Cheap and decent bike camera

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 angry pirate 16 Nov 2019

I suspect I'm asking for the impossible but can anybody recommend a cheap bike camera that actually takes halfway decent footage?

It's a fairly rare day that someone doesn't try to kill me on my commute nowadays and it would be great to have a momento of the experience.

 nniff 16 Nov 2019
In reply to angry pirate:

veho muvi K2 works well enough for me and the battery life is just long enough to capture my whole commute - a bit over two hours in total. Only PITA is that it is mounted upside down on my bike and it resets the 'inverted' setting if the battery goes flat.  

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NkACTTNK2Rs&t=98s

Post edited at 19:56
OP angry pirate 16 Nov 2019
In reply to nniff:

That looks pretty decent, thanks! 

 Bobling 16 Nov 2019
In reply to angry pirate:

I posted similar about a year ago and got recommended a Muvi Atom.  Bought it and was cheap and not particularly cheerful.  The good points - it's tiny, and it's cheap.  the bad points - couldn't record my whole commute, would randomly turn itself off and on, not detailed enough to pick up number plates unless you were very lucky, charging jack worked loose quite quickly, not water proof, sound quality terrible, oh and then just stopped working after a few months.  After it stopped working I went without for some time, until an awful incident made me really wish I had had footage, so I then invested in a Cycliq 12 and 6.  Bad points - quite expensive, a few hundred quid.  Good points - come with a very good front and rear light, have front and rear footage, intelligent power signs and option, easy app interface, great detail, great sound, automatically records over old footage rather than having to manually wipe every night, options for linking with Garmin and phones and I think Strava if you are into that sort of thing.  Most importantly I trust the thing to work when I need it to.  So yeah I'd recommend these!  It's not cheap but for about as much as a big car service I'm prepared to invest!

 JimR 16 Nov 2019
In reply to Bobling:

I'm with you on that

here's a clip from them 

rear first

youtube.com/watch?v=6K-pf_hCtak&

then front

youtube.com/watch?v=vh8bVYKHiK0&

In reply to nniff:

That's horribel how the cars are driving, and why on earth are the bus lanes overlapping with the bike lanes?

OP angry pirate 17 Nov 2019
In reply to Bobling:

Thanks for all the recommendations. Look like I'll need to start saving!

 LastBoyScout 17 Nov 2019
In reply to nniff:

Another vote for Veho Muvi K2 NPNG.

I've got 2 of them now - picked a second one up cheap on eBay to mount facing backwards, given some of the passes I've experienced.

I recommend the K-Edge mounts - solid and bomb proof.

 LastBoyScout 17 Nov 2019
In reply to Bobling:

The Cycliq ones get some pretty mixed reviews - I'd buy them if they were consistently better than they seem to be.

Although it takes up a bit more space, I also prefer separate gadgets for separate jobs.

The Muvi can be set to loop, too.

 thepodge 17 Nov 2019
In reply to angry pirate:

Was probably me that recommend the Atom. Mine is fine but then my commute is a fairly basic 12 minutes so I'm not really putting it through anything tough. 

I quite like the K2 but it looks big for a helmet mount.

 Martin W 17 Nov 2019
In reply to angry pirate:

I had a Cycliq Fly 12 and Fly 6.  I sold the Fly12 recently because (a) the wavy handlebar mount footage drove me nuts - only slightly less dreadful than a headcam, and (b) I didn't like the light*.  I also reckon it's a tad expensive for the functions it has that I actually made use of.

I now use an SJCAM SJ4000 wifi gopro clone fitted to a rucksack strap mount like this one: https://www.amazon.co.uk/ASUN-Backpack-Shoulder-Mounting-Bracket/dp/B07FKQ9... It does everything I need from a camera, in particular it doesn't wobble.  You can set it to overwrite old clips cyclically just like a car dashcam.  Battery life is at least an hour.

I still use the Fly6 at the rear: the light is civilised but the flash pattern is still reasonably conspicuous.  The camera is fine - not cinema-quality but perfectly adequate.  And compared to the Fly12, it was only a little bit pricey for the functions I use, rather than unjustifiably so.

(I do also wear flashing LED lights on my rucksack: two small red ones to the rear, one slightly larger white one on the front.  These are conspicuity lights, not for illuminating my surroundings.)

* I'm not in to light wars: for road cycling I prefer a Lezyne light that meets the German StVZO standard (reference https://www.cyclinguk.org/cycle/lighting-uptime and http://www.light-test.info/en/faq-en/169-stvzo-bike-lamps-regulations).  My retina-searing light is reserved for off-road riding, and even then I try to be ready to cover it up if I meet walkers or horse riders coming the other way.  It's really antisocial.

 wilkesley 18 Nov 2019
In reply to Martin W:

I had three SJCam SJ8 from Amazon. Great cameras, but all failed within a week of getting them. Luckily Amazon has a good returns policy. Bit the bullet and bought a GoPro 7, which fingers crossed has been fine.

Post edited at 10:55
 nniff 18 Nov 2019
In reply to Stefan Jacobsen:

Cycling in London. Not exactly cycle friendly

 Tony Jones 23 Nov 2019
In reply to nniff:

Christ dude! That's guerrilla warfare. I'm so glad I live in northern Cumbria. Stay safe!

 Dax H 24 Nov 2019
In reply to nniff:

> Cycling in London. Not exactly cycle friendly

Defiantly some pricks in cars there but you didn't come off great either. 

Riding quite fast down the left through a junction where people are likely to turn left.

Overtaking on the right going over the chevrons that had people standing on the trying to cross the road. 

The car turning left with the bit of text on the screen, his road positioning was crap as was their awareness but you could clearly see it indicating to turn a long way before the junction and rather than hanging back whilst the turn was made you ride up to the back of him. 

 Martin W 24 Nov 2019
In reply to wilkesley:

> I had three SJCam SJ8 from Amazon. Great cameras, but all failed within a week of getting them.

SJCam suffer a lot from fakes - for some reason, even more so than GoPro.  You have to be very careful that you're getting a genuine one - and, sadly, buying through Amazon is no guarantee that the one you get is genuine (ask me how I know).  There's a page on their web site about verifying the authenticity of an SJCam camera https://sjcam.com/security-check/ but that's bit late in the day if you've already spent the money.  Things to look out for include that the "A" in a circle should always be white in a red circle - a number of the fakers seem to try to get away with using a black circle.  Basically, if it's not in genuine-looking SJCam packaging when you receive it then be very, very suspicious.

Not saying that that's exactly what happened to you, but I'd say it's a risk that people need to be aware of when looking to buy an SJCam camera.

 RankAmateur 25 Nov 2019
In reply to Martin W:

I bought an SJCAM last week. No reason to not think it was authentic, but it's default language was set to Polish.

Had to use Google Translate on my phone to work out the settings menu to change it to English.

 Timmd 25 Nov 2019
In reply to Dax H: I think I've definitely learnt how much I'm 'a small fish' while cycling, and leave room for people to make mistakes and to be unaware in, I try to let things flow around me where I can and it's the right thing to do. It doesn't always do to engage in situations where one is technically in the right but aggro may ensue, if the alternative can be pausing and letting things pass. I don't live in London thankfully though.

Post edited at 13:53
 wilkesley 25 Nov 2019
In reply to Martin W:

Interesting. Nothing in the packaging suggested it wasn't genuine. I emailed SJ Cam with a report of the fault (front display failed in all three cameras) and they just told me to return it.

 Timmd 25 Nov 2019
In reply to nniff:

> veho muvi K2 works well enough for me and the battery life is just long enough to capture my whole commute - a bit over two hours in total. Only PITA is that it is mounted upside down on my bike and it resets the 'inverted' setting if the battery goes flat.  

I reckon you might benefit from cycling down the middle of the road a bit more, when you're cycling 'at speed',  you seem to speed along in the part of the road that's more hectic. I'm sure there's flaws in my own cycle commuting, but that's what strikes me. It could help save you from being side swiped by somebody suddenly deciding to turn left in front of you and not quite seeing you, like which has (almost) happened to me, I seem to err more towards the middle than I used to do. 

Stay safe, wherever you cycle.

Post edited at 17:34
 nniff 25 Nov 2019
In reply to angry pirate:

Thanks for a constructive comment.  I don't typically reply to comments on videos like this - they go onto road.cc and representatives of every school of thought climb out and voice an opinion, many of which seem to relate to an entirely different video..

The trouble is that you see a snapshot of a lot of miles, with a cue that something is going to happen imminently.  A bus and a bike braking together look as though nothing is happening.  A car braking hard looks like the bike is surging into it without taking any action etc.

I think that that particular compilation covered about 700 miles over a bit less than a month.  What you can't see is the context - what's behind etc, nor can you see the thousands of miles and hundreds of repetitions (>7,000 miles and >200 repetitions each way every year).

So, for example, I rarely cycle in the blue stripe going south though Tooting, except when there's a line of cars and my positioning then will vary according to the road and car layout.  

Clapham Common northbound - never on the blue stripe, always in either the middle of the left hand lane, or middle of right hand lane, and travelling at about car speed.   Going slower is a lot worse.  

However, everything is always under review and what was good yesterday isn't today or tomorrow.


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