speedamigo

I'm planning on building my own GFK enclosure for the CX-100. A friend of mine is pretty good with this stuff. We'll see how it turns out, otherwise I'll buy the one from Tonfly. One question: Should I plan on leaving extra room for cusion (foam padding or whatever) or can I design the GFK enclosure as tight as possible? I.e. when bumping the box on the airplane it would mean "airplane => GFK => camera" without any foam in between. Thanks

Great news! What are the dimensions and weight? Can it be fitted to other than Tonfly helmets as well (with screws)? I was planning on building my own since I'm 6'4'' and need it to be as compact as possible for topmounting. However for 65€ ...

Thanks for your answer DSE. You're right, I wanted to share the footage quality but spare everyone the 600MB main mts file with 5min of helicopter indoors I had just finished editing and thought it reflected the quality of the original footage by 99% anyways, since I chose Sony AVCHD profile for rendering and only changed the deinterlacing method. Seems like I'm wrong here!? Does Vegas recompress in this case? Working with different formats can be so confusing ... So, would you also recommend AVCHD Upshift for archiving (or a script that does the same) since it gets transcoded?

Play it with VLC or BSPlayer .. QT didn't work smoothly for me either. As previously said, it's certainly a bit shaky, but IMO it shouldn't look jerky. Well cheers, DSE. Not sure what you mean by "what you gained by converting to MPG4 ..." File size wasn't of any concern, but I needed to get it edited and deinterlaced ... or should I leave that to playback filters? Which seem to work fine, e.g. ffdshow, but not every computer user will know how to choose the appropriate deinterlace settings. And after editing, how can I not convert it to MPG4? I need to choose something IMHO ... Or which format/container do you recommend for best quality for computer viewing, resp. archiving (in Vegas)? Another question, would you recommend using another deinterlacing method than the ones provided in Vegas, whereof interpolate seems like the only way to go anyways, or am I mistaken? For example Mike's smart deinterlacer could be an alternative but I get jerky playback with it at the moment, still experimenting ...

if it helps anybody with the purchase decision ... i uploaded some footage on rapidshare: http://rapidshare.com/files/204715704/full_length_01.part2.rar http://rapidshare.com/files/204715190/full_length_01.part1.rar password for the rar: "chuchichaeschtli" ... the famous swiss german word it's an h264 mp4 file in 1920x1080x25fps (interpolation deinterlacing used) and as said before with century optics HD 0.55 lens, HD FH 16mbps mode, everything on auto, face detection stuff off, steadyshot on, helmet maybe not strapped tightly enough as i got caught in a hurry, my first camera jump anyways (arg, didn't turn my head enough to capture most of my buddy's flight and my flyby when he opened his chute)

as for autofocus: i agree that setting focus manually to infinity seems to be the rule of thumb, however in this jump autofocus worked really well (transitions between inside and outside were really fast as well, the exposure change was all i could notice). i couldn't see any scenes that were out of focus, expect for the very edges of the image that IMO are softened due to the wideangle (century HD 0.55). it was all in a hurry and i got my lens just right before the jump and when i set focus to infinity it was out of focus (apparently due to the lens or step-up ring) which got me confused as a greenhorn so i put it back on auto. seems now that the right setting is somewhere between 0.1 and 0.2m, but its a damn hassle to get it right with these basic controls and screen. as for steadyshot: opinions seem to be split ... i'll try it with steadyshot off next time i'll upload the edited full-res avc 16mpbs mp4 tomorrow. for the time being there's a lower-res HD clip on facebook: http://www.facebook.com/video/video.php?v=51784999686

usually we're a bit behind here in switzerland, but for once i got mine already last wednesday! jumped it on the weekend in the mountains with a wingsuit. i'm new to camera flying, so there's a bit of shake (also probably didn't tighten the helmet enough ... got caught in a hurry) ... but apart from that the footage is great! had everything on auto (also focus), the whole face detection stuff off, "wide conversion" on and a century 0.55! camera top mounted on a rawa helmet with just a screw. if somebody is interested in footage (be it some framegrabs, the raw mts files or a 3min mp4 avc clip i created in 1920x1080x25fps ... let me know, i'll upload it to rapidshare.com)

Looks like my next cam The only thing I'm not sure about yet is the support for the Sony infrared remote ... I seems it doesn't come with one, however if bought seperately will it support it nevertheless?

Judging by these pictures I'm not 100% convinced yet that the Hypeye AV connector sits on the shoulder where it reads A/V (http://www.infosyncworld.com/reviews/camcorders/sony-hdr-cx100/?n=3) or somewhere inside/behind the display (http://www.infosyncworld.com/reviews/camcorders/sony-hdr-cx100/?n=2), which would very much suck for the Hypeye.

I see your point. I don't want to start the discussion again, but as far as I remember the appropriate posts here it was primarly freeflying that resulted in shaky video though, wasn't it? Although I'm still gonna use it primarily for skydiving it will mostly be wingsuiting, filming students and base jumping, so I reckon it should be fine. Or did I entirely misinterpret the findings of people who are using it? I'm no professional but I wouldn't want base footage to be shaky either ... I'll already have enough trembling in my joints to cope with

Arg, I've just made my mind up to go with the CX12. Haven't ordered the cam yet but Hypeye Pro, extra battery, etc .. now this thing appears! Does it really have the AV half-moon connector as stated above, respectively support for the Hypeye Pro? Hmm, the EIS is really tempting, but since I will use the cam for shooting snowboarding and other sports stuff as well sometime (where I think OIS would be better), it's quite a two-faced issue for me anyways. I also have my doubts about the sensor. Although EXMOR sounds nice, it's pretty tiny (1/5" compared to 1/3" of the CX12), isn't it? The stills resolution (especially in dual record mode) is considerably lower as well. I was planning on using the mouth switch feature of the Hypeye Pro to take stills with the CX12. Yeah, I know, a dedicated DSLR is better, and no, I'm not selling them as tandem pics

Thanks for your swift answer and for clarifying, DSE. Yeah, I think I'll stick with the Century .55 for the beginning and if I need to go wider and the head-banging is going alright I'll face the Raynox 0.3. Well those calfs come in handy with wingsuiting ... and the ladies

Please excuse this question, I've searched the forum/inet but couldn't find an obvious answer: The Royal Diamond lenses aren't HD lenses, are they? Because I can't really tell much of a difference between the Royal 0.5 and the Century .55 which is reportedly HD. Some color deviation but in terms of lines ... ? The Raynox clearly stands out ... if only it wasn't such a huge beast. Topmounting the Raynox together with a CX12 with my 6 feet 4 will probably be very prone to banging it in the plane or under the door.

Well, you sure got your points. Don't get me wrong, I'm not really determined to buy the Panny, I think I might even gonna wait this one out for the next generation to reach the stores. I'm just really skeptic towards opinions that say "this is better, period". Isn't AVCHD said to have been developed by Sony and Panasonic? With manual control I meant focus, white balance, exposure, etc .. the Sony is clearly focused on the simple point-and-shooter whereas the Panny definitely offers much more and better control over these factors in manual mode, also thanks to the better screen (higher resolution) which is a quite a bit of a factor as both of them are missing a viewfinder. I definitely agree that HDD is the way to go, I was never a fan of tapes.

Well as much as I appreciate your feedback maybe you're a little bit biased. Even when considered with the necessary precaution, serious reviews don't look that bad for the Panny. As for the one-hand control: the CX7 comes with a touch-screen that will require a second hand for many functions whereas the Panny can be fully controlled with one hand. O yeah, and what about the very sluggish manual control on the Sony? I haven't figured out yet which number of the measurements relates to the width as they are not very consistent but it might even be that the Sony is roughly 10mm wider. Agreed, top-mounting would be the way to go, however I'm pretty big already, so adding a camera on top even makes me taller and prone to bounce the camera. Furthermore, sooner or later even though that will result in the same height-problem I'll opt for a Canon EOS which has to be top-mounted ... now where do I put the video camera? So, even when disregarding the higher price, the Sony can't convince fully either (furthermore I bet it's not great in low-light either nor does it come with a lanc port). Is there any alternative out there - compact like the CX7/SD5 and flash-card based, since I don't think a HDD is the best option for high-altitude/outdoor use. Or should I jump on the miniDV wagon, even though I got the processing power for AVCHD and think it's the way to go in the consumer segment on the long run. Do you think Canon will join the battle for compact flash-based cameras? Basically a HG10 with flash memory and which is skydive-proof ...