FPS cams?

[lidocaine]

Hey I wanted to make my own FPS series and I need some ideas on a cheap but decent camera. Ive seen some of your FPS vids, so what do you all use?No more than $100 please.

Thanks,Lido

[Smoothice]

what does FPS mean?

[Chaos_Theory!]

With cameras, frames per second. Im thinking he wants a cheap high speed cam that has a high FPS which really isnt gonna happen. At least not for a nice one.

[Outlaw5]

FPS+ First Person Shooter Cams. Outlaw5 ;)

[lidocaine]

^ Yes.
A lot of people who film paintball videos have whats called an "FPS" series (First Person Shooter), where they film themselves in well.. First Person playing ball.
So anyway, I need ideas for a cheap helmet cam!

Thanks,Lido

[Smoothice]

Ah. Now I see.

What do you plan on doing with it? Youtube videos? I have seen one that seems to work well for youtube quality and would be in your price range. If you are looking for higher quality then youtube then I doubt you will find one under $100

[lidocaine]

youtube, and homevideos for family friends that want to see what my hobby is like :)

[Smoothice]

Orgeon Scientific ATC-1000 Helmet cam

some guy was selling one in the bst's a while back. I looked into it from there and found some for under $70.

Never bought one but looks decent for a youtube type application.

[Hilltop Customs]

http://webdog.specialopspaintball.com/video/fps/howto.html

hope that helps....ive been thinking about picking one up for motorcycle/paintball

[lidocaine]

Im pretty interested in the oregon scientific one.
Cheaper, video quality seemed to be the same to me when he showed an example of the helmetcam.com one and the oregon one, and the sound quality didnt seem too bad on the oregon.Also the oregon has no external wiring.Keep the ideas coming!

[Chaos_Theory!]

Ive never heard anyone call those FPS cameras. They are usually called helmet cams or somethign similar. I have the oregon one and like it.

[lidocaine]

Chaos are you using the ATC 1k or 2k series?

[Merlinpb]

Sony makes a number of bullet cams that will hook into any digicamcorder, I use a 35 dollar Sony bullet cam with my canon SD camcorder and it works great, just need to be creative with where to put the camcorder so it doesn't get damaged. Hope this helps.

[drg]

Im pretty interested in the oregon scientific one.
Cheaper, video quality seemed to be the same to me when he showed an example of the helmetcam.com one and the oregon one, and the sound quality didnt seem too bad on the oregon.Also the oregon has no external wiring.Keep the ideas coming!

There's a HUGE difference in image quality between a real bullet cam and the Oregon Scientific one. But on Youtube it gets mitigated substantially. Is this for indoor or outdoor?

[lidocaine]

Outdoor

[drg]

Outdoor

That does help the Oregon Scientific one then. It's hard to beat the price for an integrated unit like that. Alternatively you can consider a small all-in-one device (Aiptek type) or video-capable still camera, and rig up a mounting system. Sometimes those can produce better video at that price point.

[Severe]

I've made a number of FPS videos using the ATC2K helmet cam. It's functional but obviously you get what you pay for. You should be able to find these cams on Ebay or various other e-tailers for under your $100 budget.

You can sample my vids at http://www.youtube.com/severevsf

I've tried several options with the cam with mounting. So far, having it on the opposite side of my shooting hand appears to work best. I've done this with my teammates also. Mounting on the barrel/marker, gives you a unique perspective but most shooters don't keep their markers up for good video except when shooting.

A couple of pointers.

YouTube video quality is MUCH worse than the camera can do. I use a 2GB SD card recording at 640x480@ 30FPS in .avi. I edit my vids using Windows Movie Maker and reduce the size to 320x240 so it's closer to the native YouTube resolution. Unfortunately you get in to a problem where the cam is compressing the video and then YouTube does it again. The end result is quality suffers. However, I have not uploaded any new videos since YouTube moved to the 1GB file size limit and the 480x360 resolution.

Sound. The ATC2K is designed to be 'waterproof' to 3 feet or so. For me, it has been in some rafting tests. :D However, for paintball, you'll need to modify the cam to get decent sound quality. Basically there's a rubber cover to the mic. If you remove this and then put a small piece of cotton/sound dampener material in, sound quality is significantly better..but you loose the waterproof feature. It is reversible so no worries.

The ATC2K is a fun little toy, but if you can hold off and save a bit more money, I'd recommend checking out VHoldR (http://www.vholdr.com/) from Twenty20. It's about $350 but significantly better than the ATC-2K. Is it 3x better?...I don't know for sure.