New P Zeros Installed & New Auto X Layout = Blistering Fast Times and So Much Fun!

SpdRcrGTS said:

Completely agree on my end. Just downloaded 'Track Addict' app and got the pro version for $8.99. Going to take your input and try and figure out the GoPro before next Tuesday as well.

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I'm not a professional in this area, just an amateur with increasing experience. If you don't mind, let me share a few things.

I've been using TrackAddict (TA) and RaceRender (RR) for about five years now. I bought the top versions of each -- less than the cost of a new Macan tire, certainly -- the Ultimate or whatever they call it. For RR, see RaceRender 3 Video+Data by HP Tuners | Features .

My initial setup was an iPhone 6 and a GoPro Hero4 Silver, mounted on a motorcycle. The iPhone was running the TA app and GoPro's app; you could configure the TA app to fire up the GoPro app (or possibly I have this backward), which would start the GoPro recording. That is, the phone's built-in GPS was functioning as a telemetry gatherer, and the GoPro was doing the video recording, and the apps ensured that those two devices were in sync.

To process this after the fact, I would download both the data from the phone and the GoPro. Then, I would bring them into RR. This probably sounds more complicated than it is, but RR is built for this sort of thing, isn't confused by it, etc. And then I instruct RR to generate a final video, with specified overlays.

The downside of this setup is that, okay, it is a little complicated, and required mounting two physical devices. Also, the GPS in phones -- at least back then, and I don't know if this has changed much lately -- would ping satellites at about 1 Hz. This makes for some laggy bursts of displayed speedometer movement on the output video.

Fast forward to a couple of years ago. I bought a GoPro Hero7 Black, and did so for two reasons, even though the Hero4 was functioning like new:

1) The GoPro (and they're up to version 9 these days) now came with a built-in GPS, and so records its own telemetry data.

2) GoPro has implemented software-based stabilization, which they call HyperSmooth. I had read for years now that mechanical stabilization, built into camera bodies or their lens, is preferable to software. I don't know whether that's still what photography pros still say, but, regardless, the HyperSmooth implementation is an absolute credit to GoPro's programmers.

So, as of about two years ago, my setup is now simply to mount the Hero7, period. The phone (and I'm now up to an iPhone11 Pro) is completely irrelevant. And so I also don't have any need for TA, since it was functioning just as a sort of interface to the phone's GPS (and RR is perfectly capable of using the same track maps, if you're on a track).

This has the advantage of, um, just having to mount one device, i.e., the camera. And one set of files to transfer to my Mac, not two. And the GPS in the GoPro runs at something like 19 Hz, which means that there's now negligible lag or bursts in the speedometer display in the final video.

And then have RR generate that final video, with whatever design you like. Note that RR is a pretty smart program. For instance, when you upload a file from a GoPro (or some other supported action cams) it will say something to the effect of, "Hey, this has telemetry data associated with it. You want me to upload that, too?" And when that upload is finished, it will say something like, "Hey, I see that this video file is part of a set of video files. You want me to upload those, too?"

And you can answer those questions yes or no, depending on what you're working on, what you're trying to accomplish. For example, in my typical settings, GoPro will generate a 4 GB file in about 20 minutes of recording, and then start another one. If you want to create a final video that's completely contained within one of those chunks, then there's no need to mess with the others. (And it certainly helps to have a computer with a boatload of RAM, when you start working with, potentially, multiple 4 GB files.)

One final note: if you get into RPMs and other OBD-only data, you're on your own. I've never captured any of that stuff, and I'm not sure that I ever had a bike with a standard ODB port. I believe HP Tuners, the TA and RR folks, sells hardware gizmos for that purpose, i.e., collection and integration with their software.

Hope this helps a bit, and good luck.

Aldo said:

Here’s a video from a track day I did at COTA in my Golf R using Harry’s on an iPhone mounted to the windshield. It’s only GPS data- no car telemetry.

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That is an excellent video, and one that looks like it was pretty easy to set up with HLT. Nice work on that, and nice driving.

By the way, my buddy and I rode our bikes out to COTA (from our home in the Albany, NY, area) back in 2013. This was for the inaugural MotoGP race weekend there; the big bikes get up to something like 210 MPH down that long back straight.

We were in the stands right after the first couple of bends after that back straight, turn 15, and had a pretty good view, e.g.: