This is sort of on topic so am posting it in the bike forum – hope that’s ok !

Can anyone suggest a good HD camcorder to be used for filming riding, budget is up to around £1000.00. Have done the usual online / magazine / store research but would be good to hear what any riders that film may have to say.

Thanks

Jim

Thought about an SLR? They can shoot HD video now, and you can switch the lenses on them for better control of the output.

Contour HD

Comes with vented helmet mount

or handlebar mount

If you want a camcorder rather than a helmet cam, I would look at the world of SLRs. The Canon 5D mkII was the first and a benchmark. Then there was the Canon 7D. Now it’s trickled down to the lower models. The other SLR manufacturers also do video, but I haven’t any personal experience with those.

The output is superb, but it does require good lenses (which are the really expensive bit).
They allow so much creative control that it can be a proper lesson in film making. That can be both a good and bad thing. They can also shoot on full auto.

Anyway – it might not be the obvious way to go, but I would research it before buying a traditional camcorder.

I’ve just noticed that the Canon 60D is out now. Worth a look as it will probably be second gen SLR video. I need to research it more myself.

Getting something like the Canon EF 50mm f1.8 II (nifty fifty) for around £60 can be a fantastic way to get lovely high quality background-out-of-focus shots.

Photography-wise I lived with the kit lens and the nifty fifty for quite a while before buying a upgraded zoom lens.

@organic355: how do you find the mounts on your VHoldr? Mine seem really crap – very loose and wobbly. I think I’ll end up making my own.

-j

Remember with an SLR you can’t really use autofocus in video mode – for most serious film makers this isn’t a problem as they use manual anyway but for casual users it might be a problem to find it doesn’t work quite like a camcorder.

Just got a 550D but haven’t shot anything riding wise yet. But I think SLRs are the way to go for getting a professional look and control without going too silly money wise.

Already got an EF50 1.8 and an EF-S 10-22 which give shots you won’t get out of any remotely affordable camcorders.

@jwr – I’ve got the vented helmet mount for my ContourHD and it holds the camera very steady.

[video]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6u-qEUF5Qj8[/video]

That video is shot with the vented helmet mount.

Forget the Canons, the Panasonic GH1 and the brand new announced GH2 are *the* interchangeable lens still / video cameras for video. They produce better video and are much smaller than the Canons, and they are much more suited to video.

Ianmmm … check this video shot with GoPro HD instead, chesty and helmet mounts were used. Didn’t film it with 1080p chose 720p instead, otherwise it would be too large for upload.

[video]http://vimeo.com/15103185[/video]

Jim, if portable action camera isn’t on your mind then most probably 550D is the way to go. Didn’t make any vidz with wife’s canon yet. But for Sunday warrior as I am, GoPro fits my needs.

Grum – true about SLR auto focus. They certainly aren’t the same as a handycam.

Do things like the Hero HD and other headcams autofocus? I just assumed they’d shoot with a small aperture and assume that your target is in the middle-distance.

With the SLRs you can do the same (go above f8 and most of middle-distance will be in focus) or you can periodically autofocus by half depressing the shutter.

There are also parafocal lenses available which mean that as you manually zoom, the focus on the subject is retained.

Basically, you end up having to compose your shots in the same way as filmakers do. Manually focussing, avoiding having to focus, subjects hitting marks, frequent cuts, etc.

It might be worth contacting somebody like MTB Cut to see what equipment they use. Their videos look very slick and I’m sure they’ll be friendly enough to offer a bit of advice.

Good luck!

Sorry to repeat myself, but:

The Panasonic GH1 and GH2 cameras are THE SLR type cameras to use for video.

They autofocus.

They have a liveview display (electronic viewfinder plus swivel LCD).

They provide top notch video capability.

http://vimeo.com/groups/gh1/videos

The new GH2 looks to be amazing:

The GH cameras are Micro Four Thirds, and so are smaller than standard DSLRs. I cycled round Morzine for a week this summer with one in the front pocket of my backpack.

@IanMmmm – yeah, your footage looks a lot steadier than mine. I am using the vent mount as well… I wonder it it’s faulty. Thanks for the sample video – looks great.

-j

@organic355: how do you find the mounts on your VHoldr? Mine seem really crap – very loose and wobbly. I think I’ll end up making my own.

-j

I agree. The bar mount is pretty crap. Designed for non OS bars you’re limited to where you can put it. I jammed some rubber in the screw hole to reduce the vibration. That helped, as does mounting the cam under the bar rather than over it.

The helmet mount seems OK on my Xen, due to the vent locations. It does need to be cranked down hard though.

I do get really variable results though – If you push the cam all the way in to the bar mount as you’re supposed to you get more vibration.

Some other experiences. Mine had the common “blurry centre” fault. I bought it from Tredz but they couldn’t check one in the UK and send it out to me until Contour had seen the camera, so I arranged to deal direct with Contour to speed things up.

It took 3 weeks to turn it round – I shipped it next day to the US. They dispatched one pretty quickly but didn’t fill in some forms correctly so it sat in a customs warehouse, and I got hit with a VAT bill and a process from hell to claim it back – I couldn’t be bothered! Up to that point they’d been pretty impressive customer service wise. I wouldn’t have minded if I hadn’t bought the camera specifically to take skiing with the kids which I couldn’t because of the screw up. Better UK support / RMA would make it a lot better. This may have improved in the last 10 months though.

I’ve also got the waterproof housing. I’ll be trying it on the board next month, but I noticed the plastic in front of the lens looks a bit discououred like it wasn’t moulded properly!

So a good to great cam, with very sensitive set up unless you’re using a sticky mount / goggle mount and some pretty poor accesories.

Thanks to 7hz that video is amazing
[video]http://vimeo.com/groups/gh1/videos/15233733[/video]

The Panasonic GH1

If you get an older GH1 on ebay you can hack the firmware too and get astonishingly high bit rate HD.

http://www.dvxuser.com/V6/showthread.php?t=206788

Spent all morning since your post reading about the GH1 (and GH2). It does seem that as a camcorder replacement, it’s a far more usable solution. I’m not a huge fan of the autofocus lens choice (and prices), but at least the kit lens looks pretty good.
The GH2 looks to remove a couple of the niggles too.
Hmmmmm – 60D versus GH2 will be very interesting. I already have a 40D and lenses, so Canon is the obvious choice, but the handiness of the GH2 is appealing.

I wonder if the OP is still reading! 🙂

Ok, slr’s are great quality but apart from auto-focus, what about stabilisers and anti-shake soft/hardware that dedicated cameras have?

No SLR offers the same stabilisation and anti-shake of the dedicated camcorders, but they do have some…

The GH1 has image stabilisation from what I was reading.

With the Canons it’s in the leneses (IS).
So on the wide end you don’t really need it, but on the telephoto lenses, it’s going to make a big difference.

The anti-shake can be software, which is going to result in other image artifacts. But depending on what you’re doing the trade-off might be worth it.

I think it comes down to what you want to achieve. Do you just want to reliably record an event with the minimum fuss. Or are you trying to creatively produce a film. Where you can take time to compose, retake, light, edit, etc.

Film makers are using the SLRs in certain circumstances. Where budget, size, weight or spontaneity are factors which might preclude traditional film cameras.

The GH1 has image stabilisation from what I was reading.

The IS is in (some of) the lenses not the body.

The good thing about the GH1 is lots of old MF lenses are easily adaptable, moreso than with most SLRs

Thanks for the clarification – I was confused because people say it “includes stabilisation”, but that’s because the kit lens is stabilised.

I believe there is software that will process footage and stabilize it.

When software does it, you loose image quality. Not by much but crispiness fades, at least with mine. Image stabilizer is usefull if cameraman himself in action, but tripod is the future for me. Those IS in canon lenses are handy.

OP himself isn’t interested in debate it seems.