A rather unique hardware request for help - live video stream from a race car to trackside.

[Effex]

hi guys,

one of my clients has started a racing school / track ride company. basicaly taking people out in sports cars around different tracks in the UK for corperate days etc.

He posed a question to me today. is it possible to do the following and if so how:

a) have a live video stream from the car to track side on a projector

b) record this in a manor that could be compiled to DVD on that day for a gift/souvineer

c) would it also be possible to use multibple cameras inside the car to record passangers reactions possibly to have shown as a PIP within the souvineer dvd.

now I really havnt done much research into this but i figure that this would be a viable request and Id love some feedback as some people here really seem to know there stuff.


cheers,


Effex

[mikekim]

i know Everyman Racing ('http://www.everymanracing.co.uk/') do souvineer dvd's that are PIP, but that is produced via a dvd recorder and 2 cameras in car.

streaming the dvd to a screen would prove a challenge as if you look at the typical distance of a race track i'm not sure that current video senders would give you the quality you need to cover the distance

[Dgc2002]

If he really wanted to do it he could technically set up a bunch of access points around the track to avoid the out of range issue.

[mmcookies]

nm i can't read.

[cryinsham]

The best option i would think would be a mini-itx machine inside the car recording and compressing the video to a stream then sending that stream out, trying to send raw data from a camera/video sender to track side would be a PITA, plus if he is just a driver and is just paying to drive on the course ( like nueberring) then he wouldnt be able to setup all the access points anyway, so something like cellular wireless etc would be better option.

[Bovidae]

LOL@multiple access points around Nueberring, I'd like to see that.

But Cryinsham is dead on. You can't rely on the feed to make a recording (unless you have unlimited budget). On board hardware would have to record to HDD (I'd prefer SSD) then you could export and burn copies.

As far a as a live stream goes, for guests I assume, I would look at cellular technology. Mobile broadband would be much more reliable over the entire course, than wifi, even if you have multiple access points.

[Effex]

Thanks for the feedback guys.

Ive been having further chats with the client on this and it looks like we'll be putting the live feed on hold for now and setting up the system to simply record the driver/passengers in action, the idea being to swop the SSD out of the car when we swop passengers/drivers then play that recording over the projector. though not live after thinking further about it, it does offer some benefits live would not.
theres a few off the shelf setups for this on the market already at very reasonable pricing and from my limited knowledge they would seem a good start point if nothing else.