A couple of weekends ago we had one of those wonderful January days when the sun comes out, the sky turns deep blue, and the thermometer heads up to 60F or beyond. I managed to get one of the KLX's cranked late in the afternoon and headed out on some of the trails and fields at our farm to survey the winter's damage.

I had my GoPro Hero HD camera with me and snapped it onto the helmet to capture the fun. The camera captures fantastic quality footage and this was taped in the 1280x960 format to give more vertical depth. The quality of the posted product is not as good as the original footage but I think that has to do with some compression and reformatting stuff that Vimeo does on their end.

At the bottom right hand corner of the video window you will see a small "HD". Make sure this is turned on to get the HD file. Also click on the expand box to get the full size picture. Here's the link...

http://vimeo.com/19614526

 

Nice ride! You're lucky to have such close access to the woods.

Do you mount the camera on top of your helmet? I'm looking for another helmet cam but have seen the go pro and it seems like it's a bit vulnerable with it's 'out-there' mounting. I ride extremely tight woods and endless whoops...can the camera be mounted close to the helmet?
Thanks!

 

That's great quality video. I'm not so sure I like the extreme wide angle, especially when on flat, open ground; makes for an extremely curved horizon.

I bought the Vholdr Contour HD camera partly because it is not so wide angle, and also because it fits closer to the helmet.

 

Yeah ,,Nice! Thanks for taking us out on the ride with you. Looks like some great woods. Excellent spot if you wanted to make some tight trails. Your HiDef cam looks good, even if it loses some quality on the upload. I'm happy enough with the standard GoPro, but uploading my vids I really notice the quality taking a hit.
Stroker. I ride some tight spots that don't allow for things sticking up on a helmet. I knew the cam wouldn't last long on the top of my helmet so I mounted it under the visor. The GoPro has a setting that allows you to mount it upside down and it will automatically flip the signal. I made a mount for my standard GoPro and mounted it like this.
Dan

 

The GoPro can be side mounted to the helmet but you have to use a couple of extra "arms". I put the required hardware together to do that but it looks pretty flexible and flimsy and so I just use the top helmet mount for dirt riding. When I was filming this video I got smacked in the helmet several times and stopped to check the camera. It was still there and still aimed. I use RAM mount hardware and have mounted the camera to the handlebars of several street bikes and a snowmobile with great results.

As far as the curvature, aspect ratio, and wide angle, the GoPro has several different settings from full 1920x1080 on down. For dirt riding the setting with more vertical tends to give more of the action from the handle bars and front of the bike. The tilt of the camera (or my head) and how close objects are will effect how much curvature you get. It's a trade off. The full 1080i is a horizontal wide angle which looks great but the file size is larger and for trail riding may not add much extra.

 

I use a 2020 bullet cam and it's great for not snagging on anything. Just too much wiring and camcorder to carry. The under the visor mount looks interesting but is the mounting robust enough? I like the contour setup but need to find some video of them. Thanks all!

 

My fitment has been robust enough. I have bounced off a few trees, flipped the bike and hit the ground plenty. I actually put a chip in the replaceable glass lens cover, and even then the camera stayed put. A few factors would be variable though. My visor is able to be raised enough to fit the cam. There is a threaded insert in my helmet that i used , along with the extremely sticky 3M two sided tape, to mount my home made bracket. The bracket is bent out of 1/8 aluminum plate. You would have to consider things like that to use the GoPro.
Dan

Me vs tree= flying dismount.


No room on top here, duck!