Blink Quick Start Guide
Introduction
Congratulations on purchasing your new CamDo Blink! This quick start guide will show you how to connect to a GoPro camera and create a schedule so you can start capturing amazing footage. You can also view helpful instructional videos as part of the Blink Support section of our website.
Note: Blink is powered from the GoPro battery and does not require a separate power source. Any external power supply should be attached to the GoPro camera to keep the GoPro battery charged.
Step 1
Prepare the GoPro camera for use with Blink.
Ensure the GoPro camera firmware is updated to the latest version. (v05.00 was the latest HERO4 version at Nov 2016). This can be completed by using the official GoPro App for iOS or Android. You can also visit the GoPro website here.
Turn on the GoPro camera and adjust the default capture settings. Blink can switch between camera modes but will use the default resolutions, frame rates, and Protune settings for photo, night photo, burst photo, and video modes that have been set from the GoPro camera.
Format your SD card using the GoPro camera by navigating through the GoPro setup menu. If your SD card has previously been used on another device, first preform a 'full-format' (not 'quick-format') of the SD card using a computer and SD card reader to fully purge all data. Any information on the SD card about another device can affect the performance of the GoPro camera. 'Full-formatting' the SD card can be done as shown in this YouTube video link. To be compatible with the GoPro, make sure to format to FAT32 for SD cards 32GB or less, and exFAT for SD cards 64GB or higher.
Note that the GoPro requires an SD card with a minimum read and write speed of 30MB/s (U3 rating) for reliable operation - use our SD card speed tester here. We recommend the use of an SD card of 64GB or less for the best performance from your equipment.
Use the GoPro setup menu to set the beep, LED, and AutoOff settings to avoid having to touch the camera once setup. We suggest an AutoOff of 1 minute in the event of an error to prevent the camera battery from draining. If using the HERO4 Silver, turn off the touch display from the GoPro setup menu to conserve power.
Step 2
Remove Blink from its packaging and connect to a GoPro HERO3+ or HERO4 camera.
Step 3
Wait 10 seconds. After this time, Blink will turn on the camera, read the camera’s time, and turn off. Don’t worry if the camera’s time is inaccurate, we’ll set it later.
Step 4
Plug the Wired Remote plugged into the Blink's 2.5mm port. Blink's WiFi can be turned on and off by holding down the button of the Wired Remote for 3 seconds. Blink's LED will flash cyan three times to indicate WiFi has been turned on and twice to indicate WiFi has been turned off. The LED will continue to flash blue every 5 seconds while Blink's WiFi is active and WiFi will automatically turn off after 15minutes to conserve power. The Wired Remote can be unplugged after activating Blink's WiFi.
Step 5
With a smartphone, laptop, or other wireless device, connect to the Blink wireless network “CamDoBlink_XXXX”, where XXXX is the MAC address of Blink. Unless you have multiple Blinks you will only see one Blink wireless network to connect to. The password to connect is “1234567890”.
NOTE: If the LED of Blink is not flashing blue to signify WiFi is on, connect the wired remote and hold the button for 3 seconds to turn it on.
Step 6
Open a web browser and navigate to “http://192.168.1.1” in the search bar. You will be presented with the following interface. We recommend creating a shortcut on your smartphone home screen or bookmarking the address if you are using a laptop/PC/Mac. Instructions to create a shortcut on your smartphone/tablet home screen are in the main Blink user manual.
Step 7
Click the “Sync” button to update the camera’s time with the local time on your browsing device.
Step 8
Modify a schedule to suit your capture requirements. In this example, we will create a schedule to take an image every 20 minutes, Monday through Friday, 10am till 4pm.
To create the schedule, complete the following:
- Tap the days of the week to enable the schedule for that day. As can be seen in the image below, M, T, W, T, F are highlighted in blue indicating they are active.
- Set the Start Time and End Time
- Select “Intervalometer” under “Select a mode”
- Set to your desired interval (20 mins in this example)
- “Select an action” - in this case a Photo during the Day is selected.
That’s it! Follow the same procedure to set additional Schedules as needed.
Step 9
Once the schedule has been modified, be sure to click the “Enable” button. A quick way to tell if a schedule is enabled is by the dark blue colour of the drop-down box. Schedule conflicts will be resolved by priority in descending order. For example, schedule 1 has priority over schedule 2.
Step 10
Click “Save All”. The page will refresh and your modified schedule should be shown in the appropriate drop-down box. Clicking “Clear All” will reset all schedules to their default values and disable.
Additional Information
For more detailed information on Blink, see the Blink User Manual here.
Blink Troubleshooting information can be found here.