she's..uh..small and white, and a deathtrap

[Matra et Alpine]

We've been playing with installing a number of the cheap ($20) digital units with 16Gb memory cards as an option. Being tiny and light weight they are ideal for mounting in unusual places and best of all dont' need huge mounts to make them secure -- low mass
We've rigged a number of differnet mounts for differnet areas of our cars and await the arrival of the race season to see how good they really are. The beauty of 16Gb is we can turn them on and leave them recording from the time we start up in the pits.
Trying to get bulk-buy down to $15

BIG downside is all the buttons are "foutery" --- ie small and difficult to use Espsecially with race gloves or bike gloves on. Can't have everything and so far all recording have 5 minutes at the start fo "crap" while we set things up hjaving started them up before final preps.

[clutch-monkey]

something like that would be great matra, much prefer to stick them on the car somewhere rather than have the cabin taking up most of the shot.

[whiteballz]

Surely quality would be an issue with those? The whites would be blown out and poor automatic contrast control etc?

[whiteballz]

Princess sent me some photos to clean up/crop.

Here they are.

[whiteballz]

Last lot.

[clutch-monkey]

thanks for the editing 'ballz, pics look a lot better now.

[Matra et Alpine]

Surely quality would be an issue with those? The whites would be blown out and poor automatic contrast control etc?

Autmoatic contrast control as with any digital processing chips nowadays.
REALLY bad in low light though ... not unsurprising with such a small aperture and plastic lens
They're looking "OK" for the heart-shots, the ones that look dramatic, but am not convinced on the encoding for fast moving objects. Tests are fair, but it's not the same as on track doing another 50mph on top
I don't see them taking over from my main camera ( I now use a Canon sx200 HD in place of the Samsung ).

Another "wee test" that's been suggested is to hook the cheapos up to laptop and stream 4-6 of them and avoid some of the processing on the camera. A cheap netwbook and SSD might be a good way forward on that too. We'll see.

All tasks for first test sessions .... and we've jsut had another 4 inches of snow dumped on us, so more delays. Getting really pissed off now as Lotus Evora with the C/R box is awaiting the better road conditions. Local dealer offering a stonking deal

[Matra et Alpine]

I've posted a contrast/lighting test clip on YouTube to give an idea on that.
[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mvn8gDC9YeQ]YouTube - Quick test in sun/shadows[/ame]
You can see the contrast light time at the end there.
Good idea I post more to YouTube as most of my club mates are looking to stick a few on their cars this season too. At $17 you don't mind losing one or two in the inevitable "incidents"

[Matra et Alpine]

I know the feeling mate, I look at my footage round Bathurst and Im saying your farkin soft but I bet I will be a wimp over the top again this year

It helps to use wide angle lens and then also to then crop to wide angle ratio. It's to do with the way the mind sees that 2d image on screen
I've even played with variable stretch but way too much effort to get it looking right
Especially get rid of "Lots of sky"

[whiteballz]

[clutch-monkey]

also got new pics from the last month or so. will make separate thread most likely

[f6fhellcat13]

From a pink rollcage to a purple Porsche...

It's poetic, really.
Congrats!

[Kitdy]

Congratulations!

How the hell can you afford them?

[clutch-monkey]

Congratulations!

How the hell can you afford them?

me? i can't afford this, not without selling the 911SC (UNACCEPTABLE).
this is my mum's daily.

[wwgkd]

me? i can't afford this, not without selling the 911SC (UNACCEPTABLE).
this is my mum's daily.

Wait, really? So your dad drives the GT3 and your mom has this? My mom's favorite car ever was a crappy little yellow toyota and she says even if she won the lotto she wouldn't buy another car (she's driving a liberty now since the toyota couldn't tow the horse trailer.)