Shake it, fishy....

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This is going to be my Easter holiday hack: to integrate an accelerometer chip (e.g. Wake on Shake board from SparkFun Electronics) inside the housing of an action cam, to trigger a video when the camera is being accelerated or in other words, ideally as soon as a fish pulls on the hook-less bait, the camera starts recording for a fixed period. CamDo Solutions published a really cool trigger option for a GoPro.....I reckon the same must be possible for an angling type underwater camera. The camera would need a wireless function to transfer files instantly. The tricky part fill be to fit everything into the casing and configure the wake and shake to the desired acceleration speed.

The early beginnings...

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fishpic_drawing_contrast.jpg

A drawing based on ideas and a very first pre-prototype (named PhishPic) field tested in Arrawarra/Red Rock, NSW in Nov. 2011. Admittedly, the design resembles more a portable baited remote under water video station (BRUV), but in case of PhisPic that can be actively triggered by an approaching organism. The thought to marry this concept with angling appealed as well. Back then, one of the few decent underwater fishing cams was the Aussie towcam (http://towcam.com.au/): a cam for big game trolling. But only allowing continuous video capture - which I considered to be not very user friendly and convenient.

Since then, a lot has happened, and while a number of fishing cams are now out there on the consumer market, only one of them (as far as I know) offers an active, camera-trap like trigger mechanism which is comparable to Dr Snapper's working prototype (keep an eye out on the next posts) or Dr Snapper's other concept ideas (also still to come, watch this space).

Back then, in 2011, when playing around with the PhishPic pre-prototype, I am dead sure I cleaned that blimmin o-ring of the SeaLife Mini-II camera, but that thing kissed me goodbye after its first underwater touch. First, the pics went red, then it was dead. Farewell, bubble, bubble....