Hi Guys

I have see quite a lot of footage with the "Made in China" DJ4000 Action Cam and to be honest it looks better than my Hero 2 and costs a quarter of the price!

Has anyone here used one .. I just need something to take on a snorkelling holiday this year and would rather spend $100 than $300 !!

Chris

Chris, pick up a used Sony action cam from B&H for about $120-$150. Currently its my favorite of all my action cams. Picture isn't as good as a Hero3 but the form factor and usability makes up for it.

Used base model $115
Used Sony HDR-AS15 HD Action Camcorder with WiFi HDRAS15/B B&H

Chris, pick up a used Sony action cam from B&H for about $120-$150. Currently its my favorite of all my action cams. Picture isn't as good as a Hero3 but the form factor and usability makes up for it.

Used base model $115
Used Sony HDR-AS15 HD Action Camcorder with WiFi HDRAS15/B B&H (http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/801111449-USE/sony_hdras15_b_hdr_as15_hd_action_camcorder.html)

I am sorry, but I have to strongly disagree. I own the Sony AS15, and the video is horrible by any standard. I have shot some videos comparing its performance to the Panasonic A500. That camera is out of your price range (it is rated the best of the Action Cams; see another thread), but you can see the AS15 "quality" from these comparisons:

Action Cam Comparison: Panasonic HX-A500 versus Sony HDR-AS15 in HD on Vimeo

Action Cam Comparison 2: Panasonic HX-A500 versus Sony HDR-AS15 in HD on Vimeo

The first clip in each scene is the AS15.

Well, as someone who went on a boys vacation with Dylan in January to Mexico I can tell you that we ended up with virtually no usable footage from the GoPros we took quadding and seadooing since they kept shutting down and stopped recording whereas the Sony action cam never fails when we throw it in the rally cars Dylan and I race. I prefer the image on the hero 3 but we have lost SO much footage with them I'll never buy one.

Thanks for the comments Guys

A mate of mine has one of these SJ4000's and it's just a quarter of a GoPro price and he has had no issues whatsoever! For $100 including all the fittings it's pretty good value so it's worth a try.

My Hero 2 has frozen on me a few times ... I found firstly that if you don't actuate the top button correctly it simply freezes ...you need to give it a quick "blip" to get it running ..if you keep it pressed too long it simply freezes and the only cure is to rip out the battery! It won't even turn off. It's quite hard to get the "single button press" right too when the camera is on top of a lighting stand and also in a skeleton case!!

I have also had a few instances where it recorded the first MP4 file until it hit the 2GB limit, then created a new file as it should but then stopped recording!!

These 4000 cams also have a tiny LCD which won't be much good in daylight but will at least give some framing. Sadly unlike the Hero it only has one field of view (170 degrees) but it does have a digital zoom which admittedly with drop res but it does allow you to reduce the angle to the Hero's "medium" setting by zooming in to 1.4X

I have ordered one so I'll give it a workout!! We only take our well deserved break from wedding shoots in 2 months which is enough time to evaluate it

Chris

Mark, clearly there will be a difference between a $100 1080 camera and $400 4k camera.

But remember there is a lot more to an action camera than image. Say, like Chris, you're on holiday on a 8 hour tour of some type, how good is your 4k footage after your single, fixed internal battery in the A500 dies and hour and a half in, then your camera is completely down until you leave it plugged in to charge.

With action cameras, getting the image is more important than the image. I won't even start on versatility of the form factor. The tethered style of the A500 has very limited uses (though what it is good for it excels at! I do love my A100 for a few niche things).

Chris, if you boost your budget to $150, you can pick up a used AS30 which is much better than the 15 in picture quality. Plus built in GPS is cool.

Mark, We're talking $100 action cameras but clearly be should be buying an Epic. ;)

Remember there is a lot more to an action camera than image.
Form factor, functionality, batteries...
I'd up my suggestion to the AS30 used for $150 from b&h but Chris said $100. Chris if you can swing the extra $50 the quality goes way up.

You are correct there is more than picture quality that matters for camera choice, except for the viewer of the final video, who does not care about inputs.

And you forgot to mention lcd screen. To frame the Sony Action Cam you need an lcd accessory, which may double the price. The DJ4000 has an lcd, and I cannot imagine the video quality would be worse than the AS15.

I have also seen no evidence that the AS30 has any better picture than the AS15 (and I have looked). The AS100 is better, but inferior by a lot to the GoPros (and, of course, the Panasonic A500). I like the Sony form-factor and other things, which is why I looked into the successors to the horrible AS15, but ultimately the picture quality of all the Sony Action Cams was a big turn-off.

Thanks Guys

Yep the primary mission with most action cams is getting the image and a 4K camera that dies after 90 minutes is something you don't want. So far the 4000 footage I have seen (even zoomed a bit to reduce the super wide angle) looks pretty darn good to me and is on a par with my GoPro but is only 1/4 of the price and you get 2 battery packs too. I sold my LCD back from my GoPro as they are not exactly the best to preview footage but any cam with even a tiny LCD is useful to roughly frame a shot and maybe to confirm that you did get the shot, but that's about all. I use my GoPro as a safety camera at weddings and yes, it's a pain having to wire it up to an external monitor just to frame the shot or have to put on the wiFi back and then use my smart phone to frame the pic.

Should have the el-cheapo next week sometime so I'll post back comments

Chris

I downloaded some *original* clips from the SJ4000, from here:

https://mega.co.nz/#F!U8hHyCKK!quAy6pOjiopykp0t2wPqGA

Here is what I discovered:

1. All the daylight scenes are blue-tinted. You can clearly see sharpening artifacts, very heavy. But otherwise not terrible.

2. The audio is mono, phone quality - 32Khz, 512 kbps PCM (uncompressed, low bandwidth).

3. The bitrate for 108030p is 15 Mbps (low).

4. The frame rate is a nonstandard 30.0000fps, not NTSC.

What I learned from other sites:

There is no real 60p, either at 1080 or 720.

Here are two frame grabs from the original clips:

http://i849.photobucket.com/albums/ab56/markr041/SJ40001_zpsbdf73d32.jpg

http://i849.photobucket.com/albums/ab56/markr041/SJ40002_zpsec8d8740.jpg

You are correct there is more than picture quality that matters for camera choice, except for the viewer of the final video, who does not care about inputs.

True, but also the end viewer doesn't care about image quality either, only content.

And you forgot to mention lcd screen. To frame the Sony Action Cam you need an lcd accessory, which may double the price. The DJ4000 has an lcd, and I cannot imagine the video quality would be worse than the AS15.

I have also seen no evidence that the AS30 has any better picture than the AS15 (and I have looked). The AS100 is better, but inferior by a lot to the GoPros (and, of course, the Panasonic A500). I like the Sony form-factor and other things, which is why I looked into the successors to the horrible AS15, but ultimately the picture quality of all the Sony Action Cams was a big turn-off.


First off Mark... I'm still secretly jealous you have an A500 and I don't. :)

But for general info for others reading this thread:

-The Sony wifi and app actually work quite well for framing, at least for a locked off shot. Better than the goPro and Panny ones (which is the most annoying)

-One of the coolest (though bulky and could be better thought out) features of the Sony is the LCD dock, which turns the whole thing into a palmcorder style device. It's the best "selfie" screen option out there. Though at $100 it greatly increases the buy in. Still, I think it's worth it, esp compared to the GoPro screen. The A500 does have a screen built in, (wish my A100 did) but again, 4x the price.

-My AS30 looked better to me than the AS15, but again, may be subjective. It is much more feature packed though with 120fps being a ton of fun for family/vacation stuff. Easy to implement in camera as well. And the GPS is great for logging travel.

Now, the most important thing is... picking the right camera for the job. IMHO the Sony is the best travel fun family camera, the A500 is the best on person POV action camera. The GoPro... well... a good blend of the two, but probably the best for multipurpose mounting options. Again, right camera for the right job on the day.

I have a case with 4 of the Chinese ones and 1 real go pro. Through choice, I like the Chinese ones! The weird 30fps seems to be fine in the edit, I don't use the other settings. Sound is ok, and as the sound these small cameras collect is always compromised by the case, it isn't that different from the go pro. One button press to turn it on, one to start recording. Monitor is adequate. I've had two ruined by being run over, and it's not a worry. The go pro has more gizmos and adjustments. I use them mainly on stage for live music, and they perform rather well. Cut in with other footage from normal hd cameras, all I really notice is the barrel distortion of verticals, I don't see a quality change. Colours do seem to record slightly differently, and sometimes I may reduce the saturation just a bit for a better match on sky or trees, but on stage with coloured lighting, there's no need, because white is fine.

Thanks Paul

I obviously still have my GoPro too that I use quite a lot at weddings but nice to know that the 4000 works OK ... initially the one I'm getting is for some underwater work in December in the Cocos Islands and my main reason in looking for a replacement was also my old Hero still has a fuzzy image underwater (which the Hero 3 fixed) but I never modded my Hero 2 so figured (hopefully) that the SJ4000 produces a decent image underwater. However if it works for weddings too I'll use it!!!

Chris

Just got my first SJ4000 and I must say the image quality is pretty good! It's hard to believe that a $113 kit can produce this sort of image ... certainly a lot better than my Hero 2!! One drawback is that it only has a wide setting but has digital zoom so you can change the FOV just by zooming about 1.3X to take away the curvature of the super wide angle. At 1.3X zoom the image quality is also very good and it's impossible to tell the difference on a 24" monitor and full screen video ... you might lose a bit at full zoom but nothing that will make it unusable. Sheesh I paid $400 for my Hero 2 a few years ago here and had to buy the LCD back as well and spare batteries so a camera with 2 spare batteries and built-in LCD for a quarter of the price was attractive!!

Chris

Maybe hang out for the new low cost (about $100) basic GoPro see to be released very soon.

http://s13.postimg.org/5c27q3rmv/image.jpg
http://s13.postimg.org/mnxyxsvqf/image.jpg
GoPro will be unveiling a cheaper, entry-level action camera simply called the HERO and priced about $100

While the GoPro HERO4 Black and Silver editions feature 4K/30 video and a touch display, respectively, the HERO will be a low-end camera that doesn’t offer either of those features (nor will it have wireless connectivity through Wi-Fi or Bluetooth).

Instead, it offers high-quality 1080p30 and 720p60 video capture with some of the other new HERO4 sprinkled in (video will be limited to those two resolutions and frame rates).

The QuikCapture feature allows you to power on the camera and begin recording with a single press of a button, allowing you to react to situations and capture them without having to fumble around with your camera.

A Burst Photo feature snaps 5 megapixel still frames at a rate of 5 shots per second. There’s also a 0.5 second Time Lapse feature.

The rugged housing that comes with the camera allows it to be waterproof down to 131 feet (40m). This housing is integrated with the camera and cannot be removed, meaning the camera isn’t compatible with certain accessories (e.g. The Frame and the LCD Touch BacPac).

There’s an Auto Low Light mode that automatically adjusts the camera’s frame rates when you’re in low-light situations in order to optimize performance.

Other features include a built-in microphone, microSD card support of up to 32GB, a 2.5-hour battery, and a 3.9oz body.

So the new lineup will look like this .....
http://s8.postimg.org/qm4kwsesl/image.jpg

A friend just bought the SJ4000 and I did a quick low light comparison with my GoPro. I've had some issues with the low light performance of the GoPro, so what I do is assign an ISO limit of 400 to keep the graininess down. My friend wasn't sure of his setting on the SJ4000 but it appears to have been on auto. Nevertheless, I was sold on the $90 camera and ordered it. I'll do a more controlled test when my camera arrives, but for now here are the results I got:

Low Light Test SJ4000 vs GoPro 4 Black - YouTube

That comparison doesn't make any sense, you limit the iso on the gopro to 400 but set it on auto on the dj4000? What's the point of that?

Well, I mainly wanted to see how the SJ4000 is in low light and it seems to do pretty good. The next iso level on the GoPro after ISO 400 is 1600 and from previous experience it's pretty grainy. I wish there would've been an ISO 800 level. But even at ISO 400, you can see how the GoPro is more grainy than the SJ4000.

I'll be getting my own SJ4000 and will have time to do a more controlled comparison. (I was using my friend's SJ4000 and he doesn't live in the same city as me, so I didn't have much time.)

Bottom line, except for the white balance, the SJ4000 low light image is quite acceptable to me.

If you make a video where you are comparing low light between 2 camera's and you use 400 iso on one and maybe 1600 iso on the other, then it's not a low light comparison.

My concern was the GoPro graininess during low light situations. The only way to reduce it is by shooting at ISO 400 instead of ISO 1600. Here's how grainy ISO 1600 looks like even when there's ample lighting:

http://youtu.be/y0Wk9gzmq1c


PS: I will be updating the comparison when I get my own SJ4000.

What sort of battery life can you get from the SJ4000?

My concern was the GoPro graininess during low light situations. The only way to reduce it is by shooting at ISO 400 instead of ISO 1600. Here's how grainy ISO 1600 looks like even when there's ample lighting:


PS: I will be updating the comparison when I get my own SJ4000.

Maybe I missed it, but what model GoPro is being compared? Are you comparing the new SJ4000 to an old or lower-level GoPro model? The new entry-level GoPro, the GoPro Hero 4 Black? what?

I find it hard to believe that this clone, which certainly has an much inferior feature set to the GoPro Hero 4 Black, will yield superior video in any light with the same settings.

Still, whatever model you are comparing it is useful to see.

What sort of battery life can you get from the SJ4000?

I had 1.5 hrs with some to spare at a church service over Christmas.

Thanks Dave. What was the performance like, grain and image quality in the church I mean .

I was well pleased with it, shot 720 not 1080, minimal noise / grain, auto expose was spot on but auto colour was a bit off but it corrected well in FCPX. I'll try and grab a still and post it. For the price (I paid £54 off eBay) it's the best value for money I've spent on kit in a long while!

I did consider a 'juice pack' usually used for charging mobile phones from Amazon for around £15 but I really don't think it's needed until the battery performance drops off.

Maybe I missed it, but what model GoPro is being compared? Are you comparing the new SJ4000 to an old or lower-level GoPro model? The new entry-level GoPro, the GoPro Hero 4 Black? what?
.

It's the new GoPro Hero 4 Black, the 4K verson. The band clip I posted is from a radio station that I film regularly and for the life of me, I can't get a clean image with the GoPro under those lighting conditions. I always have to touch it up with the Neat Video noise removal program.

I bought a second one too! Shucks for under $200 for two with all the bits and pieces you cannot go wrong! Yes they have auto exposure but also have EV correction too. OK, you don't get 4K video with them but a Hero4 Black is a crazy price in comparison!

SJ have also brought out the 5000 which has a better Panasonic sensor and a better chipset and only a little more in price. You however do lose out on selecting a POV angle like the Hero has but the SJ has a digital zoom which works very well indeed and little if any image quality loss ..I zoom to 1.2 and it takes away all the curvature if you don't want the super wide view.

Chris

Possibly I've got this wrong, but I think techmoan reported that the sj5000 is made by a totally different company.

IYou however do lose out on selecting a POV angle like the Hero has but the SJ has a digital zoom which works very well indeed and little if any image quality loss ..I zoom to 1.2 and it takes away all the curvature if you don't want the super wide view.

On the Hero2, which i got a few years ago, when you change the POV to Medium or Narrow, the GoPro does the same thing. It uses a digital zoom. I called GoPro because I thought my camera was defective and sent them a couple sample clips. It looks really grainy and washed out in medium 1080. They told me at the time that it was due to the zoom effect they use to get medium and narrow POV. I think they center crop the sensor image and then up res it to 1080.

-gb-

Hi Paul

As far as I can see they make a complete range including the 5000. Look at SJCAM Action Camera - New way, new world! - SJCAM (http://www.sjcam.com/en/)

Thanks Greg, that's nice to know that the Hero 2 which I had was also digital. I must admit the IQ from the 4000 (as long as you don't zoom too much) is pretty good

Chris

Maybe he was talking about something else then. I'll check up on it.

EDIT - Looks as though he has the SJ5000+ now and is going to do a review soon!

Mine have had some heavy use over the past 10 weeks in a theatrical setting - battery life seems to agree with the above time - about 90 mins. The Chinese ones seem quite good in stage lighting. I've also discovered one extra plus point.

Stage lighting is going more and more LED, and the lighting designers love the saturated bright colour. I also do stills photography of these kinds of events and I always have trouble with blue and magenta.

One scene to the eye is clearly pink/magenta - extremely obvious but my DSLRs see a much bluer colour - so much so that the camera images are NOT what the audience see, however the DJ4000 sees exactly what my eye does, which is pretty impressive.

Underwater - I took a couple with me on holiday - again, pretty impressed. Here's a couple of vimeo links.

The night Holly's boyfriend got up on stage on Vimeo a short on stage clip
Barbados - 2014 Snorkelling on Vimeo underwater