Helmet Cameras

[JK moscraciun]

From my experience (I own Go pro and Vio) and after a couple of years of frustrations my conclusion is that you have to take a couple of decisions

If you want simple rouged, whether sealed and cheap you got a lot of options (go pro, drift x, etc) but forget quality.REALLY.

Cheap fixed optics, limited low consumption sensors, slow processing power etc. only can result jerky over/underexposed overcompresed videos!

This is a the painful truth!

None of the systems which are claiming HD are not native/true HD systems > generally just overblown/interpolated pile of dirty pixels.

There other professional quality(TV production) systems on the market but they are expensive 1000+ $ and consist of separate battery packs, hard drives, microphones and finally the camera unit al connected together with a ton of separate cables so installing and running such a system daily is not really practical.

The Vio from a construction point of view is special but that level of build quality is coming with a price and the video quality is still presenting al the above mentioned issues.

So is you if you want quality video you have to look elsewhere

Buy a small miniDV style camcorder and with some DIY attach to yourself or your gear

Or

by far the best creative solution to date reasonable both from practicality and quality perspective is seen here

http://www.bomberonline.com/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=29090&highlight=video&page=4

and is invented by a BOL member

Is brilliant!

a small good quality(canon/panasonic/etc) point and shoot camera attached to the chinguard of a full-face helmet!

advantages are a better quality video, fast, responsive, instant playback, true HD, directly in to your eyesight and reach etc. etc.

I believe the safety should be improved by attaching far lover on a true full face helmet thus in a chase of a face plant wont be smashed in to your face and rather in the chingurad.

It is a good idea worth improving.

Chances are that you or other family member are already own such a camera,

from aesthetic point of view is not elegant but not uglier than the latest GoPro HD

this is my opinion so feel free to correct me if I'm wrong or if you know better

JK

[pokkis]

You sure that GoProHD quality would not be what they claim?

I have used that and compared result to consumer my Sony HD's quality and would say that in good light they are quite comberable.

But what comes to WB, your right, it could be better but it is not too far away of WB autosettings of some cameras anyway :)

I have more problems with jello-effect, but that is case with almost all cameras :(

[JK moscraciun]

You sure that GoProHD quality would not be what they claim?

I have used that and compared result to consumer my Sony HD's quality and would say that in good light they are quite comberable.

But what comes to WB, your right, it could be better but it is not too far away of WB autosettings of some cameras anyway :)

I have more problems with jello-effect, but that is case with almost all cameras :(

Please do not understand me wrong

I'm not pointing in any direction or saying that one brand better or worst than other

I'm just pointing out the inherent limitations of the bullet camera systems,

Anybody who want to buy such a system should know about the compromises demanded by a small, roughed & cheap camera.

But there is hope, things are evolving and I believe in the next couple of years we will see serious improvement on image quality.

And I hope some of the big names(samsung, sony, canon, panasonic etc) will jump in am turn out some quality product.

[pokkis]

Sony has one nice bullet camera but price tag is 2.5k

http://pro.sony.com/bbsc/ssr/cat-industrialcameras/cat-highdefinition/product-HXRMC1%2FACC/

[shawndoggy]

Please do not understand me wrong

I'm not pointing in any direction or saying that one brand better or worst than other

I'm just pointing out the inherent limitations of the bullet camera systems,

Anybody who want to buy such a system should know about the compromises demanded by a small, roughed & cheap camera.

But there is hope, things are evolving and I believe in the next couple of years we will see serious improvement on image quality.

And I hope some of the big names(samsung, sony, canon, panasonic etc) will jump in am turn out some quality product.

Bang for the buck, the gopro HD is pretty darn good for $250. If you are looking for the absolute BEST HD resolution, probably not. But shooting in the r3 mode (720p, 60fps) the results are quite good. I'd say 90% as good as my canon vixia hf100, for half the (current) price.

As for editing, I've started using imovie (mac) and it's pretty good for a moron like me. Apple actually converts every video into its own apple codec first, before you edit. So it can take quite a while to import videos, but once they're imported, they edit very well in real time. You can then export the videos into different formats.

For editing on a PC, I'd look at a rig that's billed as a "gaming" machine. Core i7 with a 1gb video card should be awesome.

A couple of samples of the gopro HD in action this summer:

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