I personally have never used an action camera because I didn't want to worry about the perfect shot and whatnot. Plus I've never liked short-range, low-quality shots.
Since the Insta360s have become available (particularly the x3) the topic seems much more interesting to me, especially because the 360? shots give the possibility of filming (quite in third person) everything that happens and then choosing what you prefer to show in videos.
Apart from the X3 / similar tools I've always had the desire to find a drone that it could fly autonomously (without a pilot) and that it could follow the action or the subject with the "active track" / "follow me" / similar functions. This way it would be possible to not need another person time and work. Is there such a thing? Works well? Is it worth the effort and expense? Thx
It was (and possibly still is) possible to get a drone with a "follow me" function. The user wears a watch, it follows the watch.
in all honesty though, compared to human operated drones the footage is clunky. The drone can only follow the watch, so there are no dynamic moves, or dodging you at the last second if you get it to follow close. Could be cool if you just want some footage and you don't mind clunky..
Make this and try it with a friend's camera:
My favourite is a:
Flymount to hold RDM or MDM. mast or SDM very high. Or boom head / tail. 20cm aluminium extension arm
GoPro 360 or regular GoPro with a swivel mount and maybe another 90? angle mount.
youtube.com/@berowne
I have used action camera's for a long time. Usually mounted on the helmet on the front (close to eye level).
Initial camera's had horribe stabilization and not so good wide angle. All of that has improved a lot, including the resolutions. 4k is quite normal, but you need quite a bit of CPU power in video editing. I like the higher frame-rates to be able slow-motion effect without stutter.
It offets an exciting insight from your own perspective. I liked the Garmin Virb Ultra 30 due to it's build-in sensors and able to overlay the video very easy with important data as Speed, Heading, G-force, track-position.
Later I also purchased the 360 camera from GoPro, the Max, not the Fusion as it was quite a bit better, also in post-processing. GPS overlay is only possible in non-360 mode unfortunately. But have some great shots mounted on the front or back of the boom. The post processing or reframing a 16:9 picture out of the 360 data is a very nice feature indeed. The Insta software clearly beats the GoPro software here.
I also have a drone. Initially a Mavic1 Pro. Great little flying camera. But no matter what the manufacturer wants you to believe the tracking is not good. I was surprised to see it could fly almost 2km over water to capture stunning video, but always of friends and never from myself. It would fly only ~15-20min on a single battery. And you need to bit of time to get in position for a shot. Later I purchased the Mavic 3 Pro and it has a lot more flight time, and a better camera, and a controller with a build-in screen (optional). This one is perfect, still no good tracking, but in FCC mode the reception is awsome and the flight times double of the Mavic1, so 30-40min. It can fly ~40kn speed, so in windspeeds of 25kn you can easily fly and return. Amazing stability of flight and easy to use, but again you can't film yourself...
In a nutshell optical tracking doesn't work over water. The hardware assisted tracking worked but just like action cam and 360 footage it's only good for very short clips. Watching 10 minutes of people just going straight isn't the most exciting content to watch.
