

PROTUNE MODE

‘Protune’ is a special mode built in to the camera (and available to Hero 2 owners through a free firmware upgrade) that gives the professional filmmakers some essential tools. Protune mode is where you will find the best use of the 4k and 2.7k ‘Cine’ settings. The main advantages to using Protune as a professional are the ability to shoot in 24p meaning that you don’t have to do time-consuming frame rate conversions. The 35Mbps data rate will increase quality further and transfer information quicker to the mircoSD card, allowing for a very neutral colour profile along with very flat Log-like curve encoding which increases flexibility in post production. At this point, we should note that the 4k and 4kCine settings are only available in Protune mode.

Unless you plan to do a lot of colour correction or other post production with the footage, we would advice users to stay out of Protune, as to avoid any disappointment or confusion. You may want to have a play around though?

To access Protune, cycle through the shooting modes on the main menu using the on/off button, until you reach the image of a spanner. Pressing the record button once whilst on this image takes you to the ‘Settings’. Once in here, continue to cycle through until you get to the ‘Capture Settings’ menu and once again enter this menu and cycle through until you reach ‘Protune’. Entering Protune gives you the option of turning it off (Automatically off from new) or on. This may sound like a long system, but when you only have two buttons to press, it really couldn’t be simpler. 

GoPro3PT

OTHER KEY FEATURES

One of the other neat features packed into the Hero 3 is the option of manually setting your White Balance. Annoyingly this is only available when you are using Protune… White balance is simply setting the ‘warmth’ of your image depending on different lighting situations.

To set manual white balance, you must first turn Protune on using the instructions above. Then within the same part of the menu system you can access the ‘White Balance’ settings. The camera is automatically set to ‘Auto’ but there are four manual settings; 3000K, 5500K, 6500K and CamRAW. CamRAW lets you set white balance using the GoPro software for your computer. Judging what Kelvin setting to use for white balance can sometimes be hard, but if you are used to similar settings for your DSLR and so on, then there are some advantages to using the manual white balance setting. Whilst the auto WB on the GoPro cameras is generally very good, but if you are travelling at speed or between different outdoor lighting situations it can sometimes struggle and produce an image that is slightly too blue or too warm. Having this setting could be useful if you are riding in and out of trees where the available light is constantly changing. 

The Hero 3 Black and Silver come equipped with the ability to change the field of view depending on how wide you want your shot to look. There are three settings are ‘Wide’, ‘Medium’ and ‘Narrow’, with the ‘Narrow’ settings being the most ‘zoomed-in’.

This can be useful if you are wanting to eliminate some of the GoPro’s infamous fisheye appearance, however due to the way that the GoPro reduces the field of view, you will find a decrease in image quality the narrower you go. To change your field of view simply cycle through to the ‘Settings’ menu, enter the first mode that appears which has a rectangle and some arrows as its thumbnail, then tab down to the ‘FDV:’ option and enter this by pressing the record button once. From here you can choose any of the three field of view settings. ‘Wide’ field of view is set as standard.

A nice feature that has been included with the Hero 2 and but lacking in the Hero 3 range is the ability to plug in an external 3.5mm microphone, most commonly a small shotgun microphone. It does seem odd that the microphone input is lacking in the Hero 3 range, however, GoPro do sell an aftermarket adapter for £19.99. Whilst most people will not have a use for this, it is a handy inclusion. Having said this, it may be that GoPro feel the need to attach an external microphone as less necessary because of the upgraded internal microphone. This is now upgraded to a set of stereo microphones which should offer substantial improvements over previous built-in mics.

To attach a microphone, all you need to do is ensure that your microphone has a 3.5mm jack and simply push it into the microphone slot on the side of the camera (Hero 2) or into the adapter (Hero 3). This will allow you to record reasonably good audio and is perfect if you are wanting a small recording set-up for shooting in confined or obscure locations – maybe not a necessity for when you are just using your GoPro on your helmet whilst out riding.

Stay tuned for more articles covering further tips to get the most from your camera out on the trail with reviews of some of the accessories on the market as well, but until then, click the logo below to find out more about GoPro. Happy trails, Dom!

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