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Looking to film your latest epic? Consider the Drift HD Point-of-View Camera for your filming needs, especially if you’ve got some mad filming skills and are looking for a camera that can keep up with them.
Drift HD Point-of-View Camera Details
- Maximum video resolution: 1080p High Definition
- Capable of taking still photos
- 4x digital zoom
- 170° Fully Rotatable Wide Angle Lens
- LCD Display Screen
- Water Resistant
- Camera includes flat surface mount, rounded surface mount, goggle mount, handlebar mount, remote and camera
- MSRP: $369.00
Drift HD Point-of-View Camera Review
Never having owned a Point-of-View camera before (or a video camera, for that matter), I was super stoked to take the Drift out backcountry skiing with me to chronicle some of the amazing terrain I have the opportunity to be skiing right now. After about a month of use, I have what is far from epic footage and a healthy respect for people who can make their own helmet cam videos look remotely cool. While the Drift is relatively easy to operate, capturing that perfect segment of shredding from an angle that makes it look rad as opposed to flat and boring is not nearly so simple. I’m definitely still working on that! However, since I’m reviewing the Drift and not my own personal cinematography skills, lets get to that.
Overall, the Drift has some amazing features. The 170 degree lens allows you to really get the scope of the terrain you’re in or on. The remote allows for easy on and off of the camera, and saves you battery life and editing time later on. The Drift is also the only POV camera that comes with an LCD screen, which I love! You can see what you’re filming, ensure that the camera is in fact on and ready to go, and you can also navigate the menu from looking at that LCD screen. The menu allows you to edit the camera settings, the settings of the video itself (1080p or 720p, adjust frames per second, etc), and the settings of the still photo mode (frame rate).
While I like (ok, LOVE) the remote, and like the LCD display, I honestly didn’t use too many of the other features. I’d toss the camera on my goggles at the top of the climb, press the button to turn it on, and then use the remote to start recording. Overall, that’s about what I wanted out a point of view camera- just point and shoot. I’m hoping to continue to learn about the features and utilize them more, but at this point, they just weren’t something I needed.
Drift seems to have gone above and beyond in their selection of features for the Drift HD. The remote (yup, we’re talking about that again) not only allows you to start and stop video without banging at your head, but it provides a “beep” noise when the button has been pushed to let you know that you’ve started/stopped filming. The lens itself is replaceable, so if you accidentally scratch it, your whole camera isn’t trashed. The rotating lens allows for mounting on the side of a helmet or the top of a helmet while still filming the same thing. The Drift HD comes with a low-light/night filming mode, which is awesome up here when the sun doesn’t come up til 10:30am. Along with an integrated microphone, the Drift HD comes with the capability of hooking up an external mic, so you could get clear, crisp narration if you wanted. All of these smaller features really indicate that Drift has put a lot of thought into the Drift HD.
The Good
- The remote is awesome! I love that there is no fiddling around with your head when you want to start filming, and the auditory feedback beep that confirms it has started is also pretty awesome.
- Rubberized exterior makes it easy to grab a hold of, gloves on or not.
- The Drift comes with several mounts when you purchase the camera. Add up how much they’d cost you to buy independently and it’s around $75 bucks… When you factor that into the total Drift price, which originally seems significantly steeper than your average POV camera, it brings the overall cost down quite a bit.
- The Drift HD, Drift’s newest model, is smaller and more aerodynamic than previous Drifts. So if you’ve looked at one before but thought it was too clunky, check out the Drift HD. It’s shorter, skinnier and weighs just 4.86 oz. Unless my research is wrong, that makes the Drift one of the lighter cameras on the market.
The Bad
- If you’re not super camera savvy, a lot of the features are not super important to you. For example, the difference between 720, 1080, etc, doesn’t mean a lot to your average Joe. While I understand that this is what makes the Drift an incredibly versatile camera, you might be paying for features you’re not going to use.
- The “quick guide” that the Drift comes with doesn’t provide a ton of information. To learn more about features of the camera and how to use them, I had to go to the Drift website and search for the information there. I was surprised there wasn’t a more detailed manual included with the camera.
;)
