I'm in desperate need of a helmet/lipstick cam rig that will meet several of my needs. I need:

--waterproof
--professional quality. At least 500 lines res./HD, 16x9?
--records to a small device. Some sort of hard disk that is waterproof or I can make waterproof.

I have a lipstick cam already but it is SD and not 16x9 and not waterproof.
I've found several browsing on the web but I find some of the marketing deceiving and I don't think that they record to the quality that I want.

Any info?

Thanks,

Michael

at my knowledge there is nothing like that on the market.
hd-head camera cost the hell and except few hardisk/memory card recorder (firestore, sony HDR-60 and the new compact flash recorder sold with the Z7)
there si nothing cheap that can record HD.
such solution, if you build it, would cost several thousand $.
You better had to put an HC7 or A1 into a waterproof case.

The SONY 1/3" Super HAD chip reports resolution in color at 520 lines. I have a lipstick cam that is small, uses that chip and with a little help can be made waterproof (to a few feet underwater anyway.)

I recently tried it out by mounting it on my car and plugging it into a Sony Handycam (about as small as you can get before spending BIG $$ for a firestore or somesuch - assuming it will even accept the signal and recrd it.) I shot over an hour of footage with it out there on my car.

Overall I was somewhat impressed with picture quality. I mean when I played it back onto a 108" front projection TV screen from the camera it wasn't too bad. Maybe a better way is to say I was not horribly disappointed with a decent SD picture. Importantly no jaggies on highway stripes as they went by, for example.

Cons: Handles varying light less than adroitly. Low light performance is so so. Is fixed at 4:3 AR.

Pros: Overall though I think it fills a niche in the arsenal when you don't want to put a camera in harms way, plus it is easy to mount. Can be adapted to digital pan (up down right left) and zoom within limits.

HD ? Forget it. For now. We can dream together. (If Hollywood will let us have a capture device.)

ps. I plan to mount it on the belly of a light aircraft - ought to produce some interesting shots on takeoff and landing.

pps. My research leads me to believe this is the upper limit of REAL lines of resolution (around 500-520). Everything else seems to be hype - I've seen cams using this chip claim higher res than Sony advertises this chip can put out.

ppps. This outputs an analog video signal.

There's this

http://www.dogcamsport.co.uk/sony-hq1-550-helmet-camera.htm

Not sure if there is a similar supplier in your neck o'the woods so to speak. Give em a bell, maybe they'll ship one to you.

Have a great evening
Max ;o)

Not sure if you have checked this site out for information on most helmet cams.
http://helmetcameracentral.com/

Ron Evans

What I am seeing on the suggested links is the same stuff I mentioned. 550 lines, 580 lines - based on a CCD incapable of delivering it. Here is the spec on the SONY 1/3" Super HAD CCD device they all use:

Effective Pixels - NTSC 768 x 492 (V) PAL 752 x 582 (V)
Scanning system - 2:1 interlace
H Resolution - 520 TV lines@Center
Low Lux Sensitivity - 1 Lux/f2.0 (30IRE, AGC Max, Day Night On

I can give you a link to where I bought mine if you send me mail.

ps. Because it is an analog signal, it is my thought that your best capture device is Hi8 or Mini-DV camcorder, which is capable of accepting and recording at that level of detail.... in fact as I understand it up to 600 lines, so it will faithfully record the 500-520 line output. Seems to bear out in my unscientific tests. Many of the solid state devices offered to record will only record at a 320x240 resolution - be careful!

if you want to spend a lot of money you can go with this
http://www.convergent-design.com/downloads/Flash%20XDR%20Brochure.pdf
and an HD camera head with HD-sdi output.

And on Giroud's supplied link, look at the little camera to the left. That's the Iconix HD POV camera.

It's about as good as it gets in POV image quality.

and these guys are nice enough to provide a pre-order form, but except advising you have to give $1000 for reservation, i have not seen any final price estimation. ($2000 or $10000 ?)
google indicates $4995.