Race Video & GPS Data Merger

Table of Contents

1. Introduction
2. Download
3. Prerequisites
4. Usage
5. Warranty
6. Errors & Suggestions

Introduction

Like most people racing today, I have a video camera setup in my car while I'm racing. I also have a GPS logging system (MaxQData in my case). As a training tool (and a pretty neat way to show off), I wanted to merge the GPS logging data and the video that I took while racing. There is one player in this space -- TrackVision. It's a great piece of software, but it costs $2-300. I can't justify that much money for a piece of software, so I wrote my own.

Here is a sample output.

Download

Prerequisites

On Your Computer

You're going to need the .NET 3.5 Framework.

You'll also need a video encoding codec. I recommend the Xvid codec.

Video File

This application only supports AVI files. If your video is in some other format, I recommend you use VirtualDub to convert them to AVI.

From testing, it appears that the software does not support MJPEG encoded files or files @ 30FPS. Again, use VirtualDub to convert to 25fps and a Divx format for the best results.

GPS Data File

The application supports GPS data in the TrackVision CSV file format. Any other formats are not supported.

Usage

The program is fairly simple to use.

1. Extract the downloaded files.
2. Run VideoDataMerger.exe
   
3. Select the AVI Video file and GPS data CSV file.
   
4. Using the sliders, sync up the video and data points.
   Hints:
   • Click on the slider, and use the arrow keys to move left and right one frame/data point.
   • Click on the label ("Start Frame", "End Frame", "Start Point", "End Point") to put the current frame/data point into the text box.
   • Try running a sample output with 1000-1500 frames to verify that the data and video is in sync.
   • Moving backwards in the video is CPU and time intensive. Have patience :).
   
   
5. Click the Go Button to start the process.
6. You will be prompted to select the codec to use. I recommend Xvid MPEG-4 Codec. Uncompressed will make multiple gigabyte files.
   
7. Be sure to configure the codec. Here are the settings I use.
   
8. Then video processing starts. Go grab a sandwich if you are doing a large video.
   
9. The processed file will be saved in the same directory as the input file with the name changed to filename_merged.avi.

Warranty

There is no warranty expressed nor implied with this software. Please don't use this on your only copy of your video. Please don't complain if it doesn't work right for you or your purposes.

Errors & Suggestions

If you have any problems or suggestions for the software, please let me know. goofygrin at gmail dot com. A sample video and input will be helpful to debug.