Bullet cams...not so easy

[frankh]

This one is in response to Groucho's excellent write up of how to make his bullet cam work.

On Bryan's site you will see a list of camcorders that have AV inputs, necessary to read the putput of the bullet cam.

Unfortunately this information is incorrect in that if you go thru Circuit City's website looking for camcorders with AV inputs there are indeed VERY few mini DV 'corders that have an AV input.

Furthermore this site cannot be trusted as I bought a Panasonic PV-GS320 corder with an AV plug only to find that it is an AV OUTPUT only. In other words it will not read the bullet cam in through that port, despite the fact the site advertises an AV INPUT on this camcorder.

According to CC the ONLY cam that will import AV images is the Cannon DV-20, i,e the high definition camera that Bryan has.

Its also twice the moola at $719. A good deal for a HD corder but more than i wanted to pay.

There are cheaper disk cameras that have AV inputs but the customer write ups on them are mixed at best and I don't know how the DVD drive will stand up to G's.

If anyone knows of a Mini DV cam that will work please let me know.

I'll put a note in Bryan's inbox on this.

Thanks

Frank

[RV7Factory]

Frank,

I have a Canon Elura 100 (non HD) which is miniDV and has an analog AV input. I've used it several times to covert analog (VHS) signals to digitial.

I don't think the Elura 100 is made anymore, but I bought mine only a year ago so maybe it could be found somewhere (like eBay). Perhaps some of canons current mini DV camcorders do the same thing. The manual refers to it as "Analog Line In Recording".

Good luck!

[TravisHamblen]

I beleive you can simply use a DV drive in place of the DV camcorder. I didn't have the time to pull up any examples, but seem to remember from when I was contemplating this that it was an easy solution. I think they are just battery powered drives with an a/v input. I think this is what they use on alot of the helmet cams and such that people use during extreme sports and such.

Let me know if you go this route and find any good deals.

Travis

[GrayHawk]

Originally Posted by TravisHamblen

I beleive you can simply use a DV drive in place of the DV camcorder. I didn't have the time to pull up any examples, but seem to remember from when I was contemplating this that it was an easy solution. I think they are just battery powered drives with an a/v input. I think this is what they use on alot of the helmet cams and such that people use during extreme sports and such.

Let me know if you go this route and find any good deals.

Travis

This is what I plan to do, until better quality solid state DVRs come along. It may be that Sony is the only one making these and therefore, not inexpensive. There are two levels of quality, wouldn't go below Digital8:

MiniDV: GV-D800/900 Best quality, a 25 mbps format

Digital8: GV-D200/300 Still good quality, plenty good for web videos

Both are way better than your typical bulletCAM.

[frankh]

Originally Posted by RV7Factory

Frank,

I have a Canon Elura 100 (non HD) which is miniDV and has an analog AV input. I've used it several times to covert analog (VHS) signals to digitial.

I don't think the Elura 100 is made anymore, but I bought mine only a year ago so maybe it could be found somewhere (like eBay). Perhaps some of canons current mini DV camcorders do the same thing. The manual refers to it as "Analog Line In Recording".

Good luck!

I did see the Elura had a form of AV input but it wasn't clear from the literature that it would actually read the output from a VHS recorder (and thus a bullet cam).

Thats useful to know as I did see a couple fo sale so I'll have a look at those...Does yours have a USB output that I can hook directly to the PC for download?? I didn't want to have to buy a new laptop just to get that "Firewire" port.

Cheers

Frank

[frankh]

Originally Posted by GrayHawk

This is what I plan to do, until better quality solid state DVRs come along. It may be that Sony is the only one making these and therefore, not inexpensive. There are two levels of quality, wouldn't go below Digital8:

MiniDV: GV-D800/900 Best quality, a 25 mbps format

Digital8: GV-D200/300 Still good quality, plenty good for web videos

Both are way better than your typical bulletCAM.

I'll have a look.

I got lucky that Circuit City made the mistake and therefore I did not have to pay the 15% restocking fee..That would have added insult to injury...

Frank

[craigvince]

I just recently bought the JVC GZ-MG255U camcorder. It is 2 megapixel, and will record about 37 hours of video. It has a 30GB hard drive built in, and can also record onto SD cards. It comes with a very easy docking station for charging, downloading, etc. It does have the AV jack, and unlike the model 130 and 155, the 255 has in and out AV. I plan to use the audio in for an intercom interface and the video for my tailcam. It also has image stabilization, which I'm sure will help some. I've only used it as a regular camcorder so far, so I can't give any in-flight reports. The only drawback I've found so far is that the included battery only lasts about an hour. I found a 3-hour battery on ebay for about $20 which works great.

[frankh]

on this hard drive camera?

I see from the manual there is an auto shutoff if the unit is dropped so I'm wondering how much G it takes to shut the thing off...Or more to the point under how much G the thing will still record effectively.

I had avoided the disk cams so far because they were an unknown quantity in this regard.

Frank

[frankh]

Originally Posted by RV7Factory

Frank,

I have a Canon Elura 100 (non HD) which is miniDV and has an analog AV input. I've used it several times to covert analog (VHS) signals to digitial.

I don't think the Elura 100 is made anymore, but I bought mine only a year ago so maybe it could be found somewhere (like eBay). Perhaps some of canons current mini DV camcorders do the same thing. The manual refers to it as "Analog Line In Recording".

Good luck!

You can still get them new on Amazon for ...Gulp...$400!

Hmmm, seems like these little gems are really sought after (I bet I can guess why). I have also found a place that sells Cannon HV-20s for $665 (Free shiping) which is an amazing deal for an high defintion camcorder...Assuming you actually get the thing, but I believe Visa gives you some buying protection if I remember right?

More as I search


Frank

[frankh]

Thats $400 USED!
and $600 NEW on Amazon.

Looks like the Cannon HV 20 might be the way to go at $665.

Frank