From http://www.launchhelmetcams.com/:

“The V.I.O. POV1 is a rugged self contained helmet cam system designed to capture your point of view (POV). The easy to use recording unit records onto SD cards (1GB card included, max card size 2GB) and captures high quality footage at 720 x 480 resolution. The wireless remote makes stopping and starting recording easy. The V.I.O. POV1 also comes with a handy carry case.”

First Impressions

The team at Launch are easy to deal with. I had no trouble corresponding by email and getting the info I needed. This is always a good sign for anyone looking at spending over a grand on a new toy.

Out of the box, the V.I.O. POV1 was smaller than I expected. It was all neatly packaged into a carry case of the sort that most lighting systems are sold in these days – nice and convenient with all the bits in one place, except the POV1 Nukeproof Mount, which is sold as an extra. Given the size, I expected the camera to be a little lighter than it was, but it’s not exactly heavy.

The recording unit is compact and rugged, with a small but useful screen and only a few buttons so that technophobes like me don’t get too confused. I actually had a bit of difficulty opening the battery compartment and plugs at the bottom of the unit, which is a sure sign that Launch are genuinely trying to provide a waterproof system, as advertised.

Fitting

I chose not to bother with mounting it to the bike and instead went straight for the helmet mount in order to capture the action on the easy DH trails at the You Yangs. I had the whole system fitted inside five minutes, which is pretty good, seeing as getting the camera in to the Nukeproof Mount is a little fiddly, requiring a very small allen key that I ended up losing.

It’s slightly tricky making sure that the camera is level inside the mount, but trial and error is easy with this system, because it turns on and records so quickly – literally just a few seconds from pressing the on button and you’re recording. Very impressive.

The mount attatches to your helmet with the most hardcore Velcro I’ve ever seen – you’d have to head butt a tree very hard to knock it off, but I still chose to use a single zip tie, just for that added bit of security.

Feel

You can feel the weight of the camera and mount on your head and I had to go one click tighter on my helmet’s retention system than I usually do, but once I was riding, it wasn’t an issue. In fact, after a while, I started wondering why I don’t secure my helmet a bit better in general. With the tension I used, I was never conscious of the helmet moving around, even during the roughest parts of the ride, so the weight of the camera and its mount must be pretty good. If the mount was made of carbon, it’d be lighter and much sexier, but I’m tipping it’d add a few dollars, so it’s probably not worth it for us mere mortals who’ll never be in the running for an Academy Award with our next MTB documentary.

The recording unit fits easily in to a small hydrapack, along with a couple of litres of water, my repair kit, a Powerbar and some gels, so there’s no need to look like you’re moving house by bike. This is probably the greatest advantage of the V.I.O. POV1 over other systems that I’ve used – no additional video camera needed. The lack of even a small video camera is instantly noticeable and you can ride along without even realising that you have a whole helmet cam system on you.

Another touch of brilliance is the remote control. Two simple buttons that actually do work from a distance and you hear the reassuring beep from the main unit to know for certain when the system starts or stops. It really is exceptionally simple. And it all works without you needing to go to some obscure website and look up instructions that you’d rather not be spending the time looking for.

Playback

Again, very simple. As soon as you’ve finished recording, you can whip the unit out of your pack, have a look at the very clear and easy to see screen and see if you’ve screwed up the take or not. I was having so much fun with it that I did a few retakes just for shits and giggles. There are only seven buttons on the whole unit, so if you can’t figure out how to work it, you’re probably best off just sticking to being the rider, not the filmer.

When I’d initially set it up, I’d actually assumed there was no microphone, so I was amazed to hear the sounds of my rumbling down the trail. It’s not bad sound, either, and is recorded by a rugged little microphone about halfway down the cable that connects the camera to the main unit. Just one issue here – the microphone had no windsock, so a lot of my footage sounded like I’d been recording during an Antarctic snowstorm. I need to check in with Launch and find out if this unit comes with a windsock, but it might not be an issue for people that like to put a soundtrack on their films.

Once I was back home and at the computer, I chucked in the software CD provided and it easily installed on my Windows Vista PC. Even better, it instantly detected that there was a new release of the software, automatically downloaded and installed it. The fact that they’re updating their software is another good sign that they stand behind their product. The software detects the videos you’ve recorded on to the unit and had some basic video editing functions, such as storyboarding.

Regarding file size, I recorded a 10:20 stretch of mostly downhill trails through the bush and it came out as a 201MB AVI file. Based on the maximum card being 2GB, then you can assume you’d be able to record uninterrupted for about 100 minutes. Pretty good. I remember extracting the raw video from the last system I used and ended up with a 9GB (yes, nine gigabyte) file that meant I needed to upgrade my laptop and “borrow” some software from Adobe to allow me to cut it all up easily. For someone that doesn’t want to be a professional, the V.I.O software is easy, but I’d expect people who wanted to really promote their films would need to have better software than what you get on the V.I.O POV Manager disc.

But what’s the video quality like? In a word: good and bad – it really depends on the conditions. For my day at the You Yangs, conditions were overcast, which is perfect for the POV1, as the available light was very consistent and the little camera can concentrate on focussing, rather than contrast and brightness. My day at Castlemaine was the challenge that showed how hard it is for a camera to deal with direct sunlight in a tall forest, where the trees create a strobe effect and the lense really struggles. Add in the rocky Castlemaine trail surface, as opposed to the manicured You Yangs surface and you’ve got some stretches of the video that are really hard to watch. But that’s putting it through the worst conditions. The fact that there’s a perfectly good video at the end of it with very little picture breakup shows you’re using a quality piece of gear.

When I got home from both rides, I hooked it straight up to my TV using the supplied A/V connectors and relived the moments in perfect clarity from the comfort of my own lounge. Again – no need to do anything complex, as it’s all plug and play. Just be aware that it records in 4:3 (not 16:9), so don’t be expecting full widescreen pleasure. Regardless, the picture quality is on par with analogue TV, but not digital, so I wouldn’t be comfortable recommending this unit as cinematic quality. For the home user, though – it’s a lot of fun.

Final Impressions

I really want one. It’s such a compact, fast and easy to use system, that I didn’t experience a single second of frustration with it (apart from the wind noise issue), which is amazing, because I’m the most impatient person on earth when it comes to gadgets. My mobile phone is three years old because I can’t be bothered learning how to work a new one, yet after only a single day of riding, I found the V.I.O. POV1 intuitive. If it’s as waterproof as they say, the possibilities of this system are endless and the fact that it uses familiar technology such as AVI files and SD cards means you don’t need to go around finding any specialist parts or software codecs to record and play your movies.

I think I’ll be contacting the boys at Launch to see if they really need this one back... I might need to keep “trialling” it... for another two or three years...

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