GoPro Hero2 Professional released but no news of Flat Port

[c0r3yz]

The real question for me is whether they fixed the damn white-ballence issue that has plagued me, as well as others in the low-light mudholes we dive in:

As illustrated in this guy's video at 30 seconds.
GoPro weird effect - YouTube

Or in my video at 1:09:
Arête Photography

Seriously, this frustrates me. After paying that much money for the camera I am not happy that I had to deal with buying a new case for the flat port…and on top of that the white balance issue of having un-useable video in dark situations (ie red effect).

I think GoPro has a great camera, but they need to get this fixed, STAT.


-Andy

I can't say that i've seen my gopro do THAT before... What settings were you running it with? What version of the firmware do you have? I have taken my heros on two dives down to 40ffw and on numerous occasions used it at shallower depths in both saltwater and fresh water, all without lights and haven't seen the effect that you are seeing. That is very odd...

[manni-yunk]

Ive had mine to 145 feet and never had that effect.


Ive got about 80+ dives with my camera and have never seen that effect on any dive.


Im not extatic about the low light capabilities - but other than that - Im happy with mine.

[Marty Cerven]

I haven't had that issue myself down to 40m with over 50 dives with my gopro's but have heard of it before, it seems like its caused when using the gopro underwater in very dark places and then quickly getting lots of light in the scene from another torch or looking up at the sun. This looks like the cameras white balance auto exposure goes a little nuts, not sure if the latest firmware helps or not.

I generally do open water dives not many wrecks or caves but the few I have done, In pretty much darkness as I don't have any decent video lights, coming back into the light this issue never happened to me. It seems pretty rare but wreck divers going beyond 40m are the main people ive heard of the issue from.

I don't see the gopro as a very good low light camera and without any decent video lights I just don't use it in the conditions where this can occur, hopefully though this issue may have been resolved with the new sensor and processor which seems a fair improvement from the videos ive seen. Mainly the auto white balance seems to work much better on land but I haven't seen any proper underwater footage with the HD2 yet.

[joecwazy]

I wonder if anything Gopro releases will be much better than the current aftermarket housings-doubt it.

These cameras are definetly not designed for low light or indoor footage. I'm curious how much better this Hd2 is. Normally I'm not too swayed by additional features but some things this new hero incorporates would be useful for underwater use.

particularly
-ability to switch between wide and not so wide angle
-internal battery heater
-almost 2x more sensitive to low light-curious how much of a difference this will make.

[OnePingOnly]

I too jumped on the GoPro bandwagon when they first came out at add to my arsenal of underwater equipment. I purchased an Eye of Mine lens while waiting for one to come from the manufacturer and was able to get some decent footage underwater with it - in very good lighting (shallow, sunny day) Great for this type of work Salmon Run 2011 GoPro used for U/W footage although grain is even evident here, or off the side of a dive boat.

In order to get the minimum quality of footage I needed when diving, I would have to take my 3 1200 sola lights down with me as well. If I have to take the lights, I'll take the 7D/Aquatica or older Z1/L&M combos instead of the GoPro for the superior control over the image.

Great little camera for topside POV shots and shallow work but that's where it will stay in my workflow for now.

Alan

[sharksdelight]

Don't hold your breath on that. This is a company that is growing too big too fast.
Steve

[ProfessorAronnax]

I've been researching the GoPro Hero and have been keeping an eye on the GoPro website for the past few days. Over the weekend they announced the release of the GoPro Hero2 Professional and a reduction in the price of the GoPro Hero Naked.

The new GoPro Hero 2 only comes in 3 versions - and an "Underwater" version is notably missing. There is no "Naked" version of the new version - even though it has 2X sharpness and goes from 5 mega pixels to 11 mega pixels.

The FOV is increased as well...(we'll let them do their own marketing).

But the key message that I received as late as last week is that they are still working on the "flat port" option and that there is no ETA on that being available from the factory.

Thanks to this forum I understand that the after-market fix from Snake River Prototying is the best option in terms of engineering and options.

I'm not in any hurry - next drive trip is planned for January - so I'm hoping to hear from someone about whether the new 2 X sharpness of the GoPro Hero2 has any real effect on the blur underwater - or if the curved lens still needs correcting (my expectation).

regards, Pical

I heard the underwater(flat lense) version will be out within a month or two

[joecwazy]

It'll be interesting to see what it turns out like. Personally I think it will be very difficult to beat the price and features of the SRP Blurfix. The fact that you can screw on different filters/replace filters you bump into rocks with and that they protect the actual lens of the camera is a big plus in my eyes(and why I decided as a poor college student to fork over an additional $40-60 over other flat lens fixes).

[Marty Cerven]

I agree with you Joe, no matter what gopro releases I cant see it being any better then the SRP Blurfix. They will either make a brand new housing with a bigger flat port or just use a drop in lens that will only be vignette free in medium and low FOV settings.

They couldn't get away with that last time as a drop in lens only works well in 1 of the 6 modes (5 video modes and photo) in the HD1 without vignette issues, the HD2 has more modes that arent 170 FOV so its possible they will release it now.

I cant see them having a threaded screw in filter solution and the location of the power button doesn't give them any more room then the Blurfix and EOM have for a large flat port that's very different to those fixes.

[TSwain]

I do belive that GoPro has the new flat port, but it has not been released yet. On another forum, this was posted from the DEMA Show: