Comments on: Oregon Scientific ATC2K (ATC-2000) Helmet Camera

By: bruce11

bruce11 — Sun, 04 May 2008 06:02:02 +0000

After reading all of the posts here I recently put my cam into service. My primary use is for auto racing but I am trying to find any reason at all just to use it to test it out.
As far as racing the cam did not seem to have a stability problem unless I ran into a fixed object. The mic seemed to be picking up anything that was necessary however my biggest concern is trying to be sure the cam is in operation while I am driving. I don’t know if it is me or if it is the cam but the buttons seem to be difficult to operate while driving at 170 mph. Is there any type of remote setup that anyone is using to ensure the cam is in operation without having to completely remove it to stare at the screen?

By: mgb76

mgb76 — Sun, 20 Apr 2008 07:30:50 +0000

I haven’t had battery problems like some have mentioned – mine is the oft commented on microphone issues. I was going to pull the thing to p[ieces to wire in an external microphone connector unless anyone had any other suggestions.

To give you some idea, this is the vision and NOISE from attaching the camera to my car last weekend.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TBIQ2LbgTcE

I know it is noisy in my car (without a helmet) but these noises are ridiculous – a mixture of engine/exhaust noises (which are desirable), wind and vibration noise (which aren’t).

I have mounted the little camera on the diagonal of my rollbar.

By: wallhalla

wallhalla — Sun, 30 Mar 2008 18:23:05 +0000

Hi,

1.) a short reply to my text above:
mine does not work connected to a PC via USB and I already got a repleacement, whic has the same issue. But using the SD card works fine, so I just plug the SD card into my PC.

2.) overall the ATC 2k is pretty cool and very easy to handle – I used it for windsurfing – water and foolproof

3.) the only thing which is not so great is the narrow angle of the cam. For a helmet camera I would prefer a much wider angle. In addition I would assume that with a wider angle the camera is much less shake sensitiv.
Has anyone tried to play with the lense or use a extra fisheye lens to improve this here? There are some small extra lenses on the market for digital cameras which you just put on top of the camera.
Could something like this work? How would such a lens be best attached? And how does the camera stay waterproof? I looks to me, that the top of the ATC ist just rubber, so it should be possible to cut it off to attach an extra, isn’t it?
Or is it possible to exchange a lens in the ATC to get a wider angle?

Thanks and regards

By: wallhalla

wallhalla — Tue, 25 Mar 2008 10:07:58 +0000

Hi,

2.) overall the ATC 2k is pretty cool and very easy to handle – I used it for windsurfing – water and foolproof

3.) the only thing which is not so great is the narrow angle of the cam. For a helmet camera I would prefer a much wider angle. In addition I would assume that with a wider angle the camera is much less shake sensitiv.
Has anyone tried to play with the lense or use a extra fisheye lens like http://www.pearl.de/a-PE5820-1123.shtml to improve this here?
Could something like this work? How would such a lens be best attached? And how does the camera stay waterproof? Or is it possible to exchange a lens in the ATC to get a wider angle?

By: 5telios

5telios — Tue, 04 Mar 2008 18:21:10 +0000

It’s a German catalogue. The 3K seems to take larger SD cards than the 2K and is waterproof to deeper. The 5K looks good. There don’t seem to be prices on any of this, though… The screen on the back of the 5K is going to be battery hungry, though.

By: jerms

jerms — Tue, 12 Feb 2008 05:17:51 +0000

Anyone get the feeling that Oregon Scientific is about to come out with a new version? They have had their cams on sale for a while now (reducing inventory?) and I found their Denmark catalog interesting, check out the ATC3K (doesn’t appear to differ from the ATC2K), and the ATC5K…(link to PDF catalog)…
http://www.oregonscientific.de/files/catalogues/ELP-Katalog%202008.pdf

By: umbrellaman77

umbrellaman77 — Sat, 09 Feb 2008 14:00:32 +0000

oh yeah-it cost me 2 bucks and an hour of creativity

By: umbrellaman77

umbrellaman77 — Sat, 09 Feb 2008 13:58:06 +0000

Glad I found out about the battery issue. Was using standards and getting about 3 min..Didn’t think lith would make that much difference but will try. So here’s the nuts and bolts off how I conquered sucky mounting issue. I am a kayaker. Friend lost his cam on a simple roll in flatwater. I secured mine better but nearly lost it on Class ! float. Went to the store and bought a 3′x1″ lashing strap,marked the two outside slots of the helmet mount that came with cam. I cut holes in my helmet to let the lashing strap pull through. Folded the rubber that came with cam over double and tucked it under camera mount as they say to.I wove the strap through vent holes in helmet as it went around. I then wrapped the velcro that ceme with cam perpendicular through vent holes and made sure it went around both sides of mount one time to prevent wobble. Also made sure loose end of first strap was tucked around itself and wrapped with second velcro strap.Then I had some doudle sided velcro, so I wrapped it tie-wrap style around second strap(The whole idea was to keep the velcro from coming undone on second strap as it isn’y much holding power on it’s own
-they should’ve known that). So basically One strap would have to come undone to let the other one go, and so on. With the weave on the straps and a rigged up lanyard on the camera to catch it if it gets knocked off, I think I have a good settup. Camera doesn’t move around at all.I have consistent mount and can just put marks on camera for alignment and keep consistent settup. In my boat the wobble doesn’t seem to be much of an issue. Will get some shots up when batteries last long enough to get footage……

By: 160R

160R — Mon, 28 Jan 2008 01:56:10 +0000

Hi,

Received a helmet camera from ebay.com to Spain, but the video looks very choppy, and I’m recording to 30fps Tried to lower the resolution and it looks a bit more smooth, but not so much…

There is something wrong with the one I received? Or did this happens to someone else? Do I need to purchase an high speed SD card? Which one would you recommend?

Tried my ATC-2K with 512MB Kingston, 2GB MicroSD Sandisk, and 1GB SD Sandisk SD cards. All have the same problem. Of course, formated them in FAT16 before testing. Any help is appreciated.

Regards,
Igor

By: caman

caman — Thu, 17 Jan 2008 07:30:58 +0000

Anyone want to sell/donate their handlebar mount if they’re not using it?