Contour HD for tandems?

[BMFin 0]

I need a new video for tandems.

Im thinking either Contour HD or Sony CX105 (or CX115)

Any experiences with the Contour on tandem videos?

[Hellis 0]

I dont video tandems myself, but i belive it would work.
But i dont think i would use this camera if i was doing tandemfilming as a job.
On my computer and with Vegas it´s horrible slow.
When i use video from a sony or canon camera it runs smoth.

Pm me if you want some raw videos to play with.

[DSE 3]

If you have one of the newer CPUs that have AVC decoding on the processor, it's not TOO bad. Shooting 1280 x 720 works.
The contour has much better sound than the GoPro, but I'm not a fan of their lens system.

They're surely good "enough" for tandems, the only drawback is audio and speed of render.

[Jonntis 0]

I started jumping with tandems recently with my contour 1080. Not selling the videos yet but I've edited a couple for friends and the camera does the job ok. I plan on using it for paying customers in the future.


The microphone as said above is rather poor. I use the noise filter in imovie which makes it a lot better. However if there is any wind at all you need to stand really close to the subject.

Our 182 dz has a 2 week delivery policy on tandem videos, so theres plenty of time to convert the video before editing. On a larger dropzone you might need the CPU power as stated above.

Another annoying thing is the framedrops you get when converting the video from 30 to 25 fps. Most people dont notice when they see the videos, but in the slowmo scenes it is pretty obvious, at least if you know of it.

You should also be aware the sliding record switch, which is an otherwise great feature, creates a rather high snap sound when you turn the video off(theres about a second delay), so you'll want to cut a second or so from the clips with sound.

The contour GPS is said to provide better sound quality and 25/50 fps, so a couple of the major drawbacks could be avoided if you get one of those. I'll probably switch my 1080p for a GPS in the nearby future, even though I see no use for the GPS itself.

The laserpointers is a great feature when jumping with a mark on your goggles instead of a fixed ringsight.


I dont know if they solved the black lines from direct sunlight in the GPS version, but i usually get them a split second per jump despite using a UV-filter on my 1080 camera.


Bottom line if price, weight, lasers and mounting versatility is more important than sound quality, hypeye and rendering times, the contour definitely works for the job IMO.


/Jonathan

[Hellis 0]

Well said.

Have you seen the new contour?
The one with a microphone input?
That looks very nice! You could easily have a microphone in you jumpsuit that you could use for groundvideo and just unplug it when you use it as a helmetcam.


Maybe i shold correct myself a bit, its not the rendering that is horrible for me.
When i try to play a video in sony vegas it works more as a powerpoint slideshow than a video.
But the computer can easily handle the videos in other players such as wmp, vlc or with some lagg even quicktime

[Jonntis 0]

Yes, I saw Trunks post earlier. External mic input would be awesome, but I like the field of view being a bit more narrow than the go pro for outside video. According to his post the field of view is claimed to be 170 degrees on the new contour, which i find a bit wide for outside tandemvideos. I use the 720 60p mode as I like the smooth slowmos you get from 60p, but I'd prefer the FOV to be a little more narrow rather than wider.

I also realised from Trunks thread there are som problems with blurry image quality of the contour GPS. I'm not buying one until this problem is solved.

[DSE 3]

Quote

Maybe i shold correct myself a bit, its not the rendering that is horrible for me.
When i try to play a video in sony vegas it works more as a powerpoint slideshow than a video.
But the computer can easily handle the videos in other players such as wmp, vlc or with some lagg even quicktime

I'm not having issues with playback, full frame rate is easily achievable in Preview/Auto mode.
Best/Full will be a challenge.
I'm running Vegas on both my 1.83GHz Mac and my quadcore PC...both play fine.

you might also be sure you're not running antivirus in the BG.

[BMFin 0]

Thanks for the replys everyone.

I think Im gonna go for the good old Sony CX105 workhorse. Rendering times and easy usage are important factors when filming tandems.

[Hellis 0]

Quote

Quote

Maybe i shold correct myself a bit, its not the rendering that is horrible for me.
When i try to play a video in sony vegas it works more as a powerpoint slideshow than a video.
But the computer can easily handle the videos in other players such as wmp, vlc or with some lagg even quicktime

I'm not having issues with playback, full frame rate is easily achievable in Preview/Auto mode.
Best/Full will be a challenge.
I'm running Vegas on both my 1.83GHz Mac and my quadcore PC...both play fine.

you might also be sure you're not running antivirus in the BG.

I use preview and Quarter as setting.
I dont have any antivirus running in the background except microsoft security essentials.
But even when i had a clean install on my computer they still lagg.

I dont have those fancy record-whats-on-the-screen softwares as you can see Look at the frame number and framerate.
Its hard to video a screen and get good video, but you can clearly see the drop and the "display framerate" goes down to about 7 when it displays the Contour video.
The other camera used in the video is some Sony camera with harddrive if i remember correct.

Right click, save as
http://www.hellis.me/FILE0003.MOV

[DSE 3]

Project settings? Settings on camera?

[Hellis 0]

Project settings are 1920x1080x32; 29.970p

Camera 1 (ContourHD): 720p 60 fps
Camera 2 (Sony): Not my camera so im not sure but i think 1080i something....
I belive Vegas chosed 1080 resolution because of the Sonycameras resolution.


EDIT: i just tried to switch settings on Vegas to 720 60fps and it still laggs.

[DSE 3]

Set your project to 1280 x 720 60fps and see if that helps speed preview.
Even an older machine should be able to manage at least half-frame rate.
Also, set preview window to Auto, then be sure you've got the preview window set to a size larger than a postage stamp (or turn off scaling).

[Hellis 0]

I tried that, but didnt help as i edited above.

I also tried preview and auto, no help.
Even Draft and auto gives me a whopping 4 fps playback .

The machine is not that bad. A 2.27 Dualcore with 4 GB ram.
But its a laptop, so i belive its the graphicscard that sucks big time.
But its still strange that the videos play with no problem in windows media player at fullscreen, but i cant have a 1 inch preview in Vegas with crappy resolution

[DSE 3]

the "one inch preview" is as much or most of the problem.

If the preview window isn't a reasonable resolution, then the CPU is working very hard to downscale it.
What happens when you drag out the Preview window and double click the header bar (this sets it to default)?

[Hellis 0]

I have tried all combinations i can think of.
Making it supertiny, or making it fullsize as original video, or using a predefined size.
And it does not help.

Vegas dont like my videos

[DSE 3]

don't know what else to tell you.
Contour footage plays back fine in Vegas for me on a machine that is *much* slower than yours.
It edits slowly, renders slowly, but plays back with no issues.
My project settings match the camera, this is important.
I don't have any 3rd party codec packages installed, this is important.
Preview is set to Auto/full and it allows Vegas to work best with it.
RAM is set to 0.

[Hellis 0]

Its allright, im used to itI have a stationary computer that probably could handle it, but its temporarly broken, for the last year or two *cough*.

I think it only needs to be reinstalled and it would work.
But it is sooo boring to do.

[trunk 0]

The only things I noticed with a slower laptop than I'm using now is sometimes if its searching for wifi it would really lock up the preview. So I used to turn off the wireless when I was editing. Also, make sure it's plugged in the wall. Even after setting the energy saving to high performance, it runs a lot faster when plugged in.

Just a couple things.

Trunk's Blog
HYPOXIC's Instagram
Like HYPOXIC

[Jonntis 0]

Quote

Thanks for the replys everyone.

I think Im gonna go for the good old Sony CX105 workhorse. Rendering times and easy usage are important factors when filming tandems.

A good choice, I believe.