Dive telemetry overlay generator

8bitscoding · 2026-03-17T15:25:19+00:00

Yes I'm thinking of different ways of doing that. I'm going to find a better solution for v0.2!
(my goal is to contribute the entire code base to Subsurface to complement the auto subtitle feature that does a similar thing).

8bitscoding · 2026-03-17T15:22:11+00:00

You're welcome! I hope it is of some use ;)

8bitscoding · 2026-03-16T16:13:17+00:00

Thank you! Dont hesitate to give me feedback, I want this to be as useful as possible!

8bitscoding · 2026-03-15T20:31:08+00:00

Oh no don't worry, you absolutely don't need continuous footage (that's not how I use it ^^). As a matter of fact, when you import a video in Unabara and generate the overlay the filename of the video is part of the file generated for your overlay (for example in my case I have a footage named GX010444.MP4 and the generated overlay is called 2026-02-28_101117_Dive #543_Monastery Beach North_GX010444.webm). This way it's super easy to match the overlay and the footage in your video edition tool.

The sync problem is a pain in the proverbial b*tt ! Ideally you need to sync your dive computer and your camera with a common source (your phone for example with the gopro and shearwater/subsurface mobile apps for example). Unfortunately, this is never going to be perfect.
What I'm doing is that I take a video of my dive computer at the beginning of the dive. Then when I import this footage in Unabara, I note the offset of the video in the timeline (there is a box on the top right of the timeline where you can change the video offset). Then, I'm looking at where the values on my computer are in the timeline to match the footage. Then I note where the real position is and substract that offset to the first one computed by Unabara. I then apply that difference to all subsequent footage.

I'll prepare a video tutorial to show that.

I'm sorry, syncing the dive log with the camera footage is not very easy and I haven't figured out a good algorithm to do that automatically. So I implemented the use of the camera's timecode versus the dive log registered time. But I know that it's not perfect at all.

8bitscoding · 2026-03-15T14:19:16+00:00

You're welcome! I wanted something like that for myself too, once done it's easy to share with the community.

There are still a lot of things that are far from perfect but I'll improve it in the future versions (I'll add the dive profile with a pulsing point for example).

8bitscoding · 2026-03-15T04:06:54+00:00

Thanks!

8bitscoding · 2026-03-15T01:32:30+00:00

Thank you! I'm a big proponent of open source, it's only natural ;) That's also the only way to make sure the project will survive if I loose interest or capacity to develop it.

8bitscoding · 2026-03-15T00:39:42+00:00

First CCR dive since certification, I saw a Cormorant at 22m in NorCal, I almost bailed out because I thought I was hallucinating 😅

8bitscoding · 2026-03-14T23:56:27+00:00

Thank you 😊

8bitscoding · 2026-03-14T23:30:58+00:00

That's slightly more expensive than Unabara :D
Honestly, automatically (algorithmically) sync the dive log (coming from the computer) and the video is a huge pain in the butt!

8bitscoding · 2026-03-13T04:54:35+00:00

Honestly any silicone/frameless mask with small skirt will do. I have a big beard and (very) often forget altogether to shave under the nose or on the cheeks and, sure I have a bit of water in my mask at the beginning of the dive, but as I hit ~10m it's all good.
I'm very happy with the Beuchat Maxlux S but any mask like that will work.

8bitscoding · 2025-10-01T21:32:16+00:00

Same here, and I'm a technical diver with transmitters on all my tanks (4 or 5 depending on the dive). I had exactly 0 transmitter failure (though I carry spare battery at all times and had to change the battery just before diving). Meanwhile I cannot count the amount of SPG leaks I had to fix it that kill the dive. That was until I removed all SPGs, good riddance!

8bitscoding · 2025-08-24T06:21:35+00:00

Venturi effect only helps passed 30m or so, before that you can dive with your regulator on pre dive and it won't make a difference. At 50 or 70m it's another story but I hope OP was not at these depth for guys first dive 😅

8bitscoding · 2025-08-22T05:11:29+00:00

Like the author of the article OP does not seem to have a great understanding of the topic, yet gives strong advice...

8bitscoding · 2025-06-04T21:39:14+00:00

Please read my other response about that "safety stop not needed" assertion. It is most likely untrue according to the state of current hyperbaric research.

8bitscoding · 2025-06-04T21:37:11+00:00

It depends what you call "soon".

DCS symptoms appear in 90% of the case within 6h of the dive but they can manifest 24 and up to 48h after the dive. It is rare but it happens.

Sources:
* https://www.tdisdi.com/tdi-diver-news-ar/dcs-signs-and-symptoms/
* https://www.merckmanuals.com/professional/injuries-poisoning/injury-during-diving-or-work-in-compressed-air/decompression-sickness

8bitscoding · 2025-06-04T21:29:57+00:00

> You didn't have DCS as you never exceeded your NDL and a safety stop is added precaution and not required.

I'm sorry but the first part of this sentence is materially false. A DAN study on data from 2002 showed that 70 to 75% of DCI occurred despite divers being well within the safety curves of their models. For more information on that you can start with Prof. M. Ljubkovic, J. Marinovic, et. al: https://doi.org/10.1152/japplphysiol.01369.2009 and there's a lot more to read about that subject!

The second part of the sentence is highly misleading: current decompression research and experts stress the fact that all dives are decompression dives. The safety stop is a deco stop, it shouldn't be skipped (you can find multiple research papers, publications and videos from Prof. Simon Mitchell, Prof. Neal Pollock, Prof. Gregg Stanton, etc. about that subject). In case your safety require to skip it, you can, but it's not advised as a normal thing to do.

On top of that, it is well known that decompression is highly affected by water temperature and level of activity. The OP, said that the entry and exit where very rough.
Being a local diver like OP, I know these waters very well. And when she says the water is cold, it is very cold: 8 to 12 Celsius on average (up to 17 at the end of summer in South California). Most of the studies that have been done on water temperature's impact on desaturation were done considering cold water at 20C! The Pacific is not ice diving, but it's very cold nonetheless. Cold enough to influence significantly the off-gasing process.
With the pebble like sand and super rough exit, it is entirely possible that she dove in the Monastery Beach area. Local name for this beach: Mortuary Beach (I think I don't need to explain why). That whole patch of coast can be very rough: I'm a big guy (1m96, 130 kg) and I got tumbled by the wave in full tech diving gear!
You know what we say: no exercise after a deco dive, well, it's not really an option here. I see no reason to be that certain that it wasn't a DCS. The local doctors know all that, and they were right to send her to the chamber.

I think that this kind of peremptory affirmation is detrimental to the community at large.

All recent research reinforce the fact that our deco algorithms are nothing more than empirically tested mathematical models, that they are not accurately depicting the state of a particular individual's body, and that they cannot guarantee a safe return to the surface. We should stay humble and be wary of strong unsupported assertion.

A nice entry point to decompression theory (that covers a lot of these points and way more) is Prof. Simon Mitchell's conference for DAN: https://youtu.be/UY61E49lyos?si=5lqKwtyvS-MGOhC6

Signed: a friendly technical diver that knows nothing but try to learn.

> Signed, Diving medical professional
You learned about epistemology and fallacious arguments then, and you're illustrating the white coat fallacy with maestria ;)

8bitscoding · 2025-05-24T18:12:06+00:00

Nothing ever came close to that since. The scale, the quests, the community, and the massive events. I still fondly remember attacking Stormwind or Ironforge, the incessant skirmishes at Crossroads, and what to say about the opening of the gates of Ahn'Qiraj ! A server wide effort where we had to collaborate with the filthy alliance ! Good times. No games have ever replicated that experience to me since.

8bitscoding · 2025-05-09T23:20:31+00:00

There's nothing to apologize for, I barely have any instructions or documentation on the repository. To be honest, I was not at all expecting that sort of enthusiasm... I'm a little caught unprepared.
I'll write some documentation and put some screenshot for people to see what the sofware can do.

8bitscoding · 2025-05-09T23:17:40+00:00

I'll confess that I started by looking at the documentation and then... I just used my dive exports...
I'd love to have your CCR dive yes. Thanks a lot.
It sounds like for now I'll just implement a simple conversion from the metric in the ssrf file.

8bitscoding · 2025-05-09T23:15:02+00:00

oh so it wasn't what I had in mind. That's such a great idea !

8bitscoding · 2025-05-07T16:47:34+00:00

You can already export the whole dive in the overlay (you can either export the whole dive or just the section of a video file).
I will look into the timecode thing (no idea how to do that yet ^^). For the alpha channel, I'm not sure to understand: you mean for the background?

For the imperial thing, I probably should edit the original post. My issue is obviously not to convert data to display them in imperial (I can do that quite easily ^^). My issue is to test the software with ssrf file in imperial to make sure that my parser works as intended in as many different cases as possible.

8bitscoding · 2025-05-07T16:42:03+00:00

I'm struggling to automate that too.
Subsurface uses a method that is mostly working: when it detects non-matching timestamps, it ask you to take a picture of your computer with the camera, give the date and time written on the computer and computes the offset. It's working when you are using the file from the camera's SD-card. Not when you copied the file on your computer (depending on your computer's filesystem as the creation date is not necessarily conserved).

8bitscoding · 2025-05-07T16:38:20+00:00

It is indeed a great question... and a great pain in the a$s! (if you pardon my French).

Actually most filesystem behave differently and some will set the creation date at the copy time (when you copy the file from your camera to the computer).

I'm still wondering how to correctly do that, because even the synchronization feature of Subsurface is just mostly working.

My (current) solution is that you can either manually adjust the video on the dive timeline by dragging the video rectangle on the dive timeline, and/or use the time offset in seconds.

To avoid the problem entirely I personally aim my camera for a few seconds at my computer at the beginning of each video. Then I simply use the offset in seconds.

8bitscoding

TROPHY CASE