Searching for cam for very particular use

zsiegler

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Hey!

I've taken a glance through the site looking for some very specific details but have had a hard time finding what I'm looking for.

I work for a billboard company. We are always in need of photos of our billboards from the driver's vantage point. I'm looking for a camera that not only takes high quality still photos (wide angle is probably going to be best) but I also would like to find one that will geo-tag each photo so that at the end of the day I can upload the photos into a map.

Does anything like this exist? Are there any options with a remote shutter button? A viewing screen would also be necessary.


Any suggestions would help immensely!

Thanks.
 
Hi zsiegler, welcome to the forum.
Using a dashcam might not be the best idea due to the wide angle lenses they all use, that do skew the distance feel in the images, making things appear further avay and smaller than they are.
I would just use a pocket camera, they have high resolution sensors and most also have build in GPS to geotag the pictures.
I assume you cant allways stop to take picture from the road, so i would just burst shoot as i drive by on the road.
 
geo tagging photos is pretty much a standard feature of any smartphone camera these days, possibly better for the job as you really want a view from the drivers perspective which may include the drivers window rather than a dashcam which is pointing straight down the road
 
How about strapping an action cam to your head? The quality of footage is much better from some of these so you may even be able to grap a still from the best frame? Granted you may look a little silly but it would give a great driver's viewpoint? I think the guy in the carbuyer reviews on Youtube now uses one to show what the driver sees. If it's small enough or attached to a baseball cap then it may be discreet. I'm not sure if action cams geotag but I would expect to be able to find some that do.
 
You probably move your head more as you drive than you think you do, and probably need to move it more often. :) I find the videos from motorcycle riders with an action cam on the helmet annoying.
I doubt most dashcams will show enough of the billboard to be much use?

A few billboards show up in this video, but this is just an inexpensive 'action' cam on a suction cup mount.

 
It would be interesting to do some eye tracking of ppl driving along a road with billbords, and mesure how much ppl actually see them ( the billbords )

At the moment eyetracking is quite a buzzword in some branches of technology, and it is also becomming more and more easy to do.

You can now get a laptop with build in eyetracking ( MSI )
 
A hatcam is not a good idea if you like me is tall ( 1.9 M ) and drive a micro / small car like i do.
This is captured with the jovuu x cam on the brim of my hat, and so there is no GPS data as the antenna is on the power lead of this camera.
 
Wouldn't that actually be more helpful than not though as it would show that billboard locations may not be visible to some people?
 
I'd just stick someone in the passenger seat with my trusty SLR camera on burst mode and call it a day.
 
Thanks for all of your replies. It seems that there is mixed reviews on whether or not a dash cam is the right option. In some of the videos posted, particularly dash riposki, it seems that the shot is exactly what I'm looking for, though it would be much easier if I could capture still photos and mark the GPS in the EXIF data.

For the longest time I have been using my iPhone with GPS and it works great, when I have my hands free and enough time to get the right shot and focus on both driving and looking through the viewfinder. I'm hoping for a safer option with a wider viewing angle that will automatically log the location in which the photo was taken.

Any specific dash cams that log GPS data for still photos?
 
You don't have to just use still photos. I use Registrator Viewer to watch videos and at any point in time you can pause it, zoom in and save the screen image within the program to create a photo.
 
billboard.jpg

This is from a moving video I happened to have. I didn't look for the most crisp photo, or edit it, but I imagine if you did both it would be usable.
 
Some dashcams do allow you to take a still photo, but then you have to press a button on it or on the screen.
And not lest have good aim/timing as you drive by.

I do think you can get a remote trigger for some pocket cameras, or at least use a APP to control and trigger taking a picture, and you should be able to find a suction cup mount that will hold a pocket camera to your windscreen.

Set camera up for burst shooting 10 or 20 photos with every press of the button, or maybe to take a photo every 0.25 seconds as you drive, and you should be golden ( dont use zoom on camera ) you will be capturing raw and or jpeg photos so you can allways crop what you need within the god knows how many megapixel photo.
If you use pocket camera i would set it up on the suction cup mount so it shoot a little towards the roadside, 15 degrees off strait forward should be fine.

If you go with the dashcam you can just grab 1 of the frames the video is made up of, 1080p or some dash/action cameras even do 4K but at 15 frames per second, this will be fine if you just plan to grab one of the frames and use it as a 4K resolution picture.

The GIT2 action/dash camera might be a good idea then.
 
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