AFF - handycam

[deadwood 0]

Nice to have that thing off your head isn't it?

He who hesitates shall inherit the earth.

Deadwood
Skydive New Mexico Motorcycle Club, Touring Division

[cpoxon 0]

monkycndo

I'm not fond of the chest strap thread through style. Not stable enough.

I bought the official GoPro Chesty mount, took all the elasticated strapping off, enlarged one of the holes on the plate slightly since the chest strap wouldn't go through it, and threaded my chest strap through that. The larger footprint of the chesty plate makes it much more stable.

Here's a video. Could probably do with angling down slightly, but you get the idea.

Skydiving Fatalities - Cease not to learn 'til thou cease to live

[fincher 0]

just a heads up. I borrowed a rig to back up a load that had a chest mount alt. I was outside on exit. Count was horrible but exit was stable. Bad part is the alt. got snagged under the students rig. I had to carefully unwedge it off the hill. Thankfully it wasnt through a handle. I would discourage wearing any cameras or chest mount alt. on something as unpredictable as a AFF jump. No need to risk yourself or a student any more than their own ignorance and your own false confidence is already doing. just food for thought.

i'll huff and I'll puff and I'll burn your packing tent down

[Dutton 0]

Finally mounted up my ParaGear chest strap mount.

GoPro2 on 1080 Wide. 720 or WVGA has a wider FOV on the 3, I'll have to experiment with the 2...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NEwKLku_9EA

Not too comfortable in the AC if the person in front is squishing you, but it feels good not having it on my head...

[shropshire 0]

Dutton

Finally mounted up my ParaGear chest strap mount.

GoPro2 on 1080 Wide. 720 or WVGA has a wider FOV on the 3, I'll have to experiment with the 2...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NEwKLku_9EA

Not too comfortable in the AC if the person in front is squishing you, but it feels good not having it on my head...

Damned GoPro generation can;t even make clickies

Nice angle.

(.)Y(.)
Chivalry is not dead; it only sleeps for want of work to do. - Jerome K Jerome

[sunnyape 1]

Our DZ tried using hand cam for AFF Stage 1 jumps for JM2 on left side of the student. The footage wasn't that good as the angle to the student's face was too acute, as well as containing too many views of the student's arm / gripper. Outside camera is still best for AFF S1 as it tells 'the full story' and lets the JMs concentrate on more important things.

We use helmet cams for the higher stages when JM needs to debrief student on body position or specific skills.

[Scrumpot 1]

Ditto. Ditto on the "angling" too - which you can see me actually even doing, mid-jump here -

Chest-Mount AFF GoPro

Much prefer this, over being on my head, or certainly (not EVER) on my hand!

coitus non circum - Moab Stone

[AaronComp 0]

Hand cams are awesome, but what you screw up isn't, the guys that built this sport have used them on aff before but not main side to its degree of functions, mirror has more safe option position, lip sticks are safer and easier to rig together. If you got closed face helmets , why cant you build noise reduction and coms , go to shop class and pose the student for review, . If you give the student a hand signal with the hand cam hand that could be wierd. You want clear thinking clean development , very real performance enhancements and safety. Review dive flows with camers guy over shoulder, add In stable image input, desired student profile, now look at instructors body positions and thought process, if you can wear an alti 2 , you can wear a camera, as long as in the safety pro, con your looking at the same thing, have you ever worn an alti on your arm or low on your rig, swoopers do, add in few knotches for angle of view, through that bad boy in the wind tunnel and see what's what's. The Army does sht at night so I have to see everything, people, gear, weather, and were training and teaching and learning, you can't give up and you can't get killed, so think, ,, exchanging information in freefall should be easy safe and fun, so you can build on sensing more in the positions the sport offers, not having them taken away. Put a camera on the student thats a great idea. Brake the students neck, thats a bad idea, watch that taxi cab game show, yes I hate gopro, looks like a mid a chlorine lunch box.

[sunnyape 1]

You didn't say which AFF stage you are attempting to use handcam for, but I assume you mean Stage 1 or 2.

We gave it a go for a while at our DZ, but the results weren't very good. Since you are holding on to the the student all the time, the point of view is very limited. We prefer to offer outside camera for AFF stage 1 or 2.

For the higher stages, 3 to 8, where a JM is in front of the student, a conventional head mounted camera is fine.

[JohnMitchell 16]

sunnyape

We gave it a go for a while at our DZ, but the results weren't very good. Since you are holding on to the the student all the time, the point of view is very limited. We prefer to offer outside camera for AFF stage 1 or 2.

For the higher stages, 3 to 8, where a JM is in front of the student, a conventional head mounted camera is fine.

I've never flown handcam but I agree with what you're saying. Except that even on level 1 and 2 the goal is to let go of the arm and let the student have max free-arm time, right? That hand could then get some okay video. I still don't like the distraction, though.