Gopro Hero 3 Black. Crap at shooting stills?

[Darkprincze]

Hey Guys,

Just got my gopro Hero 3 Black. It is not without its quirks! Had a charging issue when it was turned on. Seems fine charging when it is off. Wifi is random when it comes to connecting to my ipad / iphone using gopro app. Menu sometimes jumps out of settings and back to shooting mode. Update has helped. I am willing to let these issues slide due to the fact that the video results are simply stunning. And there are so many options for video. But. I also tried taking a few stills with it. I mean, we have a whole menu on the gopro dedicated to this. 12mp still photos. And they were utterly crap. Unusable. Anyone any experience with this? I am over the moon with the video it is capable of. But still photo shooting underwater is no use. I managed to get a few shots where parts of the shot were in focus but not the bits I wanted.

Tips welcome.

Thanks Paul

 

[divingpyrate]

just use frames from video
Much nicer result

Why is the rum always gone

 

[yarik83]

Gopro is not a photo camera so do not expect miracles out of it.

Having said that gopro hero 3 black produces stunning photographs in amazing quality. I do not know what you were shooting, what settings you were using but every time I do time lapse stills, they look fabulous.

Can you describe what specifically is an issue in your photography attempt?

 

[Darkprincze]

Apologies, I have had success with still photography above water. And can't wait to try out the time lapse mode, which is fine on a tripod or fixed shooting position. Underwater the stills are not great. That is my issue, yes I can lift them off video, but the gopro does sell itself as a 12mp still photography device. I have not had any success hand held underwater yet.

 

[irishtn]

Sorry posted this in wrong thread, but post some pics.

 

[yarik83]

I really hope that you were using a red lens filter while taking photographs and you were taking photos in high light environment. Underwater cameras need strobes to photograph objects 1-3 feet away from camera. There are a lot of limitations to underwater photography and videography. A good understanding of what goes into either will be a great place to start your adventures.

 

[Interceptor121]

It depends on your expectations. The Gopro are good for time lapse where you don't focus on the specific picture but more on the motion
If you look at a single still the results are worse than any decent camera you take underwater with a housing as the gopro sensor is tiny so pictures are usually grainy
You also get a good amount of blur as most times it shoots stills at 1/60
So if you are shooting a landscape the results may be acceptable, if you have closer shot you will notice the blur and lack of colors and light

 

[toozler]

Apologies, I have had success with still photography above water. And can't wait to try out the time lapse mode, which is fine on a tripod or fixed shooting position. Underwater the stills are not great. That is my issue, yes I can lift them off video, but the gopro does sell itself as a 12mp still photography device. I have not had any success hand held underwater yet.

Underwater, where there is much less light, you'll need to be extremely steady as theres a bigger chance it will all get blurry due to the low light. Adding a filter will decrease slightly the amount of light coming in, which will make it a little harder.

It's still possible - I personally prefer grabbing frames from 1080p video, but every now and you can get lucky and turn out with a decent still:

<- not captured from the 1080p, this is a still picture

(shot at around 45 feet, no lights, using an internal Eel Vision "BG" filter)

 

[Thook]

This is example from a Hero2 pulled from video...

 

[Interceptor121]

View attachment 156699View attachment 156700View attachment 156701

This is example from a Hero2 pulled from video...

What the hell is that guy doing with the porcupine fish??

If you zoom into the images you can see the motion blur as mentioned earlier especially the diver picture, the other two are more static you will notice less