 Poster: A snowHead
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So what's the best helmet/chest cam? The Go Pro seems to be very popular, or are ther others to think about? Are they easy to switch on/off using gloved hands? Is a zoom function useful or pointless? How much time and effort is needed for editing, adding sound etc?
many thanks for any pointers
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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I film a lot on my go pro 2. It's so easy.
Can I ever be bothered to do an edit. Rarely.
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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I've a Contour Roam, it's extremely easy to use and films in great quality (up to 1080p)
Also doesn't look like a box sticking out the front of your forehead.
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Another vote for the Contour series.
The new Roam2 and Plus2 are available now. I went for the Plus2. Picture quality is just as good as the gopro but the mounting is better and less obtrusive...
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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The GoPro has a lot of marketing fluff supporting an 'average' product.
I use the Drift which has a lot of nice features, including a remote to stop/sart recording.
However, the one I'd be looking at now is the Ion
http://www.iontheaction.com/index.html
I had a look at it at the Ski Show, and a chat with one of the guys there about what it could do, and it's features knock the GoPro into a cocked hat.
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Contour for me, I bought a GPS model 2 years ago. its great quality and pretty easy to use, but like most gadgets best to get used to it before you go with trail sessions etc. I dont use the GPS function becasue it uses a lot of battery via Bluetooth. My best advice is double up on battery's and keep the camera warm until reday to use, ie inside jacket. I dont film on 1080, rather use 720, more filming time. Only area I've struggled is to get a mount that I'm entirely happy with. I have the low profile helmet mount that fits on the side, only issue with this is that I tend to get my helmet peak in the corner of the movies which is a tad annoying. Contour have just brought out a new helmet mount with a 6 spoke pad for top hemplet mount, tempted to go with this, anyone else used this yet?
feef, Happy Birthday.
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Based on image quality the GoPro still outperforms everything and has a feature set far outweighing the competition (in the expensive latest model). Most of the competition seem to be catching up to the HD2 prior to the release of the Protune update in their latest iterations. Of course it looks more obvious than the bullet cams.
Personally I'd be on the lookout for cheap second hand GoPro HD2s as people off load and get the latest shiny. The videos on the link in my sig were all done on the HD2.
Editing and what not by far takes the longest time particularly if you have hours of footage.
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I make no secret of the the fact I am a huge gopro advocate and even though the Gopro is well documented as having the better image quality, the majority of people will probably not see the difference, even though it is there.
The big downside, for some folks, with the Gopro's is their form factor, this is addressed in a small way with the HD3 but given Gopro marketing, they are unlkely to have a significant change to that in the near future - After all you can spot them at about 100 yards.
The HD2 with protune and the HD3 does add some very useful functionality but the biggest stumbling block with Gopro is their ability to supply a stable product, this they have addressed by bringing almost all of their manufacturing and software development in house. Though this has yet to be fully realised.
I like the look of the Iontheaction but don't think it's going to be a gopro killer, I haven't gone through all the manuals so can't yet comment on any features or functionality at the moment.
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You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
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Thanks for all this info...was thinking about buying one for the OH and wasn't really sure where to start. 
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When I looked before (few years back), the Go Pro seemed to be the best on sound. Personally I see the form factor as a positive (at least there's choice), and at least makes the chest harness a possibility, which at least for biking seems a lot more stable than other mounts (speaking as a youtube/vimeo viewer here, not as a user).
Was kind of hoping the new Sony (AS15?) would have been a contender in the Contour/Drift form factor, but reviews I saw all seem to hint that the case is rattly as heck, and you need the case for all the mounts.
Either way, I'd get the one with the biggest array of mounts, and use them. Much more interesting vids when they have multiple angles.
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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
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| andy wrote: |
When I looked before (few years back), the Go Pro seemed to be the best on sound. Personally I see the form factor as a positive (at least there's choice), and at least makes the chest harness a possibility, which at least for biking seems a lot more stable than other mounts (speaking as a youtube/vimeo viewer here, not as a user).
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I'd disagree with that. Have a look at my helmet cam footage, using a DriftHD held in place just by the goggle-strap
https://vimeo.com/51468889
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And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
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Having just had a brief run through some the iontheaction manuals, I feel they may be being a little disingenuious about things, they paste all over their site
"It's not just about the camera it is about the ability to SHOOT in High Definition and SHARE in Real Time."
Well as far as I can see that's not exactly true (I may be wrong of course). What you can do is live preview the camera, but not when it's actually recording and as far as I can see you can't live stream, what you can do however is take the images and video straight off the card once you have stopped recording and then share post recording.
Also there are some other limitations.
It can't record in 1080p when mounted at 90/270 degrees, if mounted in the this position it records at the following resolution.
1080P 608x1088
960P 720x960
720P 416x720
Also maximum frame rates (not the be all and end all of things)
1080, 960 - Maximum frame rate 30fps
720 - Max frame rate 60fps
Battery life - Again a clever bit or wording here on their website, they talk about 7 hours recording, yep if you have their battery booster pack (a bit like a power monkey or pebble charger), standard battery will last at most 2.5 hours according to the online manual, this goes down to 1 hour if you have the wifi podz in and turned on.
Other stuff that jumps out, and again only really skim read the manuals. It seems that if you want to change any of the settings you need to connect it to a PC or TV, not ideal on the slopes.
Price - @ £299, if you can live with the form factor then my money is on a Gopro HD2 as these can now be had for a lot less than that at the moment and a HD3 black is not a lot more money if you can stretch to it.
I'll take a longer read of the manuals later perhaps and see if I have mis-represented anything.
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I think they need to work on their manuals, and maybe slow-down a bit with some of the claims on their website. I'm privvy to some of what's coming, which is hinted at on the website, but it's not available yet.
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You know it makes sense.
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| Quote: |
When I looked before (few years back), the Go Pro seemed to be the best on sound.
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I wouldn't necessarily agree, there are some issue (particularly with high frequency case rattle) on the GP's. A lot of these issues can be overcome very easily. The HD3 (all models) is reported to have improved its mic/sound profiles though.
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Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
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| feef wrote: |
| I think they need to work on their manuals, and maybe slow-down a bit with some of the claims on their website. I'm privvy to some of what's coming, which is hinted at on the website, but it's not available yet. |
Which is incidentally the very same issue that caused a lot of annoyance in the Gopro camps over the past 12 months.
Coming Soon
Coming Soon
was the phrase of the day, often felt as though it was an advert for a porn movie.
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Poster: A snowHead
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And whilst I'm thinking of something, I wonder if you can change the wifi password?
If not, or if it can and the user doesn't change it - How long before people start stealing or just plain deleting the images off the camera whilst you're sitting in the bar/bubble!
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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| ansta1 wrote: |
And whilst I'm thinking of something, I wonder if you can change the wifi password?
If not, or if it can and the user doesn't change it - How long before people start stealing or just plain deleting the images off the camera whilst you're sitting in the bar/bubble! |
You can change the password as far as I know 
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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I assumed so, but they don't explain it in the manuals, will have my eyes open and the wifi sniffer at the ready next time I'm on the slopes.
I see the video format actually records 2 streams.
The HD or Full HD version and a Thumbnail version, it's the thumbnail version that they will be using for the live preview and possibly the upcoming live streaming option, same as the gopro FWIW.
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You need to Login to know who's really who.
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The thumbnail version is what's transmitted to their app on your smart phone, yes.
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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I've got a Roam2 coming next week through work so I can do underwater filming when I'm out on jobs. Should add a nice dimension to the DSLR footage I shoot. It'll also be finding its way to the Alps when I go in January 
From what I've seen from the Contours, they seem every bit as good as GoPro for average shooting
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Agree with feef about mounting. I've been using helmet cams for some time now and helmet footage always comes out the best. Your head is naturally the most stable part of you, and as most of my filming is normally focussing on other people i'm riding with as long as I'm looking at them, I know i've got them in frame.
Looking forward to playing with the Plus2 this year - replacing my REALLY ancient bulletcams and tape-pack - be nice to ride without trailing 3 yards of cable. Trial run at HH methinks.
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| Richard_Sideways wrote: |
Agree with feef about mounting. I've been using helmet cams for some time now and helmet footage always comes out the best. Your head is naturally the most stable part of you, and as most of my filming is normally focussing on other people i'm riding with as long as I'm looking at them, I know i've got them in frame.
Looking forward to playing with the Plus2 this year - replacing my REALLY ancient bulletcams and tape-pack - be nice to ride without trailing 3 yards of cable. Trial run at HH methinks. |
shooting from the head or helmet does provide a pretty stable platform so to speak, so long as you can resist the urge to keep looking left or right.
other angles that are good if used are the lower angle shots, from the boot or lower leg for example, obviously this can be less so if in deep powder but still good for the odd cut away shot.
also if you are that way inclined dont pass up the fly by shot with the camera static on the piste. Clearly we are getting into edited pieces here and not just strait pov stuff.
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| Kevin Stephens wrote: |
So what's the best helmet/chest cam? The Go Pro seems to be very popular, or are ther others to think about? Are they easy to switch on/off using gloved hands? Is a zoom function useful or pointless? How much time and effort is needed for editing, adding sound etc?
many thanks for any pointers |
I've used various cameras provided to me, and the GoPro HD2 is the best I've used, hands down. It's not as pretty as some of the competition, but I shoot with it, I don't look at it. You'll find a lot of people who end up buying GoPro after they bought the other stuff, or wondering if they should have.
As far as I know the GoPro (HD2 and HD3) are the only cameras which will optionally shoot raw. They're serious tools.
All the cameras I've used are fine with mittens, you just have to press the one button.
Zoom is broadly pointless, they're practically fisheye.
Sound... the cameras catch sound, but I'm not sure that would be hugely useful for snow sports.
The amount of time you put into editing is down to you. I doubt any camera captures anything other than mpeg-4 H.264, so in this respect it makes little difference which you buy. If you want to shoot raw you'd not be asking this question, but for that you will need a fairly beefy computer.
Price-wise these are pound-for-dollar in the USA, so you can buy more and better if you do it outside the UK.
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You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
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pedantic i know but, technically even in protune on the gopro cameras its not raw its just unadulterated compresed jpeg. In, as you point out h.264 mp4 format. As the bit rate is higher in this format there is a much greater lattitude for post processing. Most consumer pc's or laptops would strugle to handle pure raw data.
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True enough; it's half-cooked. The fact that it's not gamma corrected & noise reduced, plus the increased bandwidth are the important bits. For snow, the ease of colour correction on non-gamma adjusted signal should be good.
I think many consumer PCs (no apostrophe, we're being pedantic ) will struggle with ProTune - there's a lot of data. Processing that is about the only thing which will get my machine properly out of bed.
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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
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we need pedantica to confirm pluralisation of PC in the context above......I am running various flavours but the biggest is 64 bit windows 7 with 8gb ram, seperate graphics card and core i7 (latest gen) processor, it's a laptop so not super fast. Usually convert the good stuff to full quality .mov before edit, then back to whatever format before final render.
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And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
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philwig, its not that much extra data, I can edit the protune H.264 right out of the camera with no transcoding to a ProRes intermediary on my laptop! It's not even as a high a bitrate you get out with some DSLRs when shooting video let alone anywhere near a RAW format like CinemaDNG.
Most people won't worry about that though, even on it's own the HD2 stands a head above the competition in terms of image quality out of the camera.
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As far as my needs are concerned, the picture quality of the Drift is more than good enough. 1080p at 25 or 30fps and a wrist mounted remote to start and stop. But one of the key features that it has, which the GoPro doesn't, is removable batteries. I can carry as many spare, charged batteries as I want and swap them out all day. No need to carry any additional pebble chargers or cables.
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You know it makes sense.
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feef, err, you can change batteries on a GoPro. I've had one 'continuously' recording for over 12 hours swapping batteries out as needed.
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Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
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I got a Delkin Wingman HD
Easier to use than a GoPro, waterproof to 30 metres, remote control, ......
The Delkin Wingman is a Full HD video and stills camera that can be worn or mounted on a variety of surfaces. Waterproof to 100 feet (30m) it can also be used to record extreme and active sports.
Video quality is Full HD with 1080p resolution at 30 frames per second. There is also the option of super-smooth quality for ultra-fast action using a 60 frames per second recording rate at 720p HD quality. Still image quality is selectable from 8 megapixels, 5 megapixels or 3 megapixels, and there are dedicated video and stills recording buttons so no complex switching between modes.
Unlike many action cameras, the Delkin Wingman has a 1.5” Live View LCD monitor that has auto brightness adjustment and LCD Standby Mode, to both conserve battery power and make the screen clearly visible when required in bright sunlight.
And can be found on the net for way less than the cost of a GoPro.
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Poster: A snowHead
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skimastaaah, the image quality is poor even compared with the first generation GoPro HD though and costs as much (if not more) these days.
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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| meh wrote: |
| feef, err, you can change batteries on a GoPro. I've had one 'continuously' recording for over 12 hours swapping batteries out as needed. |
I was going on the GoPro website:
1050mAh rechargeable lithium-ion
Charge via USB
http://gopro.com/cameras/hd-hero3-silver-edition#specs
It didn't mention removable, so my (incorrect) assumption was that they are built in.
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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feef, it's not very obviously written that's for sure!
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You need to Login to know who's really who.
You need to Login to know who's really who.
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To be fair, people, all these cameras, GoPro, Drift, Ion, Contour, Delkin.. you name it... have MORE than good enough video quality for most occasions and uses that we'll encounter. I'm not a pro film maker and just want to record some stuff to put up on Vimeo from my trips and activities. They all have features that we like or dislike and so we choose what suits us.
For me, I didn't like the the GoPro form factor, when I was in the market, the GoPro didn't have a remote to start/stop recording, it didn't have a user-replaceable lens, so for me, the Drift ticked all the right boxes.
You pays your money and you makes your choice.
All the cameras are This good.
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And we're arguing about an extra |-| on top of that.
It wasn't that long ago that I had a DogCam bullet cam, which required a 12v external power supply and external recording device. That was SO bulky and unweidly. All these current deivces are night and day compared to that, and I expect there'll be just as many massive changes in the near future.
Live 4G streaming, multiple remote control and whatever else has been mentioned, and I'm sure stuff we haven't even considered. Let's not see the helmet cam debate turn into a mac/linux/windows jihad
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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| skimastaaah wrote: |
| I got a Delkin Wingman HD /SNIP/... |
I saw these at FocusOnImaging 2012 when I was checking out camera kit for work. The guy on the stand was enthusiastic although wasn't 100 per cent certain on the features, but nonetheless it looked like a decent product. I just got swept up in the GoPro/Contour way of thinking that the Delkin just slipped my mind as a consideration...
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You'll need to Register first of course.
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The camera batteries on all the gopro cameras can be swapped out, the difference is with the HD3 battery back (which gives extended recording) which unlike the HD2 battery back is a sealed unit. With the HD2 battery back you could use it as a standalone charger so if you had multiple batteries you could cycle them through that to charge. You cant do that with the HD3, fortunately the HD2 battery back works with the HD3 and a little bit of dremel work allows you to charge spare HD3 batteries in the HD2 battery back.
Just need someone with a 3d printer to make me up a custom filler for the HD battery back so the HD3 batteries fit better.
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It is a departure from their previous MO I'll give you that. I guess their logic runs something like.
With a battery back you will get about 4 hours recording, which will be more than enough for almost all circumstances so why design the option to swap batteries out on the fly as you will most likely have filled up the memory card anyway. The HD1, HD2 didn't have a standby mode, either they were on or they were off (though in reality off doesn't mean really really off). The HD3's will go into a low power cycle if not used for a period of time saving battery.
still not sure their logic stacks up completely, but remember the battery is a completely different form factor in the HD3 than the HD1/2 so that may have had a bearing.
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You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
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| Quote: |
Just need someone with a 3d printer to make me up...
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PM lampbus - he seems to be printing something new every other day, probably "because he can"
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FAQ
