360 cam and Mapillary app

Contributing and equipment
#1

In that email about 1 year Qoocam 8K, Kandao says that they have implemented the Open Spherical Camera protocol. I remember from reading the Mapillary blog from the start that Mapillary has implemented OSC in their iOS app! That means that Mapillary app can fire the Qoocam 8K! I do not know if Mapillary on iOS has the same superb capture approach as on Android, depending on distance covered or curve taken. I do not know how fast Qoocam 8K can fire to use it on a car with 7 fps. But, it means that you can get leveled pics off cam. However, seems to be without location data, but enough tools around to add that. Ready to upload to Mapillary. Note that the operating environment temperature for Qoocam 8K of 40C is way too low to use it in the tropical sun. I have neither. Anyone able to test this?

Ricoh Thetas have Open Spherical Camera protocol too.

Alternatively, you may consider a Labpano Pilot camera and use GSV video mode capture and the GSV2JPG or TrekView tools to extract the frames, but that footage is not leveled.

Anyone else on >= 8K 360?

1 Like
#2

Hi

the best you could get in usage and other value is the gopro max 360° camera. Nearly all out of the box in one picture full quality every 2 sec.
Mapillary does limit size of pictures on upload, thats why 8K is not always a good idea. I did have had interest in labpano Pilot, but that has limits, e.g. GSV video is a lossy workflow which I do not accept, but taking 8k pictures is not working faster than 1 pic every 3-4 sec. Also the resulting pictures are partly >20 MB, which is one limit in mapillary, so postprocessing needs to be taken. Which I do not want with a nearly 2k Euro camera.
So I stick with the GoPro, it still works flawless and creates good quality.

Amiga4000

#3

Hi,

Surprised about your point of view. 2 frames per sec is enough for walking only. Mapillary limiting size of pictures on upload? GSV video a lossy workflow?

Mounting my Pilot Era on the roof of my car, I capture with 7 frames per sec GSV video. Extracting frames at every 3 meter with GSV2JPG happens in a couple of blinks and uploading to Mapillary with its desktop uploader causes no pain either. Refer main routes on the island of Curaçao for examples.

#4

Hi

yeah, as GSV is a lossy video format (it is not MJPEG), so it looses details. Also it is less resolution than single picture mode on the Pilot cameras.
Creating still pictured from a (already lossy) video format does reduce quality even more, as the picture mode is also lossy.
Adding the “guessing” feature of the (lossy) video format, which renders/guesses in between images between two fully rendered/saved pictures. Read more on this about h.264 and h.265 video formats.
If a camera cannot do single pictrues in 7fps, how should the same system process the same amount of data in video format in 7fps in the same quality? (is always a good question to see the limits of a system).

Also mapillary has a filsesize limit of 20 MB, if the picture extract from video (or single picture mode) do create pictures above 20 MB in filesize (which the Pilot cams do), you need to reduce filesize, aka do another manual step in workflow.

Over all: GorPro has less resolution, but works flwless and does costs a quarter of the Pilot One.
I do not pay 2k+x for a more manual, more lossy workflow.
If the Pilot one COULD save 8K pictures in 1sec timeframe, I would think about the 2k Euro, but not in 1 every three sec.

So, over all, a Pilto One for the same price as a GoPro Max, sure, why not.
Price/value does not suite me currently, which is why I stay with GoPro Max.

(oh, 2k only for the Pilot one, adding extra mount material, extra battery…)

#5

JPEG and MJPEG are lossy too.

Looking at the Curaçao images I can’t say they’re any worse than other 30 Mpx 360 images. The one advantage is that since the capture frequency is higher you’re more likely to find a photo near the text you want to read.

The price tag is an obvious damper though and it requires at least looking at other options in the same price range. Unfortunately data on the subject of camera suitability for Mapillary use is really scarce and hard to come by.

1 Like
#6

As for capture frequency of my images on Curaçao, on the road I have been using the GSV required of 7 fps. Dean Zwikel’s GSV2JPG version at the time did a 3 meter distance extraction, according to GSV requirements. With his latest version, one can set the preferred distance for extraction.

#7

Hi

I never said the quality is not good.
I jsut said: quality/value must be better for that pricetag in comparisation to the GoPro Max.

Even if jpeg is also lossy, creating stills from a already lossy format with another lossy format does create more loss than a single lossy step.

(SImple calculation: take a short video, look at filesize, take a similar amount of pcitures (e.g. 10 sec a 7 fps results in 70 pictures) and compare size of video and size of 70 pictures summed up).

Amiga4000

#8

SImple calculation: take a short video, look at filesize, take a similar amount of pcitures (e.g.
10 sec a 7 fps results in 70 pictures) and compare size of video and size of 70 pictures summed up

That comparison makes no sense at all and you should know that since you’re talking about MJPEG and such.

#9

Hi

sure it makes sense - more data, more information, more qualtiy.
A 10 sec h.265 video stream at 7 fps will remove more quality/data from the original captured data (from the sensor) than 10 sec of 7 pictures in one second.

So: bigger filesize equal more data/quality/more information.

but if the company does really bad software, they do worse. But thats on video and pictures, so my arguemnt still stands: video removes more details than single pictures, beside video has less resolution on the Pilot One.

and thats not worth my money.

Oh, please do not tell more about video/picture codecs now. If a company uses 100% perfect video codec and a really bad picture codec, they are also bad and not to be supported, Jpeg could do remove more data than a good video codec, but thats really bad implementation and should be removed from market at once,
So, a good implemented JPEG algo (which I do assume) combined into a good mjpeg stream does create better quality/data/information than a h.265 codec. Which can be seen by filesize, to.

Amiga 4000

#10

Actually, I started this thread not for a video discussion, but on Qoocam having implemented the Open Spherical Camera protocol, which allows it to be controlled by the Mapillary iOS app. That won’t capture video, but still pics, I presume.

#11

I think the Mapillary team previously comment on how some camera manufacturers implement OSC in a weird/not totally compatible way. Given how thin dev resource is, unless Qoocam works with the app now, I don’t see a specific fix appearing to make it work. The app would be able to inject gps metadata as it did for the LG, but that’s going to rely on the phone’s gps.

I don’t think the Qoocam captures stills at a high enough fps - @SviMik has a nice Qoocam setup and might be able to opine.
Looking at the imagery from the Qoocam, it’s not much (if at all?) better than existing Xiaomi/GoPro imagery. If you want decent quality and a 360-original workflow, the Insta Pro remains one of the few suitable options

#12

I’m using the video recording mode since it has visually same quality (and technically - exactly the same resolution) as photos, but provides more frames to choose so I can export them at exactly 5 meter interval no matter how the vehicle speed changes.

I’ve also made a wireless remote to start/stop the recording and monitor the disk space without wasting a phone for this task:
https://youtu.be/7t6Pf2q4g2Y