Tachyon XC Action Camera Review !

Tachyon xc vs ATC cameras

I havent purchased either yet but.....here goes.

What is swaying me is;

The Tachyon comes with a tripod screw mount on the base thsi will come in usefull although not on a bike helmet.

The water proof door on the rear clamps shut with a cam and looks a LOT more durable and long lasting than the ATC cameras fixing bits.

The 32GB card capacity is good ... on the ATC cameras thats a liniting factor in that lower capacities only are possible.

I concur the ONLY downside for me is that the remotes arent waterproof and on the Tachyon remotes only work from the front.

As I also want to mount it not just on my VFR but on the front of a 16 ft sea kayak i would need long arms to operate it !

Tachyon comes with more kit AND takes my standard connextor USB lead that I have for all other digi cam bits - so no lead to lose forget leave behind ....


The ATC has a built in LCD screen ... useful for set up I hope you can turn this off because it will eat battery life.

The you tube videos also appear crisper - I think the Tachyon gets it.

I will review and report back !

Trinc
 
Tachyon XC 2010, 3D and the new MICRO XC

Hi All

now that we have subscribed (sorry!) we can now inform you all of the NEW Tachyon 2010 XC MICRO

FULL details will be posted to our website www.thepictureexchange.co.uk/tachyon very shortly.

In short, 2 x AAA batteries, Micro SDHC cards, smaller and lighter than an i-phone, same build quality, water proof, shock proof, action cam as before......


£99 inc delivery for the camera, cards and batteries available!!!!!

contact us for more info...

Mike
 
am i going blind

Mr picture exchange...., wheres the link for the £99 camera? cant find it.
"£99 inc delivery for the camera, cards and batteries available!!!!!"
atb Paul
 
slightly.......

riginally Posted by picture exchange
Hi All


FULL details will be posted to our website www.thepictureexchange.co.uk/tachyon very shortly.

we are just programming the new micro into the site.....we only had the press release end of play friday!!!

hense the "coming shortly" and "will be posted"


full details will follow very soon....will post to here as soon as we've done it....cheers for your patience!

as for tech specs and quality....

it is the same as the full 2010 XC

AVI @ 30 fps motion JPEG 640*480 8GB card stores 2 hours at superior quality

hope that helps a little.....

Mike
 
There must be some safety issues attaching a camera to your helmet?
as for saftey issues....only if you hit something with your head!!!!
like i did when i went base over apex and the handle bars...
however the cam was fine and didn't drop a frame!!!!

happy days
 
640x480 is the highest it'll go? the Vholdr would strike me as a better option it shoots 1280x720 and is just a bit more around £300 I think. It's also 16x9 not 4x3.... or the flip camera which is cheaper at about 200 and shoots 1280x720 HD.

it depends what you want to do with the footage if your burning a DVD the minimum resolution you need is 720x576. Even youtube is going HD, why when your considering spending a load of Nelson's not go that bit further....

2 hours of 640x480 below DVD quality or with the other camera I think it's 1 hour of HD quality for an extra 75 nikka....:augie

or buy a bigger card and get more footage.

the cheaper camera looks water proof which i guess the Vholdr is not totally but then again how many times do you film yourself in the rain, when the lens will be compromised with in a couple of seconds and you won't see nuffing anyway....

there you go just an ill informed opinion....
 
Theres a new 2010 model with some very good improvements which Im currently testing and will do a write up this week. Its as good as mini dv camera these days and also does indoor footage plus a new 90 degree lens :thumb2
 
640x480 is the highest it'll go? the Vholdr would strike me as a better option it shoots 1280x720 and is just a bit more around £300 I think. It's also 16x9 not 4x3.... or the flip camera which is cheaper at about 200 and shoots 1280x720 HD.

it depends what you want to do with the footage if your burning a DVD the minimum resolution you need is 720x576. Even youtube is going HD, why when your considering spending a load of Nelson's not go that bit further....

2 hours of 640x480 below DVD quality or with the other camera I think it's 1 hour of HD quality for an extra 75 nikka....:augie

or buy a bigger card and get more footage.

the cheaper camera looks water proof which i guess the Vholdr is not totally but then again how many times do you film yourself in the rain, when the lens will be compromised with in a couple of seconds and you won't see nuffing anyway....

there you go just an ill informed opinion....
the vholder was going to be my camera of choice too...untill i read the reviews on their forum! build quality was reported as not good....water/dirt ingression was a big factor...the start/stop button failed and caused premature stopping of recordings.....hence we as a company started the process of reselling the Tachyon's..

as for quality. thanks to the high quality of the compression codec, the slightly smaller frame size is balanced out....

for youtube HD you can just crop and export to 1280x720 or even 1920x1080!!! with very good results....underwater is amazing....

don't shoot me for the quality/speed of the ride but here is some youtube hd from the tachyon xc 2010 at whites levels in afan......
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Go4LATLKGK4

clear as mud?

if any one does want more info mail us ay
[email protected]

and as promised....micro details to follow.....

ALSO for november we are tracking the price drop from Tachyon Inc....so buy now!!!!!

hugs
 
not an accurate test it's been editted on an Avid media composer....:augie

your average punter won't have one of them sitting on the desk... the software is a fag paper less that £1,200 plus VAT and a machine to run it on.

I don't want to be pissing on anyone's chips but.... as your here I might as well

if you think I'm kidding

http://store.avid.com/uk/index.cfm?page=templates/product_grp_index&categoryid=157

or are you saying that I a regular punter can buy one of these camera's and expect results like you've just shown me from a 5 year old PC running xp and editing on MSmovie maker? which is who this camera is aimed at....
 
640x480 is the highest it'll go? the Vholdr would strike me as a better option it shoots 1280x720 and is just a bit more around £300 I think. It's also 16x9 not 4x3.... or the flip camera which is cheaper at about 200 and shoots 1280x720 HD.

it depends what you want to do with the footage if your burning a DVD the minimum resolution you need is 720x576. Even youtube is going HD, why when your considering spending a load of Nelson's not go that bit further....

2 hours of 640x480 below DVD quality or with the other camera I think it's 1 hour of HD quality for an extra 75 nikka....:augie

or buy a bigger card and get more footage.

the cheaper camera looks water proof which i guess the Vholdr is not totally but then again how many times do you film yourself in the rain, when the lens will be compromised with in a couple of seconds and you won't see nuffing anyway....

there you go just an ill informed opinion....

this is all very good stuff, but i looked at the mountings and fittings and its base price is 99 nikka.
it uses widely avail aa's and sdhc cards, but all advice is greatly recoeived.
but you are right, why spoil the ship for halfpenny of tar??still looking..
 
not an accurate test it's been editted on an Avid media composer....:augie

your average punter won't have one of them sitting on the desk... the software is a fag paper less that £1,200 plus VAT and a machine to run it on.

I don't want to be pissing on anyone's chips but.... as your here I might as well

if you think I'm kidding

http://store.avid.com/uk/index.cfm?page=templates/product_grp_index&categoryid=157

or are you saying that I a regular punter can buy one of these camera's and expect results like you've just shown me from a 5 year old PC running xp and editing on MSmovie maker? which is who this camera is aimed at....
fair comment on the editing app.....but what did i do in the edit that movie maker, i-movie, premier, fcp etc can't do? cuts, dissolves (fades), basic titles, music import from cd? all competely doable in any of ther above....all i did that a joe bloggs might not, is apply my knowledge (which i give away freely) of hd frame sizes etc in the export process....otherwise i worked with the native files from the good ol tachyon xc 2010 (gotta lurve the way google ranks by repitition as well as content!).....

what i did with the edit was not made possible by Avid Media Composer (which you can also buy from us), but merely made more efficient due to the pro nature of the app....

but all said and done....always up for a bit of a debate about software...


cuddles


mike
 
media composer by it's nature allows for some very clever rescaling, it adds information in a similar way to the new version of photoshop does with it's inteligent pixle mapping.

Therefore the footage has been enhanced and the test is not accurate as the footage is no longer a native format to that camera.

it's like saying buy this box of crayons and sketch like rolf harris and in your test you've shown something that rolf harris has sketched, in reality however the crayons will be used by a child, who will not be able to sketch at all. Or your saying buy my petrol and drive like Jenson button showing jenson button winning a gand prix but the car that's being refilled is a shagged old mini.

I'm saying your test has a flaw and so is not accurate and can not be used to say how good or how bad a specific camera is.

free software such as MS movie, I movie, pinnicale. Yes of course they all have cut, fades, and disolves but they do not have the upscaling in the same way as the avid software does. And in that piece your now showing which is POV and really does not show the use of editted effects anyway that then has no bearing on the test footage.

More expensive editing software Premier Pro (CS4) or Apple's FCP (final cut pro master suite) programs which cost between £800-£3,000 there is a rescale function it's not very good.

Avid's software for this type of work is the best I've seen but the software is expensive and by it's use in the test you'll have invalidated whatever the camera is capable of. Because the footage is nolonger native to the camera, in the same way as taking a picture on your mobile phone then taking photoshop enhancing the colours, exposure, croping, framing etc. and saying you should buy this phone as the picture quality is this good..... the test is flawed.

Selling or representing a product any product in such a way is not accurate and your punters level of expectation will be set incorrectly, they will not be able to replicate the results and could I assume be unhappy with the results.

in summary a camera which has a native format 640x480 (pixels or dots of information that make the picture) and is being tested against a camera which has a native format of 1280x720 (smaller dots and therefore more of them making the picture quality better) is already flawed.

on that note it's been great....:thumb2
 
to be "fair" then....as soon as i can i will re-edit the video in movie maker to compare and contrast...... but in responce to your summary.......surely that is excatly want people want to do...test a higher res camera against a cheeper lower res to see if the extra money is worth while or if the more rubust nature/other features of the cheeper camera is enough.

sounds like you know what your on about ref software (which is nice)....this is the only forum i have posted a link to that clip in and is not used a sales tool.....but as a point of ref, all Tachyon Inc. in house videos are edited in FCP....

may the debate continue,,,,,,will do the movie maker edit asap....ish!

mike

ps where what do yo do as your post indicates you've used/seen avid properly.... drop me a PM....sounds interesting...
 


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