Big Helium Balloons & Aerial Photography?

[MiniMan64]

Bit random this one so bear with me...

At work I have come into possession of a large latex balloon (a 1600g?) and a Go Pro camera which I believe, given there was a parachute in the box as well, was intended to be the basis of a project to take pictures in space. It's being living under a colleagues desk for 2 years and while I'm not sure I'm confident enough to attempt the original mission, someone has suggested we could have a go at some aerial photography of our building and local area?

My question I guess is does anyone have any experience in this area? I believe the balloon is about 2m across so some rouhg fag packet calculations say I need about 3-4 litres of helium, how much will that cost?

Is the rest just inflate balloon, tie camera to it, tie string to it and away you go?

[55palfers]

http://www.argos.co.uk/static/Product/partNumber/3...

Try a couple of these.
Don't overfill the balloon on the ground as the helium will expand as it goes higher

Good luck!

[Simpo Two]

How do you get it down/the camera back?

[eybic]

The balloon will pop when it reaches a certain height, you then have to track the camera and collect it providing it hasn't been broken in its fall. There's a PHer that does this kind of thing, have a look in the photography section.

ETA: http://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?t=102...

[geeks]

Would love to come and follow that along/help out with planning. There is a load of info here: http://sentintospace.com/helpful-stuff/ PM if you want someone to help out

[MiniMan64]

eybic said:

The balloon will pop when it reaches a certain height, you then have to track the camera and collect it providing it hasn't been broken in its fall. There's a PHer that does this kind of thing, have a look in the photography section.

ETA: http://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?t=102...

I believe the original intent was to send the camera into space as part of small payload that included a GPS tracker but given we're in Devon there is a large possibility of a sea landing. That along with other reasons means this time we may go for a tethered balloon so we can easily retrieve it.