Mapillary and GoPro® – A Match Made in Mapping Heaven
We love GoPro® cameras. These tiny action cameras create stunning, quality images. They have a wide field of view and can capture up to two photos every second, making them perfect when you're creating Structure from Motion, like we are with our 3D Navigation tool. Also, they are easy to mount on pretty much anything.
Although they're great cameras, one problem with GoPro® is that they lack GPS. In order to capture GPS coordinates of the photos you take with your GoPro® camera, you have to use an external GPS recorder, then sync the photos on your computer and manually upload them to Mapillary. It is doable, but it's not smooth and user friendly. Until now.
Many Mapillary members are already using GoPro® cameras to capture the world (check out members ahzf from Germany and maxim75 from Australia). We added support for GoPro® Hero4 cameras to the iOS app (don't worry, Android is coming soon!) to make it a lot easier and smoother to capture photos.
This means that you can control your GoPro directly from within the Mapillary camera and geotag the photos directly on your phone. Photos are stored as regular sequences in the app and you can review, delete, and upload as usual. The GoPro® cameras we support in the first version are GoPro® Hero4 Silver and Black.
In short, it works like this:
- Pair the GoPro® camera with your phone and change to GoPro® WiFi
- Start camera in the Mapillary app, select "Yes" to use GoPro® camera when asked
- Capture as usual. The app will control the GoPro® to capture every 1.5 seconds.
- Transfer photos directly after the capture or do it from the Uploads view later
- Review and upload as usual
The photos are saved on the memory card in the GoPro® camera until you delete them yourself. Pro tip: format the memory card before each Mapillary session.
This feature is in beta right now with many improvements and new modes to come. As usual, feedback is more than welcome.
Now go explore the world with your GoPro - and document it on Mapillary!
/Anders
For and more detailed description on how to connect and use your GoPro® camera with the Mapillary app, read this blog post.