[Skybird]

More testing completed.



With 1080p @ 60 frames, the internal battery was down to 14% after 1 hour 20 minutes. In this mode, the camera said the sd card with 64 GB would store movielength up to 2 hours 38 minutes. After 1h20m, the display said 1:26 recoidng time remaining, which would already trabslate into a total of 2:46 hours. The projected capacity thus is not totally correct. The film took 26.8 GB on the card, with 32.5 GB still free. Simple math tells me that 177 minutes, or close to 3 hours, would fit on the card in this video mode 1080/60. Temperature did not seem to vary much to those tests with higher resolutions yesterday.


The timewarp function works like a charm. Different to time lapse films made by single phto frames tacked together, this movie is absolutely smooth, and again stabilised, it can be shot in 4K or 1080, with wide (no super wide) viewing angle. The speed can be varied over sdeverla factors (2x, 5x 10x for driving tasks, even more like 15x, 20x, 30x when you move slowler or stand still). I can see using this with 2x and 5x a lot.


The difference in resolution quality between 2.7k and 1080 is not apparent to my eyes on my 1950x1080 monitor at 24", or my TV with same resolution and a diagonal span of ~80cm.



I had a first deeper look at the backgroudn settings that can be unlocked, usually the automatic takes care of them (and does a terrific job!). The image sharpness can be varied in three levels, and I can see that when shooting photos and only watching them on a monitor, not printing them on paper, there might be benefits if reducing sharpness from high to medium. The differences are visible between sharpness levels, but not dramatic. ISO msettings, upper and lower limtis, are mor eimportantk, again the automatic takes good care of them, but one must say that shooting in low light conditions is not the strength of the GoPro 7 Black. Images become grainy. The camera in general has a tendency to soften contrast and lighten up the image overall, which works very good in dalyight, since else trees and bushes with dark fooliage often are just too black-ish in the video, many other comaeras for my tatse are way too harshg there, prioritiozie harsh cinbtrasts too much, the GoPro is easier and gentlier there, and I appreciate that very much, it reveals more details in dark and in very bright parts of the image as well. There is an alternative colour toning available, which is more natural in its palette than the original processing filter, sicn eht elatter is more focussed on indeed making the action shine in some more saturated colours. Usually the action filter works good and nice, and its good to know there is a more natural filter available as well in case I shoot an environment that already is very ich inc olours and contrasts in reality. Addtionally you can of course influence the white balance alignment, but again the automatic does a vey good job here, but you can chnage the colour temperature manually as well, which may sometimes be the better option when shooting inside rooms at low light with lamps on. The camera by automatic tends to brighten such dark scenes up very much, which is good, since you can see details still, and is not good, since it is no longer that dark - but the difference between unlit dark spots and the light radfiuation around lamps it nevertheless works out nicely.



I tried the photo camera, and it delivers surprisingly good results again. Additonal post processing is possible, but mainly automatic. The HDR option works very, very good. The camera can take up to 30 photos to calculate the best exposure for various picture parts of brightness and darkness, I founf that here the image saving indeed can take 1-2 seconds. Without any such processing, the camera works as fast as any digital camera, and saves in a split of a second.



I think I am done now with the purely technical testing of battery and memory card endurcance at various resolutions and options. The mounting gear shoudl arrive later todfay, and now it is about getting out and testing image quality in the wild.



Worth to note, since there are so many complaints: like yesterday, today I still have not had a single freeze or system lockdown. No overheating alert, nothing. It gets warm, and thats all.



I have started to really fall in deep love with this little thing. Definitely worth the money.


P.S. Worth to note: after the test described, after running for 80 minute, battery was down to 14%, and with the manipulations I did in the following two minutes, it went further down to 9%. Then I left it alone and the camera cooled down. When I turned it on again, the battery showed 19%. The high temperature obviously lets the capacity suffer, like cold would do with batteries as well.