Guide: How to extract GPS data from the CF-100 .AVI video files

Kip

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Dash Cam
JooVuu X, Shadow GT550WS, Blacksys CF-100 (dead & gone)
Using unbelievably old, unsupported and outdated software, I have found a way to extract the GPS data from the CF-100 video files. I don't think anybody has done this before (if they have, I haven't found anything yet). I can't guarantee this will work for you on your system, but, I will list all the steps I've done and post screenshots to assist. I'm using an AMD based Acer Aspire 5551 laptop running Windows 7 64-bit.

When done, you should have your GPS data available to you in a format of your choice, which you could then use to create a video of your speed and/or location using an animated map. You then simply load that into your video editor of choice to overlay on top of your actual footage. It is even possible to do custom designed speedometers if you want.

You can also tweak this method to extract the front video, rear video and audio streams from your raw footage however you fancy, in a similar manner to Gibson99's script.

P.S. I will make an example video up sometime, until then, some useful (and free!) post-extraction software I've come across:

Handbrake-
https://handbrake.fr/
Very useful open source video transcoder.

DashWare-
http://www.dashware.net/
After converting your files to MP4 using Handbrake, load them + GPX files into DashWare to sync and overlay all sorts of gauges. It's not a full featured video editor, however, there is a way to use Chroma Key to export only the gauges. You can also create a template of your favourite gauges and their on-screen size and positions so every new project matches up perfectly. Check the DashWare tutorials page.

GPX Animator-
http://zdila.github.io/gpx-animator/
Requires Java
Used to create an animated map from GPX files, exports to a video format you could then overlay in your main video editor. Takes a bit of tweaking to find the right settings... but it does work! This little gem may require a setup guide all on its own.

CycleCam-
https://sites.google.com/site/verymadmart/cyclecam
Requires Java and QuickTime, designed for Macs
Can create video overlay using GPS data to use with your main video editor. However, I can't get it to work on my Windows 7 machine.

GPX Editor-
https://sourceforge.net/projects/gpxeditor/
Useful for fixing and combining multiple GPX files (DashWare is best used with a single GPX file, as each gauge you use can only take data from one file).
 
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- Step 1 -

We need something called GraphEdit. This software is Windows only, unfortunately. I'm using the latest version (I think): 10 090704 (July 04, 2009). I did say old software, didn't I?

TIP: I've now found that there are more up to date alternatives to GraphEdit available, called GraphEditPlus and GraphStudio, which may be worth a look.

I got it from here: http://www.videohelp.com/download/graphedit10-090724.zip

Some extra information on this page: http://www.videohelp.com/software/Graphedit

Unzip and place the folder wherever you like, it does not need to be installed.

We will also need Registrator Viewer. Yes, I know it does not support .AVI files, but, we need it anyway... I'm using 6.0.0.8, because that is just what I already have.
 
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- Step 2 -

Run graphedt_x64.exe (that is the version I used, 32-bit version will probably work too)

A new document (called a graph) is already open for you. We use filters to make GraphEdit do useful stuff for us. Click the blue square-looking 'Insert New Filter' button (circled red).
pic1.png

In the list that opens next, find and click on 'DirectShow Filters'.
pic2.png

Next, click on 'File Source (Async.)'.
pic3.png

Finally, click the big grey 'Insert Filter' button.

You will now be given the option to find and select the raw CF-100 video file you want the GPS data from. Choose it, and a new filter will be placed in your graph. Which is great, except it doesn't do anything on its own. It should look like this:
pic4.png

Click the blue 'Insert New Filter' button again from the main screen and again go to 'DirectShow Filters'. This time, we are going to insert 'AVI Splitter', 'AVI Mux', and 'File Writer'. Upon inserting 'File Writer', you will be asked to decide your output file. Navigate to the folder you want to use, and type in a NEW filename, make sure you include the .AVI file extension and that the type is 'All media files' before you click 'Open'. If you've entered a new filename, 'Open' will not actually open anything, so don't worry. If you've entered an existing filename (within that folder of course), GraphEdit will output it's result to that file, so be careful. You can now close the 'Insert Filter' list, and should have something like this:
pic5.png

Now it's time to join the dots and make all this work. You need to click the pins and drag the line over to the other pin you need. You can also click and drag the boxes around to make it look nicer. Make your connections in order of left to right like my picture:
pic6.png

Last bit! If yours looks like mine then it's time to click 'Play'. When the loading bar stops, it has finished. The loading bar probably won't get to the end, but once it disappears, it's done.
pic7.png pic8.png

You should now find you have a small (sub ~1MB) .AVI file in the folder you selected with the filename you gave it. If you attempt to play this file in VLC as it is, it will simply stop and do nothing, as there are no video or audio streams present.
 
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- Step 3 -

Open Registrator Viewer.

TIP: I was getting multiple script errors using Registrator Viewer when set to display Google Maps. Try switching to Open Street Maps instead if you also run into this problem.

Go to File -> Convert GPS Log. Click on the little green + symbol to add your newly created file from GraphEdit.
pic9.png

Make sure All Files are visible otherwise it won't show up in the list.
pic10.png

Notice the Points column has a value in it? With a raw CF-100 file, it just says "Error".
pic11.png

Make sure the checkbox for your file is ticked, also check any boxes for the formats you want. You now have two options. You can simply hit the big 'Convert' button as is but there isn't much feedback as to if the job was successful or not. If you do this, go to the folder your GraphEdit exported .AVI is in (test.avi in my case) and look to see if it has put a new file in there with the GPS file extension you chose (there should be one file for each format you chose, eg. test.gpx).

You can also convert the GPS from multiple .AVI files into one GPS format file, by checking the 'Merge into one file' box.
pic12.png

If you use the 'Merge into one file' option, when completed, it will open the folder of your new GPS files for you. The ones highlighted in green are one per .AVI file, the ones in blue are from using the 'Merge into one file' option.
pic13.png

TIP: When converting your GraphEdit 'video' into a proper GPS file, I've only tested the 'Merge into one file' option once. It more or less put the parts in the wrong order, possibly due to one clip being only 4 seconds long... If this happens to you, do each file one by one and combine them manually using GPX Editor.

To quickly test your new GPS file, upload and map it to a website like this: http://www.gpsvisualizer.com/
No registration is required and it's very quick. If all's well, it should be able to put your route onto Google maps and display it to you.
pic14.png

You can also play your GraphEdit "video" in Registrator Viewer and it will play your route and speed to you. Just open it (need to view All files again) as you would with any other video file.

And that's it! If you succeed, please show in this thread. I'd also like to see any creative ideas you can come up with using the GPS data in your YouTube videos or similar.

P.S. It's also possible that this trick might work for other dashcams with embedded GPS data. If it works for you with another dashcam, please let everyone know (either here or in your own dashcam's subforum). Also remember to include any extra steps or differences (if any) between my guide and getting it to work for your dashcam.

P.P.S. There may be quicker ways than that of my guide to do all this if you play around a bit with GraphEdit. Any shortcuts you find that speed up or make the process easier (especially when working with multiple files) are welcome.
 
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Just a quick post to say I've updated the first post. I've listed some useful software to give an idea of the sort of things that are now possible once you get your GPS data extracted. It took me longer to find all that software and figure it all out than it did to actually work out how to get the GPS data in the first place! Once I got the GPS data, I didn't really know how to use it for anything until I really started looking into it. I expected it to be easy and to find all sorts of software to do what I wanted but it was quite difficult actually. I'll make up a short example clip hopefully one day soon showing map, speedo and whatever else fancy but useless data I can chuck in!
 
Re: cycle cam - don't try to use it on windows if it requires QuickTime. Qt has some pretty serious documented security flaws and apple has publicly stated that they aren't doing any more updates to qt for windows. So having it on your PC is a big risk.

Looking forward to trying this next time I work on a compilation video... I had been planning to try doing a screen capture video of the blacksys software to capture the speedo, but this can be much more flexible.
 
Thanks for that tip on QuickTime, since CycleCam doesn't work anyway I'll take it off.

I'm currently using DashWare in my 2nd compilation to put the speed in certain clips. If I offset the GPS by 2 seconds it syncs perfectly with the footage (can see the speed in the footage change and hear the engine speed change in correlation with the GPS speed, emulating a real speedometer pretty well). It's a lot easier than messing around with the Blacksys software but it does mean I have to convert video files a couple of times (which takes ages on my old laptop).
 
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