Helmet cams
 

I was looking at a contour Hd 1080 on Ebay, Has anyone heard of this camara??

Yes, a buddy lend one of those to me for my Alaska trip this year. I'm not big on videos and not an expert by any stretch. But, video quality is good and the fact that I got it to work tells a lot about its simplicity :rolleyes2:.

I don't like the fact that you cannot check immediately what you're taping (videoing). So, I rode the Denali Hwy for 100 miles with the camera mostly pointing at my speedometer.

Granted, I didn't try out the adjustments before I went on the trip. I slapped it on the helmet assuming the best angle. I guess, you can't blame the camera for that.

My buddy had the biggest SD card in there, which actually exceeded the battery time (4 hours). Again, for somebody who knows what they are doing, I think its a good quality piece of equipment...:thumbup1:

Helmet cam
 

The thing people don't often take into account with helmet cams is what you're going to use the footage for. Shooting hours of forward-looking helmetcam does provide a good context piece for your movies, the occasional accident etc. on the downside, it requires a dedicated device that needs to be charged and fed SD cards at all times, the sound is poor, it takes a while to review the footage, and is no subsitute for well-shot, interesting footage from a more traditional camera or video camera.

At the base-level, sure they're a bit of fun and a good bit of kit to keep in your arsenal but don't think it will shoot lots of stuff your friends and family will really be that intersted to watch much of. Aside over.

<carry on>

We're using the "GO PRO" HD camera. Seems great and sturdy upto now !! Loads of accessories, clamps etc etc just for bikes etc etc !!

Really fast to charge, even by USB too.

What helmet cam ?
 

I used the VIO POV http://www.vio-pov.com/products/pov_15m.php helmet cam after reviewing many types. The reason for me was simple, most helmet cams are not made for long travel, yes they will film 4 to 6 hours of your forward view for that day, but mostly the interesting parts will be few and far between which means you are just shooting hours of road.

The VIO is a real Heavy duty professional system, you can set it up for continues shooting or keep looping ever x amount of minutes (We used 3) until you press the remote control on the handlebar to save those minutes. The loop functions is so great that you can save an event after it happens since most likely the shot is in the current loop that you want to save.

It would take two to three days to fill up one SD memory card this way which meant we only downloaded the footage every other day.

You can also view the footage on the recording unit screen, and it has a permanent connection to the bike’s battery so that I don’t need to charge or replace batteries. We had three cameras which gave good footage since there was mostly a motorcycle in the clips.
The only thing is that it is not HD, I hope that they will develop one soon, but you only need HD if you are going to view it on an HD screen. It records up to 720x480 using MPEG4 AVI (DivX Codec) which looks good on any screen. You can view our videos by typing “OSPKW” in the search box on youtube, or go to our blog site at Our Shared Planet Motorcycle Adventure .

If you are going to create a decent video you will also need a camcorder for times when you are not riding, or to set up videos for special events like water crossings, or getting stuck. I admit that I did use an HD camcorder for our trip since I know I could always downsize the resolution to what I wanted when editing.

I like the DRIFT HD170

Waterproof, Shock proof (I dropped it while riding). Only complant is
the remote is terrible - no positive indication when it is on/off.
Shoots both 720 and 1080.

I like the DRIFT HD17, too