So, Santa brought you a GoPro for the holidays and you’re looking for something extreme and crazy to film with it. Well, you’re in luck, because we’ve come across one of the most impressive GoPro ‘tests’ we’ve ever seen.
It’s called the GoPro Cannon and it comes from the brilliant minds behind Eclectical Engineering, David and Ryan. The concept is fairly straightforward. Take a GoPro Hero 4 Session, create a 3D printed missile to place the camera into and launch said projectile into the sky via a compressed air cannon.
The budget for the project was $150. Despite limited funds, David and Ryan accomplished the task with supplies gathered from around the house, online and their local hardware store. Once they had the supplies, all it took was some good ol’ elbow grease and mathematics.
The cannon itself was built out of PVC pipe, a blowgun, a sprinkler valve, a bicycle pump and last but not least, a pressure gauge to help gauge distance. The GoPro Hero 4 Session was housed inside a 3D printed projectile that had to undergo a few iterations before it yield any sort of stabilized footage; most notably, the addition of spring-loaded fins.
Once the team had everything constructed, they worked out an equation that would give them the rough distance of how far the projectile would go so that they could catch it and protect it from excessive damage.
From there, they packed up, headed to San Francisco’s Crissy Field and prepared to launch the GoPro Cannon. After a few short attempts to test the pressure and distance, David and Ryan went all out, launching the GoPro projectile an impressive distance.
If you’re wondering how you even get started on building a GoPro Cannon, don’t worry. Eclectical Engineering has provided an extremely thorough set of instructions that include everything you need to get started, including links and downloads to the products and 3D components used to build and house everything.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EDbvjOqhUCQ
Eclectical Engineering funds their projects through their online store, so if you’d like to support their endeavors and see more projects from them, head on over to their store and pick up a t-shirt with your holiday money.
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