Horizon stabilized camera mount

[Miami78]

Was poking around looking for something that would let one mount a small camera on a bike and would keep the horizon line level while cornering. At first I was thinking of something like one of those swiveling drink holders rigged up with a mounting plate and a counter weight. Found a youtube video of a home made version, but it rocked a lot during use...would make me seasick if I watched it too long.

Then found these, pricey and made for sailing...but pretty much exactly what I was picturing. I'm emailing them to see if they have thought of trying to market to the motorcycling industry.

Has anyone seen anything like this already (and is less expensive!)? Would there be any interest in trying to get a group buy if the price would come down some?

 

[08levin]

Haven't seen them for sale, but MotoGP had one on Rossi's bike at a race last year. Really gave a good idea of how far they are leaning over on the corners.

 

[08levin]

The cornering G's on the bike would mess up a simple gravity style horizon mount. Don't have to worry about that on a sailboat. Probably need a gyro type of mount. Then you need power to drive it, so it probably gets complicated. Might be a fun project to get a small battery powered motor to drive a flywheel. Maybe some RC car stuff?

 

[Miami78]

That's true, hadn't thought about the g's. Once I hear back from them I'm going to see if they will let me try a unit out to see if it will work for what we would want.

 

[08levin]

Found some information online about using RC helicopter gyros and a digital servo for a stabilized camera. Still would cost about 100 bucks just for the parts and then need a mount of some sort built.

 

[Miami78]

They said they had some other people test them on some bikes...once it got above about 50 or so it would no longer stabilize...

 

[J_Undisputed]

Sounds like something digital could be a solution. Perhaps hacking a camera app on a phone to see if you can get some kind of arbitrary values out of the tilt actuator and then keep the image flat by turning the camera image at a negative or supplementary angle? The feed back from the tilt might be too slow on the draw though to be responsive. Just a thought.

 

[williegoat]

Sounds like something digital could be a solution.

It can be done with Cinelerra
http://heroinewarrior.com/cinelerra/cinelerra.html#MOTION
http://wn.com/Basic_Editing_in_Cinelerra_Pt_1
Look at "stability tutorial pt.1 & 2", rotational stability should be available.