Scuba diving camera tray for GoPro/SJCAM by oscahie

Last crawled date: 3 years, 1 month ago

I wasn't entirely satisfied with the existing designs so I've created my own simple camera tray to use with an SJ4000 camera in an upcoming diving trip. Of course it's also perfectly suitable to use as a regular camera tray out of the water ;)
The SJ4000 uses GoPro compatible mounts, and the size of its underwater case is roughly the same as the GoPro's, so the latter should work just fine with this tray too. The mount where the camera is attached was created with this customizer and then reinforced (made thicker) for extra safety and stability.
This is a very light and compact design, with superb grip and very comfortable to hold (specially with the rubber grips). Both the power/mode button and the shutter button are easily reachable without letting go of the handle.
This thingie is still a work in progress. I'll be putting it to the test at the end of May in Egypt (Red Sea). Afterwards I might do some further adjustments if necessary. Will post an update here when I'm back.
Update [20150608]: I made it back from Egypt! The camera tray worked pretty well, and not only underwater, I also used it to film a ride with quads through the dessert :) I don't really have something else to compare it against, so I can't tell whether the video stabilization is better or worse than with some other device. Admittedly the video was still a bit shaky at times, but I guess that's to be expected if you film while your body is moving, even more so when there was surge or currents.
I did find very convenient to have the ability to hold it on either hand, or two handed for extra stability. Also another great thing is that it didn't feel bulky nor heavy at any time, and also it was not getting in my way. As for buoyancy I simply added a small bolt with some washers and a nut in the hole in the middle of the base, and that provided enough extra weight (about 30gr) to achieve an slightly positive buoyancy in the red sea, which is very salty.
Finally, I'm happy to report that the printed parts did great under water (max depth 20m). Nothing broke, some water penetrated the infill as expected, but it didn't cause any damage. If anything I'd print the base with 100% infill so that it flexes a bit less, but that didn't really bother me.
So I guess the design is now final! :)