I apologize if this has been asked a thousand times before, but I don't own any Garmin equipment so I don't usually look at this board. I'm thinking about getting Livescope, but the majority of the water I fish is pretty shallow (8 ft or less, and a lot of 5 foot or less). Is Livescope still worth it if you fish mainly shallow water?
Not in my opinion but I'm not running perspective View
I have great success from 8' and deeper seeing up to 60' range. but getting 5-7' deep probably only 50'range. And less than 5' is 30-40' range this is still helping me avoid running up on basketball sized rocks in 20" of muddy water. I have only bounced off one rock in 20 hours in these conditions. Without LiveScope I wouldn't be in this area.
I also do not use perspective mode, I wish I did as I read it this is the best scenario to optimize its use.
Mercury 250 proxs 2B115089
The cone angle on a LVS32 transducer is 20* buy 120*. When your in the forward view the 20* is left to right and the 120* starts with the level plane of the water and comes back 120* which is actually about half way under the boat. Just like regular sonar form years ago as you get deeper the cone angle has more coverage and as you get more shallow the cone angle has less coverage. This is due to a fix beam on the cone. What Garmin has done with the perspective view allows you to change the angle in which the cone is looking. When you rotate the transducer sideways the 20* cone is now looking forward and down and the 120* cone is looking left to right. In essence what you are doing is somewhat like turning a traditional sonar beam into side scan. This is why perspective view is best in 10 ft of water or less. You have a wide cone angle looking left to right and a narrow cone angle looking forward and down. If your wide cone angle was looking forward but down its not covering much real-estate because its so close to the bottom. Hopefully that made sense the way I explained it.
Now another FYI...when you rotate the transducer sideways you lose the depth reading because the cone angle that reads depth is now looking sideways. If you have another Garmin unit that can display a depth reading you can network that unit to the unit you are reading perspective view with and display a depth reading that way. I only have one Garmin unit so I simply look at my Lowrance when I am in perspective view and want to know the actual depth. Once you get a perspective mount and learn how to fine tune the settings you can get amazing pictures from perspective view. Here is a link to a YouTube video and the user knows how to dial in his unit in perspective mode. When I was doing my research I found YouTube videos that made the product look amazing and I found videos that make the product look like crap. In my opinion the ones that look like crap are the one where people do not take the time to fine tune the settings. You don't have to constantly fine tune the settings but its not a tool that you simply set up and forget about, it does need to be dialed in for max picture quality.
In my opinion his gain is pretty hot. If he backed it down about 5% I think the picture would be better but its still a pretty good picture.
Thanks for the great explanation and video! Sounds like I'd be just fine with the Livescope as long as I have the Perspective mode mount.
I have Livescope on my kayak and generally fish in under 5, and most of the time 4, feet of water. They say the fish in our area know how to walk. The perspective view is great and is what I use 95% of the time. With the troll motor off, they will swim right under the boat and if you are ready you can drop the bait right on their nose. I don't think you will be disappointed.
Men and fish are alike. They both get into trouble when they open their mouths. ~Author Unknown
RedShad, your scenario got me thinking.....one of these nights when i get the time ill have to set up in a prime shallow spot with perspective on and see what kind of species activity ill see.
can you see your bait well(or at all) in the perspective mode?
Here’s a clip that (trystanding) posted a while back. I think it’s either a whopper plopped or buzz bait. Maybe he’s around and can answer.Originally Posted by W.O.T
https://www.dropbox.com/s/2wgkm876lx...92035.mp4?dl=0
4 feet is no problem
When I first watch that video it looks like a fish came out of no where when he reeled in his bait the first time right at the boat but after watching it multiple times you can see the fish is tracking his top water bait all the way in. Its hard to see the fish because the bait is leaving a trail but if you pay close attention the fish is actually tracking the bait the entire time its in the screen the first time he is reeling in. I thought that first cast was very impressive footage.
WOT - sorry for length of post.
LVS32 in forward view works from 1-5’ deep plenty good as long as your adjustments (head unit and mount) are setup.
You can see fish and lure (and structure) but as JR19 describes the cone is very narrow. I can only see lure ~25’ on a good day usually 15’ on in. This allows for accuracy in depth and location.
JR19 is correct the perspective mode is better suited for 10’ and the images are far better when images are dialed. The images are far better than forward view. However they are not 3D and like Side scan it shows what the sonar hits and also shows the shadows. This is still good when dialed in properly. However for accuracy I like forward view better than perspective and many times I find it easier to see the fish shadows but you need to think whether the fish is 3’ out or 6’ out in front and then the corresponding depth at the angle you need to guess. That said in 5’ deep water I think close Is good enough for a fish to react. In 10’ of water, not so much. In perspective mode, structure shows up far better than forward view and is easier to locate than fish. It’s most comparable to the quality of today’s better side or down scan. In perspective mode, I have a very difficult time locating lures even with adjustable perspective view and the angle of the 20 degree cone is probably the reason (just like why it’s critical to have mount in forward view aligned with direction you are aimed)
Also any sonar is limited by the water clarity, number of particulates (sand, dirt, pollen) and water movement (wind, tides, current). This is true of side scan and forward as well as perspective (no matter vendor). While they all degrade with each of the items mentioned, I find the perspective view is degrade most easily then side scan then forward scan.
My guess is the next Gen of Livescope (and I have no inside knowledge) will take the best of both forward and perspective and merge them without having to make mode software and physical adjustment by coming out with new xdcr. Or they might just need more hardware with current xdcr to get better results with current setup (which is less likely).
As I am on the fence on what is best combination of bow mounted forward and structure tool, I am interested in what Garmin comes up with next gen. I personally think if they were to get the perspective images more easily dialed in, the structure identification is pretty good (ie as good as any side or down scan if clear water and dialed in ) and the use of LV12 in shallow water would be good enough for me. (Re: the many folks who now are installing H360 and a forward looking sonar). I personally don’t think a 60 x135 degree sonar with improved processing is going to be any good with degraded water median. Clear water could be amazing (and why an under water cameras may be the benchmark for clarity :) )
Maybe somebody in the know will chime in on what direction we can expect from Garmin.
Hopefully this helps.
(ps - all the analytics of the data captured will be something to watch too )
Last edited by MDBASSNPRO; 02-01-2021 at 10:28 AM.
As I am new to this, please excuse my ignorance. I thought my new livescope had a 20 and 135 degree shot. That said,
is there software needed if you turn the transducer 90 degrees to get perspective mode? I'm running a UHD 93. Obviously the mount on the pole
has to be capable of turning 90 degrees.
There is a perspective mode bracket that attaches to the livescope scope bracket. Then software version 2.30 or 2.33(I don’t remember which one) or newer on your system.
Okay, so you do need to tell your fish finder to go to perspective mode. Is that software a free upgrade? I don't even have my Active Captain
set up yet.
Yes software is free. I don’t know how new your system is but if newer than say June of last year you probably already have SOME version of perspective mode software on it (just need to see which one). As for Active Captain it’s a piece of cake to set up and use. Even for a tech challenged man like myself.
In my original reply I said the sonar beam was 20* wide and 120* from the level plane of water to slightly half way under the boat. I was wrong it is 20* X 135* in forward or down but 20*X 150* in perspective. To best get an understanding of how the cone angle looks at things I will post a video where Garmin explains how it works. The part that starts at 34:37 - 35:50 shows how the angle looks at things, however a person one can learn a lot of information buy watching the entire video. One thing to note is this video was released buy Garmin right after perspective view was released, so when they are talking about updating your unit for the software they are talking about older units that did not have the perspective view feature. Any unit made in the last year or so will already have perspective view loaded onto the unit but with that being said you can still update newer units because the software has changed since it was first released. I "think" the most recent software version is 2.44
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