Gay Outdoors

Head Cams for Hiking Jan 26, 2012 7:28 PM

It seems that most head cams use helmets, bike mounts, or surfboard mounts and not a headband mount. They now have HD head cam models.

The "Drift Innovation X170 Action Camera" looks good mainly because it uses non-proprietary batteries, a wireless wrist mount control, and a video review screen built in. It does come with a headband mount.

A hand held camera to record some hikes and taping while walking does turn out pretty good. It's not very jerky at all. However battery life and memory capacity limits tape-while-walk taping. And you have to stop all the time to tape. Taking a hand held video camera involves a lot of stopping, unpacking the camera, and then repacking after each shot. Taping is limited to 30 minutes, and the battery pack lasts about 45 minutes. A wireless wrist remote control to start/stop taping on a Head Cam is an attractive feature.

Another brand to look into is the GoPro as it has a chest mount, which would probably be the most usable setup for filming while hiking.

Another option is a Contour 1080 to film hikes. I would recommend a monopod for making hiking movies. These smaller cameras are hard to keep still unless firmly mounted to something.

Keep in mind that Helmet Cams are POV cameras...meaning "Point of View". Therefore they are going to film every head movement or basically follow where your eyes are looking for the most part. Good video usually uses POV Cameras as a "B" roll camera in conjunction with an "A" roll Camera. "A" roll is usually considered the primary camera and is either used by a skilled videographer whom can hold the camera very steady or using some sort of stabilizing mounts to do so. "B" roll is the secondary camera and its footage is usually spliced in a way that it accentuates the "A" roll. In my opinion if you want something for hiking the GoPro chest mount is a good one because it will give you a more stable shot mounted on your chest. Your axis point is lower and does not pivot in relation to the horizontal plane as much. This camera can also be used as mounted to a mono or small tripod for real steady shots which would be very helpful with landscape views. Therefore you can get some both "A" and "B" rolls with the same camera using different mounts.

There's also the gear that someone like Les Stroud ["Survivorman" on Discovery Channel] uses. He has all sorts of lightweight equipment and a tripod to be able to film his activities or himself, in a fixed location or while walking. In fact, whether you like the show, the guy, and the premise, or not, it's worth a watch to see the technical aspects of how he films himself and his activities along the way. I'm often impressed when I realize how much he's had to backtrack or go out of his way to set up or retrieve a camera.

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Mike Boisvert