Camera setup guide
Film it right, and the AI does the rest
PlayerCam turns one fixed phone recording into a broadcast-style follow of your player. Because it works from the video alone — no GPS tags, no special camera — the way you set up the phone decides how closely it can follow the action. Five minutes of setup is the difference between a perfect PlayerCam and a lost one.
The four rules
Rule 1
Height matters more than anything
Get the camera at least 8–10 ft up — a raised tripod or monopod. The higher the phone, the less players block each other, and the easier it is for the AI to keep following your player through traffic. Ground-level filming is the #1 cause of lost tracking.
Rule 2
Stand on the sideline, near midfield
Center yourself on the halfway line, a few yards back from the touchline. This keeps the whole field in reach and means your player is rarely at an extreme edge of the frame — the edges are where tracking is hardest.
Rule 3
Frame the widest useful view
Zoom fully out (use the 0.5x ultra-wide lens if your iPhone has one). You want both goals or as much of the pitch as possible, with a small strip of space beyond the touchlines. Don't film tight — a tight frame means your player runs out of shot and the follow is over.
Rule 4
Lock it down and don't touch it
Once recording starts, never pan, zoom, or bump the tripod. The virtual PlayerCam does all the panning for you afterwards. A moving physical camera confuses the tracking.
Before you press record
- Phone in landscape, mounted securely (tighten the clamp)
- Ultra-wide lens selected (0.5x), video mode, 1080p or 4K
- Full battery or plugged into a power bank
- Enough free storage (roughly 1 GB per 10 minutes)
- Do Not Disturb on so a call doesn't stop the recording
- Tripod legs level and weighed down if it's windy
Common mistakes that break tracking
Filming from ground level
Players constantly block each other; the AI loses your player in every crowd.
Zooming in on the action
Your player sprints out of frame and the follow ends. Wide is always better.
Hand-holding or panning the phone
The virtual camera needs a still, stable picture to work from.
Standing behind a goal
You only see half the field well. Midfield on the sideline covers the most ground.
Why setup matters so much
Professional tracking systems like Trace use multiple fixed cameras and a GPS tag on every player, so they always know who is where. PlayerCam works out identity from the video alone — jersey number, team colors, and how the player moves. The more of the field your camera sees, and the less players overlap, the more reliably it keeps the right person in frame for the whole game.