Wednesday November 6, 2013
Documenting our work in the field is an important part of what we do, and we have been using GoPro cameras for several years to record various projects (see Casual Spawning). We’ve found that the cameras have great video quality and their versatile waterproof housings make them readily adaptable to our fieldwork. For this particular project, we wanted to capture video of juvenile and adult Chinook salmon and rainbow trout at three different water depths, so we used bicycle handlebar mounts to attach three GoPro Hero cameras to a twenty-foot pole approximately five feet apart. The camera pole is mounted vertically adjacent to the DIDSON ARIS sonar camera (see Seeing with Sound) so their videos can be used in conjunction. We are using the video from the GoPro cameras to validate data we are acquiring from the sonar camera system, such as estimating species composition and behavior types. The objective of the project is to evaluate fish presence and behavioral responses to hydropower operations.