Samsung head cam: Good idea, needs improvement
A movie camera that attaches to your head. It's an idea that's intrigued me since I was about six.
Unfortunately, all of the bugs have yet to be worked out.
Head case with hat cam
(Credit: James Martin, CNET Networks)For the past two weeks, I've tried out the Samsung Sports Camcorder SC-X300L, a small video camera with a lens that straps onto your head. It also comes with a voice recorder and an MP3 player. It came out last year and now sells for $449. Since I had to review an electric motorcycle, I figured it was a good time to check it out.
The good parts:
First, it's a fairly cool-looking piece of hardware. The camera itself, in flat black, is about the size of a deck of cards, so it will slide into any pocket. You can film directly with the lens built into the camera or with the strap-on lens for your head for hands-free cinematography. It stores video to an SD card--a 2GB card holds about 22 minutes of video.
The audio and video quality are fairly good, particularly the audio. Most of the time, the camera was shoved into my pocket, but the sound remained fairly clean. The integrated MP3 player sounds good.
Positioning the lens takes practice. The first few movies I took were of the sky--the camera was set too far back on my head. Subsequently, I got some good shots of the ground five feet ahead of me. You can check what the head cam is seeing through the camera's built-in LCD, but when you're biking or running, that's not practical. Still, after about six tries I got the hang of it.
And when you do, it's a lot of fun. I used it to film my trip on an electric motorcycle and first-person account of a game of tag with my daughter. Additionally, I now have a documentary of my wife putting away groceries from Trader Joe's. An attempt to strap it to the cat failed, but it was worth the effort.
The small size of the camera (minus the head lens) means you can film fairly candidly. It takes the social stigma out of being the buffoon with a video camera.
Finally, it's quite stylish. See photo.
The bad:
One word, buttons. The device has nine--count 'em, nine--control buttons. That includes three buttons that can play video, a miniature joystick, and a menu button that doesn't seem to do a lot. This is a common problem with Samsung products. I use one of their MP3 players as a video voice recorder--it took about two months to get used to it. People who borrow it at the office have recorded themselves eating lunch (by accident) and inadvertently deleted interviews.
With the Sports Camcorder, I missed a few shots because I had it on play rather than record. I also inadvertently shut it off once.
With a Samsung device, do not leave the house until you have these functions committed to memory.
Second, the format. The video is recorded in some crazy Samsung format. You need to load their software to play it. It also makes file sharing a pain.
Third, resolution. It films in 720x480. Thus, the clips look OK on a PC, but it's not for every screen.
Fourth, no still camera. How am I supposed to take undercover shots at Michael Vick's dog -ighting camp?
But still a fun camera. Someday soon in the future, this category might take off.
http://www.vholdr.com/
Without a reference camera on which you can watch what you are shooting as you shoot it, it can be very hard to line the shot up, especially if you do sideways sports (eg snowboarding). The VHoldR appears to have dual lasers to help with this. Not convinced. I tried using a laser with my ATC-2000. Try seeing where a laser beam is going in bright sunlight - they would have to be real powerful beams and I doubt regulations would mean that you could set the beams to on without holding a button. Thus, for example, with snowboarders, when using the lasers to line up the shot - you would have to be holding a "normal riding position" with your hand on your head holding a button - you won't get a natural position and the shot will be framed badly. Plus, no screen means you cannot review clips in the field and free up space on the SD card by deleting uninteresting footage.
Then there is an issue of weight. Why wear the power source on your head?
- Riddled with inaccuracies
- by evilc1971 August 23, 2007 7:02 AM PDT
- This review is pretty rubbish.
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- Oh, and also
- by evilc1971 August 23, 2007 7:27 AM PDT
- A 2GB card will hold over an hour of video from this camera on the highest quality setting. Well it does on my PAL one, and NTSC should theoretically be able to fit more as PAL's spatial resolution is higer (720x576x25 is greater than 720x480x30), although I suspect that the data stream is a Constant Bit Rate irrespective of format.
- Like this
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(4 Comments)A couple of weeks and he didn't figure out how to take a still and thought one of the buttons "Did nothing".
"Positioning the lens takes practice. The first few movies I took were of the sky--the camera was set too far back on my head. Subsequently, I got some good shots of the ground five feet ahead of me. You can check what the head cam is seeing through the camera's built-in LCD, but when you're biking or running, that's not practical. Still, after about six tries I got the hang of it."
What an idiot. Of course you can use the screen to help set up the camera positioning. Just do it while stationary. When you have it all lined up, then start running / cycling / whatever.
Then, he failed to understand that the recording format is normal divx, just with a fourcc of SEDG instead of DIVX. You do not need to "convert" it. You just need to use a hex editor or a program like avic to change 4 bytes in the header, and viola, it is a divx AVI. Yes, it is annoying that samsung decided to use that fourcc, but not the end of the world. Then there is that gripe about having to install a codec. Oh boo hoo, that's so inconvenient.
"With the Sports Camcorder, I missed a few shots because I had it on play rather than record. I also inadvertently shut it off once." Again, due to stupidity. The light clearly tells you what state it is in. I have never done this.
"With a Samsung device, do not leave the house until you have these functions committed to memory." Do you have problems programming your VCR? I was able to work this thing fine within seconds of picking it up.
"Third, resolution. It films in 720x480. Thus, the clips look OK on a PC, but it's not for every screen."
You sir, are a moron. It is for EVERY SCREEN, that's the point. Because EVERY TV SCREEN (Standard definition ones that is) in the USA IS 720x480!! That's NTSC resolution!
Kindly learn a little about the field you are reviewing about or get another job. OK, the camera isn't the best camera in the world, but it is noticable as being the best standard definition, standard framerate, but tapeless all-in-one solution by a major manufacturer. Sure, you can assemble a package of, say, an archos hdd recorder + bullet lens, but it will weigh a lot more, will not have so good a remote system, will probably need extra battery p acks and most of them will not do full res 720x576 PAL (They all do like 480 line for NTSC).
For the price and the seamless integration of components, this is a great product at a great price.