Take us for a drive in your country

Well I went out today to get a video for this, and the mount worked quite well (a bit of shaking, but its a suction mount that cost me ?4). The only issues were that there was too much traffic (too many cars getting in my way on the winding country roads :( and a polariser I taped onto the front of the camera caused a horrible loud rattling that obviously you can only hear on the video. I also overtook one of the cars (40 in a 60? Come on...) in a way that some would put in the Stupid drivers thread, but it was perfectly fine. Anyway nice drive, but it was a pain to be stuck behind cars most of the way, so I'll have to try again at some other time. Maybe a different route thats a bit shorter. :p
 
Man, where is my GoPro? :( The seller hasn't even responded to the sale.
 
Cross posted from my 'Post Your Car' thread, some videos I took with my dads GoPro

The videos are from a place called Huntington/Eccles scenic byway, specifically Huntington Canyon.
this is an excerpt from the whole video, which shows going up Fairview Canyon, and all the way down to Huntington. Going up Fairview is not terribly interesting since its quite a steep pull, and since my car has such long gearing, its a bit of a struggle to get up at a reasonable speed. the elevation does not help..

so, anyways, these videos start at the top of Fairview, around 9,000 ft, and end near the town of Huntington
(map)

the first and second videos are just going along the top of the ridge, rising from ~8,800 ft to nearly ~9,800 ft, dropping down into Upper Joe's Valley, ending near the descent to Electric Lake.

The third and fourth videos are more interesting, they are where the road begins to get more twisty, but is open enough to take the corners at some speed. I don't think I drop below 50mph in the third video, and I don't go much below 60 in the fourth. I don't go much above those speeds either for that matter, the Fairlane handles fairly well for what it is, but the chassis was designed in the 60's, and it was designed for comfort, not speed. These videos end near Bear Creek Campground, ~6,600 ft.



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[video=youtube;rmegsRzw-kY]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rmegsRzw-kY[/video]

I hate hidden speedtraps. Didn't get me though, I smell these guys by now.
 
Wait, that was a speed trap? How could you tell?
 
A drive through Hamburg from a customer back to work, this time with less tire noise since I have new tires and less rattles, I squeezed the camera firmer between the backrest and the headrest.

 
Well this isn't annoying in the slightest....I start recording my drive to the mall but the phone kills the camera app...losing everything...so annoying. Of course I'll be relying on using the phone for navigaton on the way back soooo....?
 
Day 6 and still no gopro... COME OOOOON! :( I see that the gopro has actually quite bad audio, so I'll be looking into getting a dictaphone for audio recording (of inside the car). Wish I could borrow one to test. Apparently the Olympus range is very good.
 
Alright, here is what I would call my first serious attempt at making a HD video while driving around my my car. Ignore the occasional rattling of the tripod. Eventually I will also get rid of that or come up with another solution.

Basically this is my way back home from work in the afternoon, with a rather large detour to be honest, which includes stopping at a pharmacy and getting some dinner at a McDrive ;)

I tweaked the sound a bit on these and I think I will do that always now. I noticed, that the microphone of those cameras record a disproportional amount of deep frequencies, resulting in subwoofers working overtime. That's not natural, because it's not how you sense it in the car. So I used a highpass filter to cut off frequencies below 60 Hertz, which results in a much more natural soundscape of the inside of the car.

I added some movie music for the mood and here you go:



 
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You might want to also apply a de-hiss filter so you're just left with the muted engine sound and the tripod rattle. ;)
 
Of course I tried that. That would also kill the hightones, though. And a little noise is not too bad.

I think I will ditch the whole tripod idea, at least for my car. I think I will try the squeeze-between-head-and-backrest method again, that I used at the beginning, and see, what potential that has. I think it has some advantages concerning vibrations and will also keep the picture steadier.
 
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I'm getting a 40 euro dictaphone that has an external microphone especially tailored to just pick up voices (like those lapelle mics they use in talkshows, etc). If not perfect, it'll at least be a lot better than the mic that comes with the gopro.
 
Alright, here's the first extended test drive with my new camera. Drove about 50 km from Wilhelmshaven to Oldenburg and back, mostly Autobahn.

This is completely uncut and untreated, in a Golf instead of a fancy Jaaag or S-Class, so kinda like Autobahn unplugged, as millions of commuters encounter it everyday. The journey there was done between 9:15 and 9:45 am and the journey back about an hour later. So I avoided most of the rush hour traffic and had a clear way.

Was shitty weather that day but and it wasn't for fun. I actually had an appointment at 9:45 am and was a bit late, therefore you might notice me driving a little bit with a knife between my teeth on the way there.

First here's the journey there, the journey back will be added later, since Vimeo screwed up and I have to upload it again...


 
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Do you have a vimeo pro account since you upload so much there?
 
Yes.
 
It costs money but it saves nerves, for they won't censor your videos for half of the world, when you put some music in or let the radio running. Thanks to whoever pointed me to Vimeo here on the forum. If he raises his arm, he'll get a cookie from me.
 
I've been using it for years, but only had the free account. I'll upgrade next month when I need more storage when the GoPro arrives.
 
I guess this is a good thread to ask, can someone recommend a program transfer .mov files to .avi?

My camera records in .mov but Windows movie maker can't read that file. Should I use another editor? What do you guys use?

I'm new to the video making thing so I need some help... Also, how big are those 10+ minute videos if you want to post them in 720p?
 
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