Mike D.
Well-known member
Looking for a decent enough helmet cam without spending a lottery-winning's worth on a GoPro...
Any ideas?
Any ideas?
Recommend me a helmet cam.
- Thread starter Mike D.
- Start date
I don’t use a camera but I have to GoPro attachments for helmets and bike. I really like watching the 360 degree angles on some of the cameras. I guess editing could be interesting. I have no idea of the cost but maybe as a tax deduction?(jk)
If you're not prepared to spend a decent amount don't bother at all.
They are all, without exception, rubbish.
Any of the serious alternatives to a GoPro are GoPro money anyway.
Because no one wants to watch shitty quality grainy badly stabilized footage.
Gopros also aren't particularly expensive
No. It's English mate.
Looking for a decent enough helmet cam without spending a lottery-winning's worth on a GoPro...
Any ideas?
I can recommend DJI Action 2 cam system.
It's not cheap, but the video result is amazing.
Mcharza
E*POWAH BOSS
Insta360 One X2 is also good and videos are easy to edit. But if you put it on your helmet, you will look like a teletubbie.
Tubby G
❤️🔥 Hot Stuff ❤️🔥
Take a look at Ghost Drifts. They’re used widely by Motorbike vloggers. Battery lasts hours compared to GoPros and mount is designed for full face helmets. They don’t have the image stabilisation of GoPros so if you’re sending it down rooty rocky forest / mountain trails then probably not the best camera, but fine for smoother rides
Mr_Price
Active member
If mounted on your head you can probably get a GoPro 7 or 8. The 9 and above are crazy smooth, night and day difference with the hyper stabilization. Especially if you spend even more money on the Lens Mod. LOL
you havent said what kind of price you wanna pay.
I bought 2 gopro hero 7 black cameras, you can still find them new for around £200 or used for less of course.
goes up to 4k, can put a huge memory card in, great stabilisation and sound, the only problem I have is with the colour but you can just turn that off.. dont think youll get better for cheaper.
I have had one issue with mine and it would have a big delay from pressing the button to start recording but thats solved now.
I bought 2 gopro hero 7 black cameras, you can still find them new for around £200 or used for less of course.
goes up to 4k, can put a huge memory card in, great stabilisation and sound, the only problem I have is with the colour but you can just turn that off.. dont think youll get better for cheaper.
I have had one issue with mine and it would have a big delay from pressing the button to start recording but thats solved now.
I have used Gopro for years...even before they released their first HD model. I have no doubt there are a few action cams that have been released over the last 3 or 4 years that compete pretty well with Gopro but I have never seen one that persuaded me to change. If they are good in terms of quality they are the same price or more than a Gopro!
If you want to record video of mtb video stabilisation is a must and a headcam is not the ideal POV/mount. I have tried many different mounts and decided that if I am wearing a full face helmet then chin mount is by far the best. If I am wearing open face then a chest mount is best.
Equally important if your ambition is to capture your mtb exploits, is to come to terms with the fact that you need to buy and learn to use a video editing suite. It is not difficult or necessarilly expensive and in time editing your own footage becomes as enjoyable as shooting it in the first place. You also need a pretty well specced PC to edit HD video.
I am currently using the Hero 7 Black and it spends most of its time in sea water ( Windsurfing) but occasionally for MTB if I am riding a new area etc. I saw no benefit in changing to later models when they were released.
Be aware there is a lot of hype as far as HD video is concerned. I video the vast majority of time at 2.7k and 50 frames persecond. You will see a lot of hype about 4k etc. Well first of all you need really good light for 4k and preferably with the camero on a tripod rather than a moving mount.........video files are huge......and a lot of PCs and video editing suites will struggle to deal with the codec used for 4k. MTB is often quite a difficult environment for video with rapidly changing light conditions and a lot of "scenery" that does not provide good focus. At the end of the day the highest definition viewer you are likely to use is a HD TV most of which are 1080p. Summary, dont be fooled by less than useful features!!
If you want to keep costs down I would suggest going second hand for any Gopro from Hero 6 upwards, get a chesty harness ( chinese import on ebay is the same as the Gopro one for a fraction of the price) and a chin strap if you use a full face...again dirt cheap on ebay.
I actually made my own chesty from a part of a Gopro dog harness!!
If you want to record video of mtb video stabilisation is a must and a headcam is not the ideal POV/mount. I have tried many different mounts and decided that if I am wearing a full face helmet then chin mount is by far the best. If I am wearing open face then a chest mount is best.
Equally important if your ambition is to capture your mtb exploits, is to come to terms with the fact that you need to buy and learn to use a video editing suite. It is not difficult or necessarilly expensive and in time editing your own footage becomes as enjoyable as shooting it in the first place. You also need a pretty well specced PC to edit HD video.
I am currently using the Hero 7 Black and it spends most of its time in sea water ( Windsurfing) but occasionally for MTB if I am riding a new area etc. I saw no benefit in changing to later models when they were released.
Be aware there is a lot of hype as far as HD video is concerned. I video the vast majority of time at 2.7k and 50 frames persecond. You will see a lot of hype about 4k etc. Well first of all you need really good light for 4k and preferably with the camero on a tripod rather than a moving mount.........video files are huge......and a lot of PCs and video editing suites will struggle to deal with the codec used for 4k. MTB is often quite a difficult environment for video with rapidly changing light conditions and a lot of "scenery" that does not provide good focus. At the end of the day the highest definition viewer you are likely to use is a HD TV most of which are 1080p. Summary, dont be fooled by less than useful features!!
If you want to keep costs down I would suggest going second hand for any Gopro from Hero 6 upwards, get a chesty harness ( chinese import on ebay is the same as the Gopro one for a fraction of the price) and a chin strap if you use a full face...again dirt cheap on ebay.
I actually made my own chesty from a part of a Gopro dog harness!!
Marksou
Active member
This is not the most expensive of the Akaso brand but seems the best for the money. AKASO Brave 6 Plus Action Camera
Gordon
Member
I love my Sony FDR-X3000 4K Action Cam. The microphone is way better than Go Pro.
Manc44
Member
After looking for ages trying to find a decent cheap one, I realised there isn't such a thing and I ended up with a GoPro.
The Hero 9 and 10 seemed pointless (since I am only ever filming in 1080p, to get the most battery life) so I got the Hero 8 Black.
At the time it was £260 new. Risking getting a used one might be cheaper but it's not the sort of thing I'd want to buy used, unless it was from a seller with a decent amount of unblemished feedback, or you know the owner well.
Don't expect to get decent night footage... the only way to do it is even more expensive cameras like the Insta360 1 Inch and from what I can tell, it's not even waterproof (even though it's claimed to be).
EDIT: Looking at used prices for the Hero 8 Black you might as well spend the extra £40 for a new one.
No way are these things worth what they cost considering it's only a camera. Compare it to a smart phone, it's getting on for almost half the price of the latest iPhone and does 10% of what that smart phone does, if that. Comparison videos of footage from both, leave you wondering why the camera costs what it does (or why the phone is so "cheap" lol).
One thing I will say about the Hero 8 though, it's been great. The image stabilization on it (in daytime) is insane.
The Hero 9 and 10 seemed pointless (since I am only ever filming in 1080p, to get the most battery life) so I got the Hero 8 Black.
At the time it was £260 new. Risking getting a used one might be cheaper but it's not the sort of thing I'd want to buy used, unless it was from a seller with a decent amount of unblemished feedback, or you know the owner well.
Don't expect to get decent night footage... the only way to do it is even more expensive cameras like the Insta360 1 Inch and from what I can tell, it's not even waterproof (even though it's claimed to be).
EDIT: Looking at used prices for the Hero 8 Black you might as well spend the extra £40 for a new one.
No way are these things worth what they cost considering it's only a camera. Compare it to a smart phone, it's getting on for almost half the price of the latest iPhone and does 10% of what that smart phone does, if that. Comparison videos of footage from both, leave you wondering why the camera costs what it does (or why the phone is so "cheap" lol).
One thing I will say about the Hero 8 though, it's been great. The image stabilization on it (in daytime) is insane.
Last edited:
Agree 100% I use a GoPro Hero7 Black with chest harness and external battery that goes for hours. Video capture at 1080p, 50fps. I built a high spec desktop and use the excellent free video editor Shotcut to produce finished H.264 videos.
Manc44
Member
I film at night a lot, so I set it at 1080p and 24 FPS.
It comes out a bit dark, so I lighten it slightly when converting the files. I always use FFMPEG since I can set everything with that. I don't use 1600 ISO because it starts making the footage grainy, whereas lightening footage done at 800 ISO doesn't create grain but still gives the same effect as 1600 ISO. Ideally I'd use 1200 ISO - but there is no such setting.
I found (when converting the huge GoPro files) the bitrate needs to be at 16,000k to make sure fast moving details don't start looking pixelated. I also found at that bitrate, H264 looks slightly more detailed than HEVC does. At lower bitrates like 4,000k (or even 2,000k) then HEVC looks better. At night I found I can get away with 2,000k presumably because there's a lot less detail overall.
Here's the settings I use and it took weeks of fiddling to end up with them!
Resolution: 1080p
FPS: 24
Lens: SuperView
HyperSmooth: Boost
Bitrate: High
Shutter: Auto
EV Comp: 0
White Balance: 6000k (daytime) / Auto (night)
ISO Min: 100
ISO Max: 800
Sharpness: Medium
Color: Flat
One setting that ruins GoPro footage is the "GoPro" colour profile, avoid!
If you're filming at night with only the bike light on (like on farm roads) then the ISO needs to be at 3200 or 6400 but then the footage is going to look grainy.
It comes out a bit dark, so I lighten it slightly when converting the files. I always use FFMPEG since I can set everything with that. I don't use 1600 ISO because it starts making the footage grainy, whereas lightening footage done at 800 ISO doesn't create grain but still gives the same effect as 1600 ISO. Ideally I'd use 1200 ISO - but there is no such setting.
I found (when converting the huge GoPro files) the bitrate needs to be at 16,000k to make sure fast moving details don't start looking pixelated. I also found at that bitrate, H264 looks slightly more detailed than HEVC does. At lower bitrates like 4,000k (or even 2,000k) then HEVC looks better. At night I found I can get away with 2,000k presumably because there's a lot less detail overall.
Here's the settings I use and it took weeks of fiddling to end up with them!
Resolution: 1080p
FPS: 24
Lens: SuperView
HyperSmooth: Boost
Bitrate: High
Shutter: Auto
EV Comp: 0
White Balance: 6000k (daytime) / Auto (night)
ISO Min: 100
ISO Max: 800
Sharpness: Medium
Color: Flat
One setting that ruins GoPro footage is the "GoPro" colour profile, avoid!
If you're filming at night with only the bike light on (like on farm roads) then the ISO needs to be at 3200 or 6400 but then the footage is going to look grainy.
Anyone familiar with these? Good specs in comparison to the go pro at a fraction of the price
www.behdcamera.com
BeHD Rival 2 Kit | BeHD Camera
Rear 2 inch LCD Touch screen for easy use Dual front 1.3 inch screen technology for easy and simple selfie recording Splashproof remote control (30m distance) Photographs: 24mp Video Recording: 4K/60fps 2.7K/30fps 1080p/120fps 720p/240fps Supports: Zoom / Burst / Selfie Timer / Time Lapse / Slow...
www.behdcamera.com
To avoid confusion for those new to HD video..............H264 is a long established CODEC and used by virtualy every action cam to encode a datastream from the sensor to the Sd card. Most video editor suites recognise H264 and are easilly able to decode it to produce a finished video usually as a MP4 file ( MPEG) or sometimes as a Video for Windows file. H264 encoding does however result in very large files so more recently the HEVC codec was introduced to deal with high resolution and/or high frame per second video. HEVC has the benefit of producing comparatively smaller files albeit any ultra HD setting such as 4k will result in large files regardless. The downside is that not every video editing suite can deal with HEVC accurately and in any case most will resort to creating SD Proxy files when presented to UHD files, in order to carry out editing. Gopro tells you which of the two Codecs it uses for each resolution you choose. Personally I avoid HEVC which is why the highest resolution I use is 2.7k on the Gopro.
have you read the Trust pilot reviews?!!!! Several saying the website is a scam and they never recieved their cameras!!Anyone familiar with these? Good specs in comparison to the go pro at a fraction of the price
BeHD Rival 2 Kit | BeHD Camera
Rear 2 inch LCD Touch screen for easy use Dual front 1.3 inch screen technology for easy and simple selfie recording Splashproof remote control (30m distance) Photographs: 24mp Video Recording: 4K/60fps 2.7K/30fps 1080p/120fps 720p/240fps Supports: Zoom / Burst / Selfie Timer / Time Lapse / Slow...
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