Helmet Camera Advice

gb155

Ok

I use a Muvi, I have had 2 accidents now and in the first one the force of the impact cause the SD card to come out and the second one wasnt caught as the battery had run out, due to me doing pretty long rides in the morning.

As you know my last accident has shaken me to the core, as such I want a camera that, 1. will no lose its damm card and 2. will have enough power for around 2 hours of video.

What would you reccomend and how much am I looking at spending ?

Thanks

Gaz

rich_e

GoPro.

The card can't come out as it's in the protective case.

gb155

Rich_E wrote:

GoPro.

The card can't come out as it's in the protective case.

Cheers for that, looks like the winner so far

xtremedash

I would steer away from the Oregon Scientific ones, the mounts are just too weak. I've broken two in the same place and they just can't take the force of a crash. Also they don't handle vibration well and you end up with funny shaped wheels and faces on the videos!

bike_addict

Put insulation tape arount the body of the Muvi cam to hold it in place. It should not come out full stop but this is certainly stop it. use black tape and you will hardly notice it.

gb155

bike_addict wrote:

Put insulation tape arount the body of the Muvi cam to hold it in place. It should not come out full stop but this is certainly stop it. use black tape and you will hardly notice it.

The problem is I still cant use it all day, if I spend around 90 out in the morning then its dead for the evening, I cant charge it at work

always_tyred

gb155 wrote:

bike_addict wrote:

Put insulation tape arount the body of the Muvi cam to hold it in place. It should not come out full stop but this is certainly stop it. use black tape and you will hardly notice it.

The problem is I still cant use it all day, if I spend around 90 out in the morning then its dead for the evening, I cant charge it at work

Get another one then. Charge them both overnight.

hells

I have a VholdR 1102, good quality HD videos, secure mounting system, and you can buy additional spare batteries for it

salsajake

I have a Muvi, I tend to just switch it on as I approach the more built up areas where the numpty driving normally takes place! My mate had an Oregon Scientific, they are bulky, can only be mounted on their mounts which are a pain (as opposed to Muvi where you can improvise) and the picture quality was a lot worse than the Muvi. I think they are really old tech now. Good idea just to get a second muvi, or delete files and charge up again at work, which is what I do. I think Muvis record less time when it is sunny because the battery is constantly being used to alter he brightness/contrast whatever - I think so anyway because in the summer I have been getting around 1:10 wheras in winter it was around 1:45 out of a charge

gb155

hells wrote:

I have a VholdR 1102, good quality HD videos, secure mounting system, and you can buy additional spare batteries for it

Hi mate

Could you post a link to some sample vids please?

gordon861

I think the Vhold cameras have now been superseded by the ContourHD cams from the same company.

http://contour.com/contourhd/helmetcam
They do a 720P unit and a 1080P unit, both cameras have metal bodies and are rain proof.

Lots of user videos here : http://contour.com/videolist

The UK Distributor is DogCamSport : http://www.dogcamsport.co.uk/
They do lots of different cameras and are very helpful on the phone.

Runoutofgears

I've been toying with the idea of "hacking" an HD mini camcorder, something like the Sony Bloggie, which has a "moveable" camera and colour screen. I've seen them being sold off on amazon a few times, they looked to be quite good value and the work of extracting the camera is part done. Down side apart from the work and risk involved is that the sony only seems to be able to record files up to 25 mins duration irrespective of the memory card capacity.

So I'm looking for a high frame rate, HD, consumer Camcorder rather than the dedicated and expensive sports HD camcorders.

My aim would be to package the camera on the helmet and incorporate a cable link to the recorder bit.

I've not seen any techie articles on the web attempting this mod mind!

Jamey

ContourHD 1080p.

Amazing camera.

Expensive but I think it's worth spending money on something that you may end up relying on in court one day.

BSRU

Jamey wrote:

ContourHD 1080p.

Amazing camera.

Expensive but I think it's worth spending money on something that you may end up relying on in court one day.

The Contour 1080 is a great camera but for video suitable for court you would need to have a more expensive system like this

http://www.dogcamsport.co.uk/lawmate-PV ... amera.html

which has time and date, anti-tamper stuff to comply with evidence rules.

dcurzon

i've used dogcam gear on race bikes to record race/qualifying footage. Quality is great but i havent used any HD gear. Need to play with mountings to minimise vibration. perhaps too many cables and battery packs with my setup to consider using on a bicycle though

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7vxEJPlb ... re=related

gordon861

Footage from a regular camcorder is good enough for the police to use for a prosecution for a traffic offence as long as there is no dispute about who is driving the vehicle or something like that. The police were satisfied with the DVD footage I supplied them of my accident 2 months ago which cam from a normal SD camcorder. It hit the road hence I now have the Contour720.

When you end up in court the footage just shows what happened and backs up your statement that you give to the police/court. We had a similar issue at work with using photos(from film) as evidence on enforcement cases, technically to say a photo hasn't been tampered with you need to have posession of the film at all times but that doesn't happen with 35mm processing. So you still needed the officer that took the photo to stand up in court and give normal evidence. The only other way around the film issue was to use a polaroid instant camera.

Here's some footage from the 720, I had to send this one back due to some focusing issues but it was exchanged in 48hrs by DogCam with no problems.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lINd8VUm41k

.

Jamey

Exactly... If you've got clear footage (including number plate and shot of driver's face) of someone doing something illegal but there's no time and date on the video then the absolute most they could argue is that it happened on a different date to the one you say, but it still happened because it's there on video.

Anything is admissible in court as long as it wasn't filmed on private land without the owner's permission and even then if it was a big case that was hinging on the video there might be some special circumstance, perhaps.

Anyway, the point is that all video can be used in court so make it as good as you possibly can.