Originally Posted by
denada
i got a gopro session. it's a gopro hero 4 in a 1.5 inch cube. it cost me almost nothing. i record everything. 1080, 30fps. i'm not 100 percent sure why. in case of an accident to some extent, but that's not the real reason. the video is amazing. especially cutting through downtown chicago at night. i find it beautiful. i'm not sure what to do with the footage yet. it's quickly filling up terabytes of external storage. i'm a photographer -- with a focus on street -- so it's some sort of instinct. i'll make a project out of it. i don't have direction yet.
do you record? if so, why? with what?
I've been recording my rides for almost 6 years now. It's mostly in case something bad happens. Initially I wanted to save everything, but I quickly decided that if nothing remarkable happened to just wipe the card.
At first I was excited to be able to record close calls and instances where drivers were "less than courteous". What I learned was that many times the camera and I "remembered" things differently. What I thought was close, was not so close...and that's not a function of the lens' fish-eye distortion, it's a function of adrenaline-fueled distortion.
I also learned my reaction to events and drivers was not so pretty, and I have learned to not over-react and vent so much.
But another thing I found was that I had a way to capture, edit and save and share all the beauty and excitement of my rides. Granted, the commute routes can get a little stale, but I have enough routes and variations of routes and weather to always find something new every few weeks. The first time I sent my parents a link to some commute videos they were relieved. I had been riding to work for almost 25 years at that point, and they, spending most of their nearly 80 years in Chicago had always assumed the worst when imagining my rides. Of course, I had grown up riding my bike in Chicago in the most irresponsible and dangeroous ways, so I guess that didn't help their imagination any.
WIth social media and the internet, I can also share rides with friends and family here, and across the globe. Itherwise, all my wife knows about my riding is the neon geek who leaves the house, and the sweaty, greasy mess that shows up afterwards.
And then there's me. I like to go back and look at some of the rides and remember the joy of the experiences. I supose without a camera, I'd journal about my rides. I work in audio and video production, so I have a library of music to pick and edit the rides to. I usually erase the source files after editing, so the storage needs aren't great.
In almost six years, I have used my helmet cam video less than 5 times to record a license plate. And I've only reported it to the cops twice. Usually if there's a dangerous driver I call it in on the cellphone right then.
Editing is the key. It is difficult to sit through un-edited ride video, except that year I was off the bike. It was before I started recording and when I was able to get back on the treadmill I watched other peoples unedited commute footage while I walked and eventually ran. It felt a little like riding, except the videos from countries where they drive on the left...that just hurt my brain.
Here's a link to my Youtube playlist:
https://www.youtube.com/user/bgvideo62/playlists