Helmet Cam Review 3: Launch Helmet Cam Complete Pro Kit

[Scott]

In the third chapter of our series, we look at an up and coming company in the helmet cam arena. In business for about a year and a half, Launch Helmet Cams are based in Western Australia, and is the brainchild of Matt Fitzhardinge and Markland O'Connell. Along with motocross, wakeboarding, surfing, skating, snowboarding, these guys both are aggressive mountain bikers, spending most of their time doing downhill or jamming in skateparks... so you know these guys have extensive first hand experience with how rough you can get with electronic gear you wear while playing...

Check it out here.

[Adrian]

Great Review, great vid...

[at the drive in]

I think dave the model is actually spicoli from fast times at ridgemont high

[johnny]

That's one hell of a video..... I mean Techno's editing, not my filming.

Bloody good review too!

[Muz]

I think dave the model is actually spicoli from fast times at ridgemont high

Hey Bud! What's your problem!? All i need are some tasty trails and I'm fine.

By the way, awesome editing Rob.

[sikpuppyonglory]

very impressed with the quality of build, price & clarity of this setup, now if i only had the money

[demo man]

fucking awsome video - rocked my socks off!

I am desperate to know what you used to create the intro sequence... I loved the continuity of the vid. top work bloke!

Camera has very decent colour and quality, better than i had expected to see, so well done to the Launch boys and girls!



...
wow, almost all of those sentances ended with an exclamation mark... must be good then right?

[Dicky]

Great footage, much better resolution than I expected, oh and bloody brilliant editing. Nice work Rob.

I'm thinking of an HID / high power LED setup for caving / abseiling etc as well - this thing looks well tough enough to be banged into more than the occasional rock.

Now if only I had some more toy money...

[risky]

Bloody good little video Rob.

I too am desperate to find out what you used to create the intro sequence, plus the editing package you used to put the whole thing together. Loved the split screen stuff.

Well worth the download just for the viewing pleasure.

[Techno Destructo]

Hey, thanks everybody!!!

The intro sequence was actually a learning experience for me... *WARNING - COMPUTER SOFTWARE TALK AHEAD*

I've always been a long-time user of Adobe After Effects for motion graphics and compositing, and I've gotten pretty comfortable with it over the years. But earlier this year, I just did a course in Shake (the compositing tool the big film companies use), so I tried to do as much of the intro using Shake and Shake alone. Which was a bad idea.

For anybody who wants to know, Shake should only be used for single shots of 20 seconds or less. Like layering 3D over a live action shot. I was trying to do everything After Effects could in Shake. Bad idea. To put it another way, I was trying to build an entire barn using only a hammer, for every job. 'Cause I'm stupid.

The 3D was done in Maya. Text generation was done in After Effects in the end, and some of the graphics done in Photoshop, some (with great difficulty and a lot of cursing) were made within Shake.

Overall editing (after the intro) was done in Final Cut Pro.

Music was shameless stolen from Erratic, a fantastic local band (sorry guys! I have been to your past shows and bought your CD though!), who did a mash-up called "Chems vs Eminem", so Erratic kinda stole it from those guys in the first place...

Overall, I would have probably done a much better job in half the time if I wasn't so stubborn and just used everything at my disposal instead of my "experiment" in Shake.

Thanks again to all the pilots in the video, and to Johnny for all the 3rd person footage, and to Naz for the photo, and to Jeff Spicoli for inspiring Dave Musgrove to be who he is!