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Gopro mounting device - advice please


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I have just joined the ranks of Gopro owners - Hero 3 Black. A few questions for you avid POV movie makers -

 

- what works best if you have one kind of mount, Helmet, Chest or bike eg handlebars?

- Do those stick on mounts work ie stay stuck - the tape seems bomb proof but... - I have put one on my ff to test but dont want to lose the camera

 

I am leaning towards helmet (half the price of a chest harness and less obtrusive) but I do like the behind the bars view the chest harness give...

 

Any advice would be welcome

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Mount it any way you like, just don't use the standard plastic handlebar mount.

 

It is crap,and your new toy will be bouncing down the road in no time (just like mine did)

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Chesty (but really tight!) then helmet.....bike mounts if you on the road but MTB pretty useless unless you want to mix some funk into post-editing!..eg under seat or top tube to look at rear shock....ie close ups only...distance shots from mount direct to bike result in very shaky footage....

Whatever, you gonna have fun...

Ohh and the original sticky pads are the best; your everyday garden variety Scotch double sided tape doesn't have a patch on this stuff....use the curved ones for your helmet.

Edited by capediver
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i have a chesty, helmet, bar and saddle mount and find they all have their pro's and cons, ill share my experiences below( note they are mine and not a generalisation for everybody, also i have a hero 2 hd not 3 so things may be slightly different on the later version)

  • chesty- very cool if your body position doesnt change much., i turned the clip round so the mount is on top of the camera because every angle from the bottom was too shallow and all i got was the top tube of my bike. i find the chesty is difficult to aim to get the correct view, too high and all you get is sky and too low and you get the ground and top tube only. also if you stand or change body position your vid is stuffed. the video is most stable from this mount though, i put it down to my body absorbing most of the vibrations and not transferring it to the camera.
  • helmet mount. my personal favourite and it gets the whole picture but its a very high view of the action, my head and neck seem to get most of the vibration and allows for a more stable picture i like this one because its like an apache helicopter gun, you shoot what you look at.
  • the bar/ seatpost mount is very cool, allows first hand view of the action but i find it transfers a-lot of the vibrations experienced to the video, nice video from this in my experience but quiet shaky and you only get whats directly infront of the bars/ seatpost. great most of the time but not the option i like.

as i say those are my experiences. i love my gopro but in the 2 and a bit years i have owned it i have yet to make a really cool biking video from the footage, i find the editing part really tough and can never seem to get the footage to be edited right for a post ride production.

i really love showing people what i have done and most of them (being my wife and son) accept it as a cool way to see what the hell i do with my bike but its a long way from professional and to be honest i think that's why i use it less than i should.

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Mount it any way you like, just don't use the standard plastic handlebar mount.

 

It is crap,and your new toy will be bouncing down the road in no time (just like mine did)

 

Eish...that's hectic.

 

Did the case hold up to the bouncing?

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I too was faced with the same question a few months ago when I joined the GoPro club. I ended buying a mounting/strapping pack off eBay for about R300 incl shipping. I came with a fast amount of versatile and interchangeable mounts.

 

I found that the bike mounts really only work well (as stated) for road or close up 'artistic' shots of shocked/gears etc.

 

For crisp clean wide shots of trails helmet is good, but chest is much better, I have even bailed once or twice with the chesty and the gopro was unscathed, whereas if it had been on my helmet it would have been overs.

 

You can reduce the width of the video format so that you don't get too much of your arms or bars in the shot, or even eBay a narrow angle lens that clips on to get right over the bars.

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- Do those stick on mounts work ie stay stuck - the tape seems bomb proof but... - I have put one on my ff to test but dont want to lose the camera

 

The 3M tape used is some of the strongest on the market, but it is only as good as the application of it. Be sure to wipe the surface that it is being mounted to with some alcohol and let dry before adhering and also as stated flat on flat and curved on curved.

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Eish...that's hectic.

 

Did the case hold up to the bouncing?

 

Suprisingly well, actually. It was scratched and scuffed, but not broken.

 

It was replaced under warranty, so that was no problem. Have since changed to the aluminium mount, no breakages and as a bonus, very limited vibration, which was a big problem with the plastic junk

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The 3M tape used is some of the strongest on the market, but it is only as good as the application of it. Be sure to wipe the surface that it is being mounted to with some alcohol and let dry before adhering and also as stated flat on flat and curved on curved.

 

One on my bike helmet been there for over a year now .

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Thanks guys. The stick on mounts have the super 3m tape. The problem is that neither my FF or Xc helmets are flat in the centre ie the mount has to be off to one side to be made to stick properly. Will this orientation affect the video much?

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Just sported a video on YouTube. This dude modified the mtb mount with remote controlled off road buggy shocks to cancel vibration.. post-49286-1400841877,4717.jpg

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I went with the stick on mounts. They seem very secure. For my open face helmet I attached a piece of old rear mudguard with cable ties in the top/middle of the helmet and stuck the mount onto that. Works perfectly.

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  • 1 month later...

Here's my 2cents, if you still interested and for any one else who might be interested.

I don't like the helmet mound at all. It's waaay too top heavy, makes you look like a teletubbie and the extra weight broke my helmet's rear brace while on some rough terrain.

 

My preference is the chesty. The original is pricey but if you source it from ebay you can get them really cheap. Or just make your own with the base plate that the go pro comes with. Only issue is that when you enter a MTB race you can't have the camera on your person. so....

 

If I could mount the GP on the front of the head tube I reckon that would be the best place. I'm working on a couple of custom mounts and will post sometime the results.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Where do you guys get your mounts from? Looking for bar and seat ones for road and I have a helmet one for MTB.

 

Pretty excited with new toy!

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