soloshot project, Auto-Filming yourself in motion while doing sports

Please will someone do this research? Do you know how to find the patents? I will read them if you Email them to me?

sbright33:
Please will someone do this research? Do you know how to find the patents? I will read them if you Email them to me?

I did some searches. No patent applications with the name Soloshot. No likely ones under the name Chris Boyle. Perhaps the company address would be the next thing to search for.

http://appft.uspto.gov/

Notthing found in europe either. BTW i tought it was a gps + wifi signal, but at that point i cant get the "content" of those 20 and more patent...so maybe is somethink different never used before?

If anyone has any ideas to achieve this working it would be cool.

I was thinking about a gps-like positioning system, two or more antennas and a delay signal interpolation to get the positive ( in front of the device ) position.

They say that the transmitter needs to be on for some minutes to be able to 'pair' it with the receiver. That is typical for a GPS receiver.

They also say it's range is 2000ft.
It happens to be that a 1000mW wifi transmitter has a range of 2000ft (600 meters or so). But 1000mW 2.4GHz transmitter is forbidden in many countries.
It also happens to be that there are 433MHz transmitters with a range of 2000ft. The antenna on the photo could be an antenna for 433MHz.

So it might be a GPS with a 433MHz transmitter. And the receiver has also GPS, to be able to calculate the position and angle.
There is probably no need to send something back. So the transmitter is only transmitting and the receiver is only receiving.

I think you can find everything at Sparkfun.com
It is going to cost about 200 to 300 dollars. But you need to program it, and they have already made a good looking receiver and waterproof transmitter. So you might as well buy the real thing.

I don't think you need 2 GPS's. What if you start the single GPS at the base? Would that work?

I don't think it uses GPS at all. I believe it has to do with the timing or phase of 2 antennas.

If the transmitter is held near the receiver/camera to initiate, only one GPS is needed.
That is a good suggestion.

The photo of the receiver shows only one antenna. Using two antennes to calculate the delay between the receiving waves requires specific hardware and might cost thousand of dollars. Do you know an affordable application ?
If a GPS is used, just normal standard hardware can be used.

sbright33:
I don't think it uses GPS at all. I believe it has to do with the timing or phase of 2 antennas.

There is an obvious antenna on the base unit which can only be used to communicate with the transponder. There is only one antenna and it looks like a non-directional antenna so I don't think there is any clever radio direction finding going on. This comment on the kickstarter page "Hey everyone- we designed SOLOSHOT with outdoor use in mind- the technology involved doesn't allow for indoor use." plus the fact you are recommended to be at least 50 meters away from the camera leave me certain that the system is based on GPS. I believe the transponder is essentially a GPS receiver plus radio transmitter and the base unit is a radio receiver, GPS receiver and compass.

Great deduction Peter! I believe you may be right. I will build one.

After learning more I can see there is only 1 GPS and no magnetic compass.
What if it could also do vertical tracking?
Who would use it then?
Which sports?

His is not very accurate when <200m away.
What if I could make it work up close?
Would this be valuable?

Off topic a little. You might see where I'm going.
How accurately could I measure distance apart by measuring the time of a radio signal?
The PPS pin of GPS has only 10ns jitter. I figure I can measure about 30-300m distance precision with only a TX and RX.
Going one way that is, not round trip.

Are you sure there is no GPS or compass in the base unit? If not, I suppose it would be necessary for it to be given it's initial position by putting the transponder next to it and telling it to zero its position, and the operator would also need to tell it which way it was facing. I'd have thought a second GPS and compass would make it much more use friendly. However, maybe the cost would be prohibitive.

The radio direction finding based approach you're describing would potentially be a faster and more accurate solution, could be used indoors and would be better in many respects - but it would be much harder to get working IMO and would a lot of technological development. What Soloshot already does just needs a neat idea and some readily available technology brought together.

sbright33:
After learning more I can see there is only 1 GPS and no magnetic compass.

Where did you learn that? I'd be surprised if there was not a GPS in the base station because the difference between two nearby GPS fixes will be much more stable than a new GPS fix and a previous GPS fix.

sbright33:
His is not very accurate when <200m away. What if I could make it work up close? Would this be valuable?

Yes, short distance would be useful. Indoor use would be useful.

sbright33:
How accurately could I measure distance apart by measuring the time of a radio signal?
The PPS pin of GPS has only 10ns jitter. I figure I can measure about 30-300m distance precision with only a TX and RX. Going one way that is, not round trip.

Light travels about 1 foot per nanosecond. With each end having 10-foot jitter I would think you would need a significant baseline (several meters) to triangulate a position.

What if it could also do vertical tracking?
Who would use it then?
Which sports?

His is not very accurate when <200m away.
What if I could make it work up close?
Would this be valuable?
Which sports?

If you can help me I appreciate it. Thanks for your time.

sbright33:
What if it could also do vertical tracking?
Who would use it then?
Which sports?

His is not very accurate when <200m away.
What if I could make it work up close?
Would this be valuable?
Which sports?

If you can help me I appreciate it. Thanks for your time.

Maybe motocros stunting and stuff like this?

Close and indoor working would be very cool

sbright33:
What if it could also do vertical tracking?
Who would use it then?
Which sports?

His is not very accurate when <200m away.
What if I could make it work up close?
Would this be valuable?
Which sports?

If you can help me I appreciate it. Thanks for your time.

Any flying sport/activity desperately needs (full) vertical tracking. I see huge potential in this.
Also, have you noticed in soloshot videos there is shot of base on a boat? If I want to allow to move base during filming and system is GPS based you need GPS receiver in the base too.

Radio direction finding does not give distance, just direction, but it's not too hard - can be done using doppler shift and an electronically spinning antenna (usually achived by multiplexing 4 antennas arrange in a square).
Possible solution could use two mobile phones (one with GPS, the other with GPS and a compass) and the mobile network to connect - with possible/probable lag issues?

VOR at an airport allows a plane to know where it is in relation to the VOR.
could send a signal back.reporting which radial it is on.
probably not what is used, just saying it could be an idea

VOR doesn't do vertical tho.

I like the GPS reporting, maybe with an altimeter for altitude reporting.

great job thinking

My idea is this:

Transmitter: Arduino + acelerometer + (BT or Wifi or Xbee)

Receiver: Arduino + (BT or Wifi or Xbee)

The transmitter has to be power up attached to the receiver, so when the acelerometer turns on, that would be it's zero. Then any movement would tells the arduino ( in the transmitter) the changes of position respect to the zero (delta X=0,5Gt^2) in the 3 axis. Then transmit this info to the receiver so it could correct it's direction.

What do you think?

Sorry about my english, greetings from Chile!!

Where can I get information about the project I want to do one this