Oregon Scientific ATC-1000 Review

A low-price, handy headcam, but with very poor performance. I’d rather spend the money and get good quality, specially for those braggin’ shots I’m expecting to show off. :-) :-) With only 15 frames per second, the images are at best jerky, at worst unviewable, for instance as soon as there is any semi-fast panning or movement. Very bad for “action” shots, for which the camera is supposed to be designed.

Resolution is poor, and low light shooting is hopeless. Probably not a huge problem if you limit your filming to outdoor sunny days, but results were useless while simply biking on a typical Seattle grey afternoon, in and out of trees. White balance seems to be way biased to outdoors as well, so colors indoors can be, mmm, interesting :-) Again, not really a big issue for the intended audience.

There is no way to see what you’re filming (no built in screen, no “live” output to a monitor screen) so aiming will be slow trial and error the first few times. I found that i need to consistenly aim lower than what you think is right.

Front lens is small and recessed – difficult to clean when wet or, hopefully, splattered w/ mud :-) Plus, there is no front cap to protect it during transport – minor inconvenience, but still something to think about.

4 new 2500 mAh NiMH batteries only lasted for ~10 mn of shooting + ~10 mn of standby in ~50 degree temperatures – I’ve only run a couple sets through, so that will need to be confirmed, but I was disappointed as I expected a lot more, as there is no big LCD screen to power.

Interface is very bare. Annoying feature is that you can’t preview what file you’re deleting, and can only delete the last video or photo in the list.

To end on a positive note: it _is_ fairly cheap, self contained, the sound works OK (quite directional, though, not so good for “ambience”, I can’t quite decide if that’s good or not – probably depends on the situation), and light enough that I didn’t really notice it on my bike helmet. It comes w/ a number of simple, but effective, mounting options that do give it some flexibility. It seems to be well built and, although only “water resistant”, rugged enough to take some abuse.

I’ll give it to my kids and see what they get out of it, but I will get better gear for regular use (or simply keep using my regular, jury-rigged, small digital camera, which gives much better pictures.)

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