helmet cam anyone?

[JOx2]

has anybody here tried a hdd camcorder attached to helmet as a helmet cam? i got the jvc hdd camcorder and is fairly lightweight. is it worth it? just wanted to do it for fun. its one of these.


any input is highly appreciated.

[genusmtbkr5]

Yes, I did. It is really heavy after a while, but worked great. Be sure you have someone see how the angle is cause the first time I mounted it, it was angled too low and all I got was my friends back tire. You need to angle it so when you are in your riding position, it will be the right angle. I also put a foam pad between the camera and helmet to absorb some of the bumps even though my camera had a water lens.

[stinkyrider]

It'll work great. Just a little heavy and uncomfortable.
For about $500, you could get an uber-light Archos DVR setup, but the quality won't be quite as good.

[Frozen208]

If you want a video camera check out the GoPro Helmet Hero, we have been messing around with it since we got them instock, they surprised me with the picture quality. Plus it comes in a pretty durable case, which would be my biggest fear if I just had my camera on my helmet. I worry about my point and shoot when I have it in my pack or in it's case on my camelbak straps. Check out !Pahkia!'s ride that he shot with the camera, it is a small camera too.

[dstepper]

Just a thought would of these work on that camcorder?

http://www.newworldvideodirect.com/c...FRIUagodZxslLA

[Marshall Willanholly]

Check out this site. Some of the best helmet cam stuff around.

http://www.petefagerlin.com/video_how_to.htm

[Pain Freak]

How do those little pen sized cameras work? I've seen a number of guys with these attached to their helmets and they don't weigh anything.

[allison]

I think MTBBill has some camera info on his site as well. He's also using HD cameras sometimes also, I believe.

[kanga]

I've been using my Canon S80 (yes, it's a still camera) in video mode to shoot some helmet cam video. It's been dubbed the "teletubby" helmet cam by those who've seen the custom mount I made for it. It works pretty well as can be seen in the vid below, which is raw, unedited footage.



After riding the entire Cannell trail with the S80 on my helmet, my neck was sore for a couple of days. But also because of how high the camera is with the ball-head mount, there's a lot of leverage.

But it wasn't as sore as my neck was 6 years ago after riding brown/prieto with a sony mini DV camera on the side, and a 2 pound counterbalance on the other side! I only did that once.

Now I have my eye on one of the new Panasonic HDC-SD5 cameras... an HD camcorder that records to SD cards and weighs only 340g . It would be about the same weight, but much better quality with image stabilization and HD resolution. Perhaps for the new year....

[dstepper]

The problem with most online videos is hosting big file size high quality videos. You Tube and Google compression makes them nearly un-watchable to me. I like the stuff from MtBill's and Pete's sites.

[kanga]

Originally Posted by dstepper

The problem with most online videos is hosting big file size high quality videos. You Tube and Google compression makes them nearly un-watchable to me. I like the stuff from MtBill's and Pete's sites.

Agreed... but the ease of distribution and near-universal compatibility of youtube has it's advantages.

The new version of Adobe's flash player is supposed to support streaming HD video, if you have the bandwidth to receive it. Smugmug.com, which is the photo hosting site I use, supports HD video (in quicktime format) .

HD is coming... be patient!

[JOx2]

Originally Posted by kanga

I've been using my Canon S80 (yes, it's a still camera) in video mode to shoot some helmet cam video. It's been dubbed the "teletubby" helmet cam by those who've seen the custom mount I made for it. It works pretty well as can be seen in the vid below, which is raw, unedited footage.

makes me wanna try my point and shoot SD630, the only problem is how do i mount it on handle bar.

[genusmtbkr5]

You wouldn't want to mount it on the bars, because it would too bouncy there. You can keep your head more stable for steadier footage.

[stinkyrider]

Ok, as mentioned before the Archos setup is uber-light and compact setup at fair price.
The entire setup weighs under a pound and the DVR unit is slightly bigger than an Ipod. I can fit mine in the coat pocket of my ski jacket.
The cool thing about this setup is that the microphone, remote, camera, and power are all intergrated into a single wire running into the DVR unit. The only drawback is that the camera runs 420 pixel lines instead of the 520 or even 580 you get with viosport or GoPro cameras.

I bought the Archos DVR unit from Newegg.com for about $300 including shipping and the Archos bullet cam from another site (I forget which one) for about $175 plus shipping.

[stinkyrider]

The pixel count on the camera has remained the same for the past couple of years at 420 lines. Here's the specs.

Light Sensitivity: 1.0 Lux / F 1.2
Resolution: 420 TV Lines
CCD: 1/4-inch SONY Super HAD colour LCD
Lens: fixed Pinhole 3.6mm
Depth Field: 1.5 to 10 meter
Auto focus and white balance
Records in MPEG-4 AVI format up to VGA (640X480) resolution
Power Supply: Power by product.
Resolution H x V (pixels):
- Model NTSC: 512 x 492,

Originally Posted by mechmann

that is a sweet setup... i think i will wait until they have higher resolution.

[kanga]

Originally Posted by JOx2

makes me wanna try my point and shoot SD630, the only problem is how do i mount it on handle bar.

What I did was find an aluminum plate and and old ball-head mount tripod. I took the ballhead off the tripod, and mounted it to the plate, drilled four holes in the plate and just attach it to the helmet with zip ties as needed. The ball head is nice as it allows easy adjustment in just about any direction/axis, without having to remove the camera. Disadvantage is that the camera is about 2 inches above the helmet, which means it puts a lot of leverage on the helmet.

You could do something similar and probably lower profile with a standard tripod head. Try to find one with a quick-release mount and it would be a sweet setup, but you wouldn't have the on-the-fly adjustability.... it would have to be aimed correctly when you attached it.

I'm sure there's other methods that would work too.... be creative.

And yes, helmet, not handlebars for sure.

Another trick I use to aim the camera. Put the camera in still shot mode, ride, and reach up and click a photo. Take off the helmet with cam, and view the photo to check the aim, adjust as necessary.

And if you crash and damage the camera, I assume no responsibility (mine has dings and scratches, and broken bits all over, but still works).