Which race camera to buy???

[454bug]

Hey guys,

I am in the market for a camera to video my racing activities (autocross, road racing, drag racing, etc.). I was wondering who has bought what and how happy (or not) they are with their purchases.

What should I be looking for (resolution-wise, size-wise, mounting abilities, etc.)? I have looked at the "bullet" cameras, the "box" cameras, and the use of a standard "handheld" camera to film with... I like the idea of being able to use a suction-cup apparatus to attach the camera to the side, top, or windshield of the car... otherwise a roll-bar mount would be fine.

I have seen resolution numbers in the 400-500 range... Is that as good as it gets or are there cameras out there better than this? I want to make sure whatever I film will have good enough resolution to look decent when it is converted to "youtube" or "photobucket"...

I am planning on using a "data logging" system so I will eventually purchase a "datalink-type" software to merge the video with the cars performance data...

Any direction, experience, or just opinions would be greatly appreciated!!

[Blown353]

I was going to say buy a 3/4 Race Cam...

...but then I realized you weren't talking about camshafts.

Hopefully someone else will chime in. I've only used basic camcorders (DV and older Hi-8) with direct to rollcage mounts in cars before and had good luck. A bit of vibration isolation between the vehicle and the camera is a very good idea.

[protour73]

PM (mpozzi), mary has a great race cam that she uses on her autocross excurtions!!!

[454bug]

I was going to say buy a 3/4 Race Cam...

...but then I realized you weren't talking about camshafts.

NOW THAT THERE'S FUNNY!!! I DON'T CARE WHO YOU ARE!!!

I'm sorry... I was looking at an actual camera company called "Racecam" and I didn't catch how it would come out sounding like I needed to choose a camshaft!!

I changed it on the first post but, unfortunately, it's not changing it on the header page as the thread name... I don't know how to fix this... maybe one of the moderators can make the adjustment to the name.

Thanks for the catch! And thanks for the information!

[Yelcamino]

You might check out www.viosport.com

They have a nice little "lipstick" camera with its own recording device. It looks like a pretty nice little setup.

[David Pozzi]

Mary uses the go pro hero standard, it has a suction cup for roof mounting, we use that for autocross. We haven't done a track day with it yet. We have used a regular video camera for track days inside the car mounted with a port city camera mount. It works great with a regular video camera. Don't use a hard drive type camera, it will shut down right away. Our JVC hard drive camera can be used but I have to switch output to the memory stick which turns off the hard drive completely. Then I also have to make sure it's fully zoomed out to wide angle, then leave the view screen door open or it will shut off.

The old tape cameras are easier, video stabilizing is a good feature. Soon everything is going to be wide angle HD so all the other formats will be obsolete.
David
http://www.goprocamera.com/

[454bug]

You might check out www.viosport.com

They have a nice little "lipstick" camera with its own recording device. It looks like a pretty nice little setup.

Hey Herb,

Thanks SO much for the heads up on the viosport! I have bounced around for weeks looking at different cameras and have not really been satisfied with the quality of the pictures when you expand them to full screen, especially on my 24" widescreen... I just looked at a number of the POV.1's videos and I think I may have just found my new camera system... unless something else really nice comes along...

Check out the clarity of these videos!!

http://racerecall.com/pov1_videos.html

If they can keep some of this quality when being displayed through "youtube" or "photobucket" I think I will be very happy!

Thanks again for the information!

[454bug]

Thanks to everyone for the information!

[Steve1968LS2]

I have the GoPro and for the money it's really hard to beat.. simple and pretty cheap.

[454bug]

I have the GoPro and for the money it's really hard to beat.. simple and pretty cheap.

It looks like the price point on the GoPro is much better than the POV.1. Although, it doesn't appear to really be "apples and apples" when it comes to features and included equipment. The quality of the video looks pretty nice on both products. Better than what I was seeing with other companies. The resolution listed for the GoPro is 512x384 @ 30 fps. The POV.1 resolution is listed as 720x480 @ 30 fps...

The two products have "wide-angle" lenses available. It REALLY looks cool when you can see even the peripheral vision from the sides of the car while filming... They state the "normal" lenses average between 56-70 degrees. The POV.1 has a 110 degree viewing area while the GoPro has a 170 degree viewing area!!

[454bug]

It looks like the bigger problem is in the viewing of these videos on the standard video sharing websites like "youtube"...

I checked out videos from both the Viosport company as well as GoPro. The posted videos are both displayed on a "High Definition" video-sharing site called, "Vimeo.com"... It looks like that might be the better way of sharing our high resolution videos.

I looked at the resolutions that can be displayed on youtube.com and photobucket.com versus what the vimeo.com site can handle.

Youtube.com and photobucket.com both share their videos at 320x240 while the new www.vimeo.com/hd can broadcast up to true 1280x720 (720p) for a picture up to 12 times better!

I am sure this is the direction of everything in the NEAR future...