Had some of these pocket camera mounts made up and was wondering if it would be worth it to have them made in numbers for marketing?
Need input from active shooters on whether they would use something like this for training, or…just for funzies while shooting with friends. They are reversible (for left handed shooters) and can be mounted on the bottom of a quad rail system if you desire a lower profile. You can even mount 2 cameras side by side, and back to back for making video of your training exercises.
They are machined from billet 6061 T6 aluminum and clamp onto the rail like many other rail mounted accessories.
I look forward to your input, thank you in advance.
That looks very interesting. I am guessing you could rotate the camera and lock it down in any position? I like the idea of mounting it on the 6 o’clock rail for a lower profile…could you post some pictures of that? This just uses the standard “tripod” mounting threads, right? Almost all cameras have that…cool beans.
If this were marketed, what are you thinking for a price?
I gave one to a friend to wring it out, I’ll see if he can take pics of his at 6 o’clock, I don’t have a rail mounted that low and that far back on my hand guard. Sorry, can’t help you there.
Threads are the standard 1/4x20 threads you get on tripods so it will fit any camera…you can even mount a spotting scope if you wanted to.
[ul]
[li]The StrikeMark has to be slid onto the rail. It can’t be loosened, slipped on, then clamped. It’s prevented from sliding back and forth on the rail by a less-than-robust set screw which loosens pretty easily.
[/li][li]The StrikeMark is a thinner and lighter cantilever. The problem with that is that recoil from the rifle sets up a thrumming sound resonating in the mount that is easily picked up by a video camera’s microphone. (see YouTube video below)
[/li][/ul]
Funny you should mention Strikemark. I tried to get them to let me sell their mount but they snubbed me, so I went out and designed a better ‘mousetrap’.
So far I’m thinking of calling it: “The TALON” because of the way it clamps on, but haven’t locked in on it completely.
I did shoot a test video but it has information I can’t post here, it too has a noise that I thought was coming from the metal canopy I was shooting close to during my initial testing at the range I was at. I’ll have to go out again soon and try to determine if it’s the mount or the canopy that was making the noise. Either way it wasn’t much of a big deal to me, but some could find it annoying. I’ll do my next test away from anything like that to see if it’s a rifle ‘twang’ or if it was the canopy that was twanging due to the concussion.
As far as the camera holding up my little Nikon didn’t have any issues and it still works, there is some ‘shock’ that transfers but it’s not enough to do any damage to the camera.
I’ll post the video here when it’s done.
Thanks again to everyone that has taken time to give their input, it’s a huge help to me in making a decision to go ‘hot’ into production…or not. I’ll know more in about a week…after my test unit is sent through the wringer.
In my case, I was shooting out in the open, so I conclude that the twang must be coming from the cantilever mount. Everything else mounted on the rifle was locked down pretty tight.
Below is another video shooting under a non-metal canopy. The first clip is the GoPro/StrikeMark cantilever mounted on my SBR. The other clip is the GoPro mounted on a tripod right next to a 16 inch rifle.
Your video was making a different sound than mine was making. You can kinda hear the more metallic twang in this video, as the metal canopy was just behind me and slightly to my left: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6yhk0CDbsLo
The weight is: 5.5 oz ready to mount, 13.5 with the Nikon Coolpix P5100.
The reason a fighter pilot can hear the boom when transitioning from subsonic to supersonic is because it resonates through the metal. Try mounting a piece of adhesive backed rubber between the mount and the camera to reduce the effect.
I haven’t purchased the Strikemark mount specifically because of the design flaws that your mount addresses. I’d pay your price in a heartbeat for that reason.
Your mount looks very sound OP, and seems to be well thought out.
A behind the optic camera mount is my “Eleanor” however. Maybe next up you should try to tackle a mount like that. I know lots, and lots of people who would pay for that type of camera mount.
Smart man…especially since you didn’t have to find this out like myself through trial and error.
You nailed it with the rubber pad b/t mount a camera bottom. All my various redneck’d mounts have had this feature which makes audio perfectly clear.
Recent mount…used a thicker, yet softer foam padding rather than hard rubber like I used in the past.
This somewhat reminds me of the gun cam development in the late 90’s by Tactical Electronics. They were frequent customers in the local cop shop I worked in at the time. They’d bring in their samples and we’d play with them. Of course theirs were designed with a remote helmet mounted monitor so you could look and shoot around corners without exposing yourself.
Come to think of it, if you could mount the HD camcorder on it’s side with the view screen flipped up, you could rotate the screen left and right to shoot around corners as well!
THANK YOU gentlemen!! It’s great feedback and it’s so nice to get it from this crowd of experienced shooters…and camera buffs.
The ‘rubber pad’ idea is something I will look into. With a few in the hands of other shooters I should be getting some feedback soon on how it’s working for them. I still have to get out to see just how much of the ‘twang’ came from the mount/rifle combo and how much was generated by the metal canopy that was just behind me at the range i was testing at…that will be a deciding factor in where I take this mount.
I also like the idea of getting the camera behind the optic, looks like I have another project to work on to see if I can find a way of making one in an affordable price range. Pricing was a big concern of mine when I decided to improve on the other guys mount, especially since my mount would be competing against it in the marketplace, and I knew mine would be more expensive to make than theirs is.
I would probably look at building a mount that would hold something like this. HD POV camera. I believe this will slide into a mount that would hold a surefire, or a set of 1 inch scope rings.
The whole point of designing a camera mount was so that people would NOT have to go out and buy another camera…and to build a better mount than other similar ones I’ve seen. Since most people have a small pocket camera my mount would give them something to use that would be easy on their budget…yet still provide a solid, hassle-free, base for their camera.
I’m sure people with deeper pockets would like your suggestion, but that’s not the market I want to compete in, it has plenty of players already with companies like Go-Pro and the like.
