Move Over, POV.1 — I’ve Got a Hero Now

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Decision made.

The video just blows me away. Here’s a piece of the 1.1 hours of footage I shot today with my GoPro Hero fastened to the front of my helicopter:

This is unedited. I didn’t run it through any filters or stabilizers. All I did was find a 2-minute section of interesting footage, save it as a QuickTime movie, and upload it to YouTube.

I didn’t even have the camera set for full HD.

I didn’t even touch the camera during the flight. I turned it on before I got in and started up and turned it off after I landed and shut down. It saved roughly 4 GB of footage in a normal format easily read by my Mac without QuickTime plugins.

Add to this the incredible hi-res stills (and these, too) I can shoot just as effortlessly and you have a win-win situation for anyone interested in hands-free photography and video.

This completely blows the POV.1 out of the water. I’ll be selling my complete POV.1 camera setup on Craig’s List as soon as I get home. Why mess around with a second-rate extreme video camera system when you can have something so much better for less?

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4 thoughts on “Move Over, POV.1 — I’ve Got a Hero Now”

  1. Don’t dis the POV.1s too much. I have 2 that I need to off-load. I recently got a Contour HD camera for less than half the price, and the video is soo much better. The Contour looked a little better suited to wearing than the GoPro, but either one of these beats the Vio hands down in size and video quality.

    I did shoot some cockpit video with the Contour a few weeks ago…my composition and scenery don’t stand up to yours, but I’ll have it on my YouTube channel soon. (And will probably have some side-by-side video from the Vio for comparison.)

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  2. @chris
    What gets me is that I hired a “professional” videographer a few years back to do a video for me and he rigged up a POV.1 as a “HD” camera on my ship. He also shot some video through the open doors and managed to screw most of that up pretty royally. He then attempted to create a “trailer” for the whole video using just the footage from the POV, which was not only mounted on a slight angle (so all footage was crooked) but had awful color. (Needless to say, the “professional” never finished that project. He was obviously incapable.)

    The footage from the GoPro Hero, however, is so much better than what he shot (at the same place!) that I still have trouble believing a “professional” would consider using the POV at all.

    I have 5 camera heads, 2 recording units, and multiple cables, mounting devices, and even a DC-powered back (no batteries required). They’re all going up on Craig’s List when I get back to Phoenix. I hope that someone as invested in the system as I was will snatch this stuff up.

    I’ll have to check out the Contour. Thanks for the tip.

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  3. Out of curiosity, how did you mount this camera in your R44? My wife and I are rigging a GoPro in our R44 for a trip to Mexico in a few weeks. Do you have the wide angle lens?

    Thanks,

    Bert
    Tucson (57AZ)

    Reply ↓

  4. @Bert Zaccaria
    I bought the motor sport version of the GoPro and mounted it inside using the suction cup do-dad on the Plexiglas roof window over the passenger seat. That’s what you’re seeing here: https://aneclecticmind.com/2010/09/10/my-hero/ I do have the wide angle lens. With the tripod adapter, I’m able to mount the GoPro on the nose of the helicopter using a special clamp I have from my old POV.1 setup. That mount, however, is not legal with the FAA so I don’t use it or recommend it.

    If you plan to shoot video, it’s VITAL that you connect the camera to the frame of the aircraft — someplace that does not vibrate independently of the aircraft. The instrument panel cover is NOT a good location. The bar between the two back seats is great, but you’ll need a mount that elevates it above shoulder level. Ram Mounts makes a solution (http://www.ram-mount.com/CatalogResults/PartDetails/tabid/63/partid/082065077045068045050048049085045069/Default.aspx will get you started) that requires a custom clamp to fit around that bar. (The clamp they offer is for a skinnier bar.) If you have the GPS mount offered by Robinson for the area over the pilots feet you can also mount on that, but you’re likely to get reflections and other undesirable images.

    I should probably blog about my various camera mount locations and include some photos.

    If you come up with any other solutions, please do take a moment to share them with us.

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