In February, I was returning from an amazing family holiday to the Caribbean. It was amazing up until the point of my British Airways flight being wildly delayed. Without going into the logistics of where and how I was delayed, lets just say I was stuck at London Gatwick for over 8 hours.
If you’ve ever seen the Tom Hanks movie “The Terminal”, you’ll know that airport departure lounges are good for one thing and one thing only: shopping. As may already be evident from previous posts on this site, I enjoy my gadgets and tech. So, when I finally got tired of reading that month’s copy of WIRED and Digital Camera magazines, I took a little wander along to Dixons. I was primarily interested in the DSLR kit they had, but right at the entrance they had a huge display of GoPro kit and accessories. I still had a few hundred East Caribbean Dollars still sitting in my wallet, and they were just bursting to get out. We both knew what was going to happen next.
I had a look at the selection of GoPros on display and decided to go for the HERO. Now, the HERO is an entry-level model, but for less than £100, I was willing to give it a punt. Unlike other models, the HERO is firmly fixed into its housing and cannot be removed. That’s OK for me though – it’s nice and sturdy, and when I give it to my 3-year-old, she just isn’t able to smash it into its component parts. The only removable or changeable parts are the mount point on the bottom of the camera (for attaching to helmets, straps and other stuff) and the rear panel.
The HERO comes with two different rear panels. One with cutouts which allow easy access to the USB and SD card slots, and another panel with no cutouts which creates a waterproof seal allowing you to use the camera in water up to 131 feet. Both will allow the in-built microphone to pick up sounds, but the one with cutouts allows for better quality sound.
In terms of video, it will shoot 1080p at 30fps and 720p at 60fps, making awesome slo-mo sequences possible with ease. It will also take still photos at 5MP, which is decent enough if you’re looking to take pictures in a wet environment where you’d be nervous about taking a DSLR or smartphone.
I’m just sorry I didn’t see one on my outbound journey. I could have captured so many amazing moments at the beach with my young family. At home though, I’m not really sure what I’m going to use it for. I don’t surf, I don’t have a dog to attach it to, and I’m not really that into drag-racing my 2004 Honda Civic in the middle of the town centre. That’s just me though. You might be different.
Me? Oh, yeah. I watered my plants.
