Help me build a cheap in-car camera system
 

I know there have been a lot of threads on the subject of in-car cameras. Trouble is I'm cheap. The home-made video camera mount I use just does not do justice to the experience. The essence of speed is not there on the film. My latest filming had the car hitting 120mph and looking like 40mph on film.
Folks this simply will not do.

So - can you cobble together a cheap VCR with an AC adapter hooked to a lipstic camera or two?
How can I capture the essence of speed?
How can I show the speedo / tach / road as seen by the driver?
Can the cops use this against me in court?
(skip that last one, just thinking out loud).

Mount the camera reallly low to the road and repeat the process (120MPH) through chinatown or a busy fruit market.

To get a good perception of speed, you need a wider angle lens--at least 100°. Get a lipstick camera. www.supercircuits.com has them for <$200. I use this one with this lens. Use the camcorder in VCR mode to record. While you're at Supercircuits, get a couple of their PA3 line-level microphones and stick 'em in the engine compartment. In VCR mode, a camcorder is looking for line level audio, so you need the special microphones.

Here's a vid cap:
http://www.rallystuff.com/images/vidcap6.jpg

Very funny! Don't forget to have two guys carrying a large sheet of glass right before you arrive. Rarly, The prior post was correct in that the lower the camera, the higher the sense of speed. I've seen lipstick cameras mounted to bumpers that are impressive. T

Sounds Like “Get Away in Huntsville” staring Brian B will soon be available to download LOL :D

Nice looking 78 bro…
;)

Camera shake makes everything look faster. :D
-Chris

Thanks for the info. I took a look at all those items and may visit the "spy" store down the street and see what they have.

"Get Away In Huntsville" should be on the black market shortly........

i use a tri-pod in the back seat area and a panoramic mirror mounted on my stock mirror. the tri-pod has two of the legs behind each seat (wedged), and then the third (adjusted much shorter) between the two rear seats. the rears actually "pinch" the third leg and hold the whole unit pretty stable. dont pinch just any third leg thought...

my point was with all this is that the pano mirror really is cool. the rear view give a much better concept of speed plus, you can see cars behind you on the footage. i got some great tape of a drive a couple weeks ago, chasing a gt3, with michigan matt from the board chasing me. the removable pano mirror is available @ IO Port racing for about $25 with shipping.

this set up is not track worthy for obvious

i too wondered about the man taking a copy if pulled over?? what if the first 90 seconds of the tape was me and my sweety gettin all jiggy wid it?

A really nice postion is outside and right behind the front wheel. Cutting to that shot is always very exhilerating. Perhaps a temporary suction cup mount would work.

Never thought of the wide view mirror, nice idea.
My home-made mount consists of a muffler clamp bolted through a piece of aluminum machined to hold my camcorder (on the harness bar). With the view screen turned around I can see what the camera is seeing by looking in my rear view mirror.

Fender mount and engine sound would be a definite plus.

What I'd like to do is get the tach, speedo, and boost gage in on the action as well. The boost gage is mounted in the stock clock spot.
Will the wide angle lens capture the gages as well?

What type VCR is needed for all this stuff to plug into while in the car? Will any old unit work by adding a 12V converter?

Every time I drive a car with the wide view mirror, I feel like it messes up my (backwards) depth perception. It's not a good feeling, especially on a track. Either a regular mirror or a "Wink" works great for me.