[ajmarshal1]

I’m in the market for an HD ‘action’ camera which will accompany me on a tour in the summer. Must be good quality (at least 30fps at 780, pref 60fps) Hard wearing, must have a good battery life, easy to swap between bars and helmet.

I don’t want to spend Go-pro money and have been looking at the Muvi, I’d welcome anyone’s experiences or recommendations.

Cheers.

Topic

[andrewduffy]

I’ve just bought a Liquid
I’ve just bought a Liquid Image Ego HD camera. It was about half the price of a GoPro but similar quality. 780p@60fps or 1080p@30, still and continuous mode, WiFi, USB and HDMI. I haven’t had a chance to properly try it out because a car door recently broke my finger!

I wish I had it last year for my end to end tour. I would have used the continuous shoot mode to create a time lapse of the whole journey. Battery life would have been an issue though.

[DeeJayJay]

I use a Drift HD Ghost camera
I use a Drift HD Ghost camera which I find is more than capable. I ride on and off road and the camera never lets me down. It’s water proof up to 3 meters from the box, no need for additional outer case, and its tough enough to drop and tell the tale. The battery generally last about 3 hours, unless you’re using the playback feature, which will shorten the life a little. You can pick up the camera and remote for about £250 now.

[bikebot]

ajmarshal1 wrote:£379 is a

ajmarshal1 wrote:

£379 is a fair bit more than I want to pay to be honest. Image stabilisation is something I want as I only have iMovie.

Thanks for the suggestions so far though. We have a campervan with us so it can be recharged every night.

iMovie has image stabilisation. Hit 3 or the adjust toolbar icon, and it’s the shaky camera icon.

[ajmarshal1]

£379 is a fair bit more than
£379 is a fair bit more than I want to pay to be honest. Image stabilisation is something I want as I only have iMovie.

Thanks for the suggestions so far though. We have a campervan with us so it can be recharged every night.

[sonyjim]

Take a look at the new
Take a look at the new Panasonic had camera just about to be released. It’s very light and fantastic quality. It will be a market leader for the sports enthusiast. I believe launch price will be about £379.00 I have seen it compared with the go pro and there is no comparison. Records I believe at 24 frames per second and gives a great had smooth picture

[bikebot]

I use the SJ1000 as well if I
I use the SJ1000 as well if I commute into town, it’s usually just strapped onto the backpacks shoulder straps so is fairly discrete. It’s got the best battery life of the cheap options, but I wouldn’t recommend it for a helmet camera, it’ll definitely attract a few odd looks. But then I think the people that ride around with go-pros on their lids look fairly ridiculous as well.

Something to remember with most of these cheap cameras is that you lose the fancy features such as image stabilisation. If you want nice smooth videos of your touring holiday, you should check you can do that in your video editing.

[PJ McNally]

Yes, +1 for techmoan.com’s
Yes, +1 for techmoan.com’s reviews.

I’m using the SJ 1000 at the moment, very very pleased with it! Though perhaps best suited for commuting, where it’s easily charged by USB at work if you forget to do so at home, than to touring in the wilderness! Battery life is pretty good though, and I hear you can get a spare battery pack quite easily.

[bikebot]

Take a look at techmoan.com,
Take a look at techmoan.com, and his reviews of all the cheap Chinese action cameras. The SJ4000 is the preferred go-pro clone, or the mobius if you want something very small and light.

Battery life is always a problem, consider getting extra internal batteries and an external USB battery that can recharge them.

[Author]

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