Best HD Video Camera for Flight Videos

On 1/5/2013 9:13 AM, Bill D wrote:
On Friday, January 4, 2013 8:05:35 PM UTC-7, akiley wrote:
On Friday, January 4, 2013 10:42:15 AM UTC-5, Bill D wrote:

I have no idea how it would be done but better video of
instrument panels would be welcome. Most videos, most of the
time, have the panel in shadow so the instruments are not
readable.


The problem with panels is that they tend to be much darker than
the surrounding scene. I've battled with this and find that
shooting overcast or low light helps a lot as it reduces the
brightness range so everything is more likely to fit into the
(every) cameras limited capture range. Also with direct sun, if
the sun is lighting the panel directly the shot looks good. When I
edit, I often cut the scenes with backlight panel. I've also
experimented in the past with graduated filters that darken the top
of the image only, but it's difficult to do well. Also made a mask
to brighten the panel in my video editor which works but is time
consuming. A video camera that could shoot HDR would be the trick.
Or video HDR in editing. It will come to the masses eventually.

Long ago I had reason to learn some motion picture matte-box tricks
which might be adapted to this problem. If you positioned a neutral
density gel in front of the camera lens with a cutout in the shape of
the panel, brighter light from outside the cockpit would pass through
the filter but the dim reflected light from the panel would not thus
allowing the correct exposure for each. Gel filters are just thin
plastic sheets of high optical quality available in a wide range of
colors and neutral density "stops". Of course, matte-box tricks
requires the camera to be securely mounted.

Maybe a strip of LEDs could be placed on the overhang of the glare
shield, so the panel is always illuminated. Note that they are 12 volts,
and use can use as many as you need in groups of three:

http://tinyurl.com/aatdzkf

A clever person would use photo sensor aimed at the panel to turn off
the LEDs when they weren't needed.

--
Eric Greenwell - Washington State, USA (change ".netto" to ".us" to
email me)