Jonntis

I have the same problem with a video WA lens. Hope its okay to bump this thread as Im pretty certain its the same problem as discussed here. I was hoping to use my old Sony VCL-0630X with my CX115. The overall image quality is fine for DVDs, but a few seconds after exit I get the same spot of moisture as shown in the picture above. I tried to tape a UV-filter to it which actually worked but I got vignetting instead. A wider thread filter shows up in the stillcamera. I also took the lens apart for a while and assembled it againg, and taped it but didnt work. Any ideas on this? I was hoping to avoid buying a new lens or drilling new holes in my helmet. Thanks/Jon.

Hi, yeah, the GX200 locks exposure too and if keeping it shooting continuously from inside the aircraft and through the jump you'll have the frefall pics way overexposed. Where did you get it anyway? Mine just got stolen So I have the original ricoh WA converter if you should be interested.

I dont know about the GXR, it is probably different, but the GX200 nd the CX-series locks exposure on the first frame in a burst, so shooting continuously through the whole jump would not work. You would also end up with a huge amount of pictures. I tried the second option with a cheap 2.5mm female from Kjell&co, it had some play in it, and did not work well in freefall. Now that I think about it this was likely the connection that had my system jam, and not the one that came with the remote. I removed them both anyway. Most cameras used for freefall photography has a 2.5mm jack for the switch, so the idea works, just not with the stuff I got. I dont know how many cables you need, but I would guess all three, I had a friend soldering the three cables according to the instructions above, and then tested how to connect them to the switch. Two of the cables needed to be on the same pin for the camera to shoot. /Jonathan

I jump a CX4 with the ranch pro mouth switch wired to the remote. The 2.5mm plug on the remote had some play in it, which originally made the remote jam in freefall. It was fixed by splicing the cables instead. It now works well and I guess that goes for any mouth switch with a simple on/off function.

A good choice, I believe.

Many thanks for your answers everyone. In case someone would search this forum for the same reason I did couple of months ago, I'll reignite the thread and post what I've learned outside of the forum. I talked to a pilot a while ago who had been flying both the 206 and 207 turbine, a few times on the same dropzone simultaneously. According to him, you fly the engine on the same effect on both machines(max continuous effect), so it does not make sense the 207 generates more engine problems because of this. It was also his experience the two aircrafts he had operated had quite the same amount of problems. It does however, take about 2 minutes longer for the 207 than the 206 to climb to 4000m. (16 vs 18 mins roughly) Due to some differences in the deign of the airframe, the 207 has a higher max speed, which allows you to go down about 1 minute faster. Hence, the difference in turnaround was around 1 minute. He said he had timed it himself. Considering the extra slot in the 207, it is not harder to run this plane economically, which we thought it was at first. The engine is also positioned different in these aircraft, and it is harder to access in the 207, which makes some of the maintenance slightly more expensive than on the 206. Again, overall the planes are pretty equal it seems economically. /Jonathan

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.

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

Thanks a lot for your responses so far. Appreciate it. When I think about it, I've also heard of many 207s with engine troubles. I've thought of it as coincidence, but it makes sense the high demands on the enginge would wear it out faster. So does anyone know of a 207 thats been running a while without problems?

Hi Our dropzone is looking at buying a Soloy converted Cessna, and are trying to figure out the difference between the 206 and 207. I understand Soloy put the same engine in them, while the 207 can carry one more jumper and is heavier in itself. Does anyone have experience of both of these aircarft and could share what the difference in fuel consumption, turn around times etc is? Does the extra slot for a hop n pop outweigh the possibly slower climb rate and higher fuel consumtion of the 207? Any other important differences one should be aware of? Although we know these aircraft are very hard to run economically, it seems its the only choice that would fit our needs. Any input would be highly appreciated! Thanks/Jonathan

I'd be interested in some pics as well. How much are you asking for the modification? My guess though is you would save a lot of time just posting the pics in the thread?

Ricoh cx-series shoots at 4-5 fps, but locks exposure on the first frame in a burst.

The GPS might also be cool to use on occasional canopy flights, but I'd prefer it over the 1080p for other reasons. As I mentioned in another thread the GPS version is said to have a much better microphone than the previous versions. It also has a still picture mode like the gopro and supports PAL(which I guess would be pretty useless for you). I dont find it worth the upgrade but if I was to buy one now, it would definitely be the GPS. I would likely turn off the GPS function though for 99% of the jumps.

I have made a small top platform for my Gath from a piece of a plastic plate and some fibre glass filler. Very simple and took only about an hour. I could post pics in a couple of days. There's no adaptor for this helmet that I know of, but perhaps boneheads or some other companys could fit with some modification. /Jonathan

The Contour cameras has a similar image quality but a less wide field of view. It has some other nice features too that doesnt come with the gopro. The new GPS version is said to have a much better microphone than the previous ones and its PAL compatible, which I find are two of the major drawbacks of the 1080p. You can probably find a used cx105 at about the same or even lower price than the new contour, and this is likely a better option. You'll save money on the WA lens, mounts/box and hypeye though, if thats what you're after. Jonathan