video camera choices, questions

[Scott Will]

With all these great posts and videos recently, I've gotten the bug to get in on the action. I see bullet cams taped here (i.e Doug's wheel pant), fastened there (i.e. Paul's bombrack on the wing), etc... question - are these cameras totally self-contained or are they attached to a camera and power source externally?

So in general what is the optimal equipment to use in general recording? I don't own a handheld video camera. Wondering the best way to ge in on the action at a reasonable cost.

If the cameras require external connections, are ya'll spending the time to run the wires?

Thanks for the help!

[groucho]

Scott-

Some of your questions are answered at the bottom of page 2 in my recent thread here: http://www.vansairforce.com/communit...ad.php?t=18054

Originally Posted by Scott Will

are these cameras totally self-contained or are they attached to a camera and power source externally

Some of each. My bullet/lipstick camera needs external power and something to record its video. Several others have used self-contained camcorders mounted to various parts of the plane with great success. A lot of it depends on how much you want to spend & how much work you want to do.

Originally Posted by Scott Will

So in general what is the optimal equipment to use in general recording? I don't own a handheld video camera. Wondering the best way to ge in on the action at a reasonable cost.

I started dabbling with in-cockpit video using just a camcorder. There are tons of options out there...a good standard definition digital camcorder runs around $300 these days & can be found at your local electronics store. Several people have made in-cockpit mounts...Dan Checkoway's looked like it worked very well & he has details on his web site. I've used a RAM Mount with pretty good luck (although it's not as rock-solid as Dan's mount).

Originally Posted by Scott Will

If the cameras require external connections, are ya'll spending the time to run the wires?

When my plane was down for its last annual, I ran wiring from the cockpit to the tail for my soon-to-be mounted tailcam. There are wireless options out there, but I wanted a more permanent (and hopefully more trouble-free) installation. If you use a camcorder to record your video (i.e. no bullet cam), you shouldn't need any wires unless you want to connect your headphone audio to it.

If you want to go the remote-mounted lipstick camera route, there are other requirements besides just a basic camcorder. Many of those are outlined on the post I linked above.

Hope this helps! Have fun...and fly safe everybody!

[Ironflight]

My little camera is basically a "sports toy" - it's maximum resolution is 640 x 480, and it records to an SD card - a 2 Gig card will last an hour. Greta for cool stuff to put on the web, but certainly not close to the quality of a real bullet-cam connected to a good recorder in the cockpit. I like the self-contained nature of it - except when I have to start it up then such into the cockpit and get started so I don't waste to much recording time on tasiing....

Paul

[GrayHawk]

I like Paul's camera rack approach and there are certain advantages to having a self contained solution, that is easily mounted & removed. There are probably fewer conversions (A/D,D/A) in this type solution, all of which are lossy. I believe that most of the SD card cameras use MP4 compression which has gotten good enough to give web quality video.

However, wanting a little more; I have been thinking of using the tie down ring position but with a wired liptick camera. Some of the lipstick cameras also allow limited shutter, backlight, iris control through a separate control interface (RS-422).

I still plan to try to finish my Ball Turret CAM with pan & tilt control, replacing an old unneeded belly strobe.

[Scott Will]

Hey Paul... do you have a part number or web link for your self contained camera??

Maybe with this type of camera you can experiment on placement before moving up in price/quality and a more permanent place on the aircraft.

Thanks!

[Captain Avgas]

Originally Posted by Scott Will

So in general what is the optimal equipment to use in general recording? I don't own a handheld video camera. Wondering the best way to ge in on the action at a reasonable cost.

The new hard disk camcorders stop recording when they experience an increased G force. It's an inbuilt feature to prevent the head of the hard disk from crashing. In reality it doesn't take much to get them to drop out. I don't think they'd be any good for shooting videos of aerobatics.

Many of the people selling them don't know about the feature so you may not get correct info from a salesman. If they say it will not stop recording ask them to test it. Get them to turn on the camcorder and let it drop about 300mm and then catch it again. All the one's I tested stopped recording.

[n5lp]

Originally Posted by Scott Will

Hey Paul... do you have a part number or web link for your self contained camera??

Maybe with this type of camera you can experiment on placement before moving up in price/quality and a more permanent place on the aircraft.

Thanks!

http://www.vansairforce.com/communit...392#post125392

See posts #8 and #10.

[frankh]

So presumably this is likely to also happen with the Hard disk video recorder??

Frank

[Ironflight]

That's one reason I do like the SD card....seems to be G-tolerant!

Thanks for posting the link to the camera info Larry - I've been a bit busy with all this weather down here....looks like N164MS is goign to spend the week here....

Paul

[DanH]

I've been using a Sony GV-D800 editing deck to record a lipstick camera. Bought it several years ago. It flies in a little plastic box velcroed to the airframe, with a remote on-off switch in the cockpit. Records a digital signal to 8mm tape, which might be old tech, but it doesn't seem to care about G and shouldn't care about altitude.

http://www.sonystyle.com/webapp/wcs/...n&DCMP=FROOGLE