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[Trotsky]

Hi, I wonder if someone could give me a bit of advice please?

I’m an amateur wildlife photographer (mainly birds - http://bunglingbirder.blogspot.com/) rather than a model maker but I’m fairly useful with hand tools and have always liked building things.

Quite a few of my shots are taken from the edge of a lake, where you must rely on the birds to swim close to you to get good results. It would be so much nicer to be able to float along the surface of the lake with a camera, but not at all feasible. So I had an idea to build a ‘duck-cam’ boat.

I wondered if it would be possible to buy a cheap(ish) ready-to-go r/c boat and then modify it to accept a remotely operated digital camera fastened to the deck?

I’ve been thinking about this for a few days and this is what I’ve come up with so far –

Buy a model tug boat, such as the ‘Sea Port Tug Boat ‘ or ‘Sea Port Work Boat’ which you can get from Amazon for £29.99 or £44.99 respectively. I like these because they’re quite big and appear to be quite manouverable. It doesn’t need to be at all fast. The slower the better really. I read through a thread on this forum -  http://www.modelboatmayhem.co.uk/forum/index.php?topic=6588.0
and it seems like this boat might have problems with the radio control. I only need it to travel about 50 yards. Would it be capable of this?

Remove the top half of the boat.

Bulk it out at each side to make it wider and hopefully more stable. I thought I might be able to use waterproof foam, covered and held in place with fibreglass?

Make the whole of the new ‘deck’ area flat. A bit like a raft. Possibly add ballast underneath to help stabilise it?

Build a container to take the digital slr and 300mm lens. This would be detachable from the deck.

Attach something to the top to make the whole thing look like a log or a rock.


That’s about as far as I’ve got and would really welcome your advice please.


 

[john s 2]

Depending on the weight of your video equipment. It might be possible to use a decoy Duck. They convert well to r/c. Real Ducks
appear to accept them as Kosher.Possibly a small camera could be fitted in neck ? John.

[tigertiger]

My thoughts.

Yes the seaport tug and its ilk really need the RC gear ripping out and replacing.

Boats have a habit of either frightening off, or being attacked by wildfowl. I don't know how they would react to a 'log' that behaves differently. People have used decoy ducks that have been RCd for this purpose.

One thing I will question. Why the 300mm lens. You can get up close from a distance with one of those. And with a good digital SLR the possibility for digital zoom is also great.
Whereas the 300mm lens will have a very narrow field of vision, and you won't know what you are shooting at from afar. Additionally the camera shake from the bobbing in the water will be an issue with a 300mm lens.
I would be inclined to go for a wide angle lens if you want to get close, and crop the images later. Or set up a hide on the other bank and use a big lens. Even some of the compact cameras now have 30 or even 35x optical zoom (equivalent to about 700-800 mm) lens.

There is a thread on here, one of the guys has a Cannon compact with 35x zoom, and the Fuji Finepix HS10 has 30x optical zoom for under 270 pounds.

[Trotsky]

Depending on the weight of your video equipment. It might be possible to use a decoy Duck. They convert well to r/c. Real Ducks
appear to accept them as Kosher.Possibly a small camera could be fitted in neck ? John.

The camera+lens+remote would weigh about 2kg so it would need something sturdy.

[Arrow5]

Tiger has covered most of the salient points.  The ready to run boats are not suitable.  A clip on Youtube showing a barge mounted compact camera (Nikon 7900)  on movie mode, not a HD camera. It gives an idea what the cameras sees at 3" above water level. http://www.youtube.com/profile?user=MacSpringer#p/u/24/dA03xq5vZyA   You will be restricted to calm water only and as pointed out above 35mm or 50mm (equiv) max.  The boat towing the camera barge is a "pusher tug" called a Springer, a simple design that most model boaters could knock together for you.  A Springer can push a barge with that weight easily. The idea of disguising the craft as a duck will cause your rig to be attacked by most species with young or spook them into flight. Floating foliage is best for cover. Even the noise of electric motor is cause of spooking also so drifting when closer is best. For viewing what you are taking there are plenty live feed systems available but pricey. Check the Aerial Photography section on www.RCGroups.com ( American but good info and a few UK based people contribute )   PM me if you like, I do aerial photography from model aircraft.

[Trotsky]

Many thanks for the replies.

Regarding the camera equipment. I only take still shots using a Canon 1dmkIIn or 30d body coupled with either a canon 300mm or 500mm lens. The 500mm is way too big, heavy and expensive to risk putting on a boat so it would have to be 300mm. Even then you'd be talking about a replacement value of around £2000 if it all sank so I need something that I can trust.

I wouldn't want to use it on anything but a very calm surface as the ripples which the wind can cause would reflect light (not to mention rock the boat) and this would spoil the image quality. Arrow5's video clip illustrates this very well. The dark and calm water either side of the boat is perfect but the ripples that the boat causes reflect the light and could fool the camera into under-exposing the subject.

I only intend to use the motor on the boat to deliver and then retrieve the boat. This would be done with short bursts to keep the noise and speed down. It would be sat, hopefully very still and quiet, until the wildfowl forget about it. I would then snap away whenever something came into range, rather than follow it around and risk disturbing it.

I have plenty of camo net which I could use to cover the thing so hopefully it shouldn't look too much out of place. If it did cause a disturbance then I wouldn't use it, especially as the breeding season is around the corner.

As for the ready-to-run boats. You all seem in agreement that the RC gubbins is no good. Sorry to be a pain but could I ask what is wrong with it? Is it so bad that it is not capable of moving the boat in a fairly straight line for say 40-50 yards and then returning it a while later?

[Arrow5]

The radio on most RTR boats is of poor quality regarding interference and limited range. They mostly have limited number of frequencies making them prone to interference from other models.  They way to eliminate those problems is to buy a cheap modern 2.4mHz radio system which have there own bonded receiver and transmitter which cant be affected by other transmitters ,even others on 2.4 mHz.   A barge to carry your camera could be much more stable than RTR boats. A pusher tug with barge arrangement will be better in every respect.  Are there any model boat clubs near you.?   Had a look at your website, very nice.  Is the unknown large Spanish bird a Lammergyer (spelling ?)

[Trotsky]

The radio on most RTR boats is of poor quality regarding interference and limited range. They mostly have limited number of frequencies making them prone to interference from other models.  They way to eliminate those problems is to buy a cheap modern 2.4mHz radio system which have there own bonded receiver and transmitter which cant be affected by other transmitters ,even others on 2.4 mHz.   A barge to carry your camera could be much more stable than RTR boats. A pusher tug with barge arrangement will be better in every respect.  Are there any model boat clubs near you.?   Had a look at your website, very nice.  Is the unknown large Spanish bird a Lammergyer (spelling ?)

I reckon that setup would work well but it looks quite expensive.

I take your point about the radio interference but as I'm going to use this on a lake which doesn't have any boats on (or anywhere near) it and is in a valley bottom which makes it difficult to even get a mobile phone signal I’m going to have a go with the cheap Tug from Amazon.

I can always improve it later if needed. After all I don’t know if the idea will even work yet.

Thanks for the comments about the photos. I still don’t know what the Spanish one is but bird id’s has never been a strong point and being colour blind doesn’t help.

[Arrow5]

Depends on whether you think a £100 tried and true Springer that will bring back your £2000 camera as opposed to a £50 RTR proven to be not very stable and doubtful if it can even bring itself back to shore is a better deal.  How much did your tripod cost ?  Radio interference comes from many sources not just fellow modellers, cheap radios can be affected by a car starter motor for example. You mention "remote" , is this to trigger the camera ? Is it a propretery one ,radio, infra red ? Any clubs nearby that can help ?

[pugwash]

Hi Arrow - It ain't no lammergieir - once seen never forgotten -  Swmbo and I were shown a nest site in Andorra a couple of years ago
looks like a 747 its huge makes a golden eagle looks small - guess it could be a honey buzzard but not certain.
Geoff

[Arrow5]

Thanks Pug, yep they are ugly and impressive birds. Thanks for the ID guess, Honey Buzzard sounds good.

[Trotsky]

Depends on whether you think a £100 tried and true Springer that will bring back your £2000 camera as opposed to a £50 RTR proven to be not very stable and doubtful if it can even bring itself back to shore is a better deal.  How much did your tripod cost ?  Radio interference comes from many sources not just fellow modellers, cheap radios can be affected by a car starter motor for example. You mention "remote" , is this to trigger the camera ? Is it a propretery one ,radio, infra red ? Any clubs nearby that can help ?

I'm not sure where the nearest club is. There used to be one that used the local park lake but that was back when I was a kid.

Is the Springer the one in your photo? I thought it would cost a lot more than £100. Do you have a link? Snag is I've already ordered the tug and its been dispatched.

The camera trigger is a 16 channel wireless transmitter but I don't know what frequencies is uses. I'll try them both together in a safe and reachable place and if there's any problems I'll send the boat back for a refund and then think of plan B!

Good point about the tripod. It cost about £400!

[Arrow5]

Good grief 16 channels , what functions do they operate ?  Springers are a one design class designed for simple construction using basic materials and cheap 2channel radio control. They are non-scale pusher truckable workboats typical of the rivers and docks in USA. The basic hull doesnt need a wheelhouse or other details for your purpose. There is a "Springer" section here on Mayhem, including plans. £100 would get you decent secondhand one I think, a custom simple barge to suit £25-£35. On the Youtube pages shown previously there other examples on MacSpringers channel.  BTW where are you located , roughly?  

[Arrow5]

Trotski , bigger than a Springer is a simple pusher tug from a free plan from Model Boats magazine by Glynn Guest called "Jenny Sue Two" , I have a copy if you want.  Another idea is in a personal message to you (PM)