The Camera Bag: Novo camera is a GoPro Hero3 hacked to take cinema lenses

4k cinematography gopro gopro hero3 the camera bag

posted Friday, April 12, 2013 at 5:09 PM EST

The GoPro Hero3 action camera is a great little device for capturing high definition and 4K footage in hard-to-reach situations. In fact, we've catalogued quite a few of them, including this GoPro shooter who captured footage of a diver hitching a ride with a Great White Shark and this GoPro, which got up close and personal with a lion.

But GoPros have their limitations for on-the-fly cinematography, particularly when it comes to the built-in wide-angle lens. That's why the folks at Radiant Images in Los Angeles created the Novo Digital Camera, which is a GoPro Hero3 modified to accept C-Mount cinema lenses. The Novo camera, which is essentially a GoPro Hero3 stripped of its housing and retrofitted in a new body designed by Radiant Images, isn't for sale though. But if you're interested in using one, you can rent it daily for $295 or weekly for $885.

Here are some of the enhancements to the GoPro Hero3 that come with the new Novo design:

• A C-mount lens system with back focus adjustment, which allows for extreme macro shooting.

• Exposure control capabilities.

• An internal CPU interfaced to the camera that lets users disable auto exposure and then adjust the aperture manually via the lens. This gives you the ability set a desired exposure and stops.

• Lightweight aluminum housing, which is 20% thinner than the GoPro Hero3 and includes three 1/4-20 and two 10-32 mounting points.

• Four buttons on the front (REC, PWR, WiFi & AUX) are assignable to various functions depending on the application.

• The Aux button turns the auto exposure on/off. In a future design, it will be used for other functions, such as digital zoom.

Otherwise, the Novo offers all the "old" features of the GoPro Hero3: Black Edition including a 12MP sensor capable of 30 frames per second still image bursts; 4K video shooting at 12fps, 2.7K video at 30fps; 1080p at 60fps, and 720p at 120fps, for slow-motion playback; an LCD touchscreen; and built-in WiFi.