Wreck Interior Studies — Part IV (Insta360 Video inside the HMCS Yukon)

Intro

One of the tools that I have been using and experimenting with is an Insta360 x4 camera. They make a few different cameras but the one I have has two spherical cameras that face outwards and is used to film a complete 360 view video.

The software “stitches together” the images from the two different cameras and the result is a 360 degree view of the scene.

My original plan (and is still a project on my list) was to swim through a wreck with the camera and then use extracted stills from the video in order to build a photogrammetry model. The goal was to drastically increase my efficiency compared to doing it manually like I did in the Yukon stern corridor whereby I shot individual photos.

As part of that effort, I started testing the use of the Insta360 inside of a wreck and experimenting with different lighting techniques. This post will detail those efforts.

One of the results is a very cool 360 degree video that you can manipulate on-line to see up, down, sideways, even back at me as I’m swimming through the wreck!

Camera & Light Setup

There are a few things required if you want to take the camera inside the wreck. These include a housing for the camera, a “selfie stick” to hold the camera, and then a light setup since you will want to illuminate the inside of the wreck.

Below is a picture of the setup I used:

There are smaller selfie-sticks which work well if you don’t need to add big video lights, but I found the bigger, sturdier version to be better even though it adds bulk. I also have a red rubber cover I use to avoid scratching the lens domes when I’m not filming. I use two floats in order to compensate for the negative buoyancy for the video lights. The entire setup is a little bit positive I think but basically neutral.

Final Video Version

I will detail further below the trial runs which all have interesting learning points for anybody else doing this, but I thought I would start with the two latest videos.

NOTE: These videos are on YouTube. If you use the YouTube App on a mobile device, you can actually move the device around and the video will move with it! If you are on a computer, you can use your mouse to rotate the point-of-view of the video.

You can see all around the video, look up, look down, if you turn the video, you will see me and the wreck behind me. Here are a few stills — all from the same exact point in the video — but looking in different directions. I also encourage you to increase the quality setting of the video replay if you have more bandwidth.

The best combination of lighting I found was when I pointed both video lights slightly backwards and slightly down from me so they don’t blow-out the video looking forward. I am wearing a small regular dive light on my wrist which you can see illuminating the way forward in most of the video.

Engine Room to Bow

This video is going from engine room through a few corridors, then finding my way and getting blocked a little bit before exiting through the “dolphin” cutout that faces down into the sand at the bow.

Remember to move the video around and look in all directions!

Stern to Engine Room

This video goes from the large opening in the stern through to the engine room. It is required that you go up and down a little bit so it gets tricky with buoyancy when you are also trying to hold the video gear. NOTE: This video is sped up 2x just to cut down on the time require to view it.

Trial Videos

I made a few different test runs through the stern to engine room. For completeness, I’ve included the videos below along with some notes and thoughts.

Test Run #1

This was my first test with the camera. I had the video lights pointing forward and upwards and it blows out the video a bit and you can see all the particulate matter in the water which is distracting. But, the viewer does get a pretty good view looking forward going into the wreck.

Test Run #2

For the next two tests, I recruited Oleg Baranovsky to help me out. I thought it would help to have somebody else taking the video lights in an “off board lighting” test run. In the first test, I had Oleg lead. It works pretty well, but for quite a bit of the video, you can see a small “halo” around where Oleg is but it is dark around where I and with the camera. NOTE: This video is sped up 4x to decrease the viewing time.

Test Run #3

We did this video the same day but this time I led the trip through the corridor and Oleg followed with the lights. NOTE: This video is sped up 2x normal speed. This test didn’t work too well. When you look forward, all you see is my small handheld light and when you look back, the video is blown out by the video lights in a lot of the video.

Conclusion

I think, for now, the best videos were made when I had the video lights with me and pointed downwards and backwards.

I still plan to test using some of this video for building a photogrammetry model but I think that is going to be a pretty tough project given that the lighting isn’t consistent and aligning common points will likely be tough for the software.

Thanks To…

Lora & Chris at Marissa Charters for continuing to support all of my wacky and crazy projects and giving me the freedom and encouragement to do so. It is always really great to dive on the Marissa.

Oleg Baranovsky for helping out and carrying the video lights while I was testing different ideas and configurations. Thanks, Oleg!