I'd give them the memory card, but not the camera.

Regarding the incident I described, I called police when I got home and they showed up a while later. Total time between incident and police showing up to my door was 4 hours.

However, I think that IF this should happen again, I will call the police immediately, wait on location (Gawd knows how long) and give them the memory card. Although they'll likely want the camera.

Well, that's kind of my point.

I don't believe that police officers are above lying and falsifying evidence either. If I provide video, IMO it's up to the other side to prove that it's been falsified, not just say it COULD have been falsified and therefore is inadmissible. I COULD have hired actors and rented vehicles that looked exactly like his and re-enacted the entire scene with a lookalike of him too. I COULD have been given a falsified video by space aliens. The police officer COULD be lying. You COULD be lying comatose right now with false memories being implanted into your brain electronically. But everyone has to make assumptions about what evidence they will accept to make their decisions.

Well, garsh dang. I was just typing up something very similar. Thank you.

If I do provide video, and while under oath in court, if asked if I tampered with it, then I have to respond truthfully. But yes, anyone can lie.

Note: The driver did confirm that he was the driver of the vehicle.

If the driver of the vehicle states he believes that the video COULD have been tampered with, then he has to provide proof to backup his claim. I cannot provide proof that I did NOT tamper with it. I can't prove a negative.

EDIT: This is traffic court by the way, not an episoide of CSI: Nova Scotia.

I don't know what the laws are like there, but here in the US if it's a criminal court then the burden of proof is on the prosecutor, and the goal of the defendant is to build up a doubt "beyond a reasonable doubt" in the eyes of the judge and/or jury.

If the driver is on trial for a crime, the burden of proof that any evidence against him is not tampered with is on the prosecutor, not him. (That said, it doesn't have to be proven, only shown.)

If it's a civil case, the burden of proof is a "preponderance of evidence", which basically means "which is more likely? If one seems 51% likely and the other 49%, the former is what wins". So the burden of proof for things would be on those who bring them up.

Simply saying "it could have been tampered with" without any evidence should not be very convincing, but every little bit of doubt might help, especially with a jury rather than a judge.

That said, courts have rules on the type of evidence they will accept, and certain types of evidence can be dismissed out of hand, not even allowed to be brought up. And it's entirely possible that some courts could so rule about photo or video evidence, especially when tampering by anybody but the police could have been done.

Photo and video evidence is highly convincing to a jury, but in some cases it's very easy to forge. So I can certainly see where it could be prohibited in some cases, especially minor cases where the resources to properly authenticate it won't be made available.

Nobody can prove that any evidence ever given isn't faked, any more than you can prove that Flying Spaghetti Monster didn't create Spam.

Did somebody say "Camera"?

I shot some video of a bike ride yesterday. not a commute, but the camera mount was stable, secure, and offers a great field of view, so i wanted to share it.

This is a GoPro 960 mounted on a Nitto style light mount plug mounted on an M5 bolt screwed into a fender mount at the rear dropout. The processing downgraded the image quality, it's better in the original playback.

EDIT: i changed uploads, this one can get viewed at 480p, but a far cry from the higher def raw footage i've got.



The video was very stable and if the camera was aimed with a little more angle, would easily capture license plates as they passed.

Now, i'm not too keen on taping my commutes, but if i were, i'd run a light mount at the non-drive side of the bike with one camera facing forward and one facing rear. also, one camera at the front of the bike somewhere, i'm not too happy with handlebar mount, but one on the headtube itself has promise.

Yes, very stable. Impressive. I have tried s similar mounting to my bike as well.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oEoEvj15dsc

You've inspired me to try a similar mounting style on the non-drive side.

Did you link to the correct video? The one I'm seeing is probably the worst video I've seen for years - it looks like a copy of a copy of a copy of a VHS copy, super compressed by Youtube and the max available resolution is 360P here.

No matter what your resolution though, don't bet on being able to read license plates. I've tried 6 different HD cameras now, and none of them RELIABLY catch plate numbers. the speed and distance they're passing at and the angle of the light affects this greatly. I've had some cars pass me and the plates are just clear as day, then another car passes me at about the same speed but with the sun at a slightly different angle or they're a bit farther away from me, and the plate appears as just a solid rectangular grey blur. And everything in between.

Surprisingly, the RD32II that I just got a few days ago is more consistently able to produce readable plate numbers than any of my previous cameras including the GoPro Hero3 White. Not bad for a $125 camera. I can easily see individual stones in the asphalt 15 feet down the road at 25 MPH with this camera.

I'm not concerned about license plate capture. i'll leave that up to the rest of you. I can't figure out the compression and download reduction in quality i seem to consistently get..... even with 1080p i'm not sure i get maximum image quality, but i'm a bit of a lunk head when it comes to optimizing technology.... i still use friction shifters. but in the original video, the images are higher def.

i wasn't touting the image quality, i was mentioning the stability of the camera mount on a knob off the rear dropout.

it yields stable video even on this off road trail - the "8" on the frame stays in very good focus and clarity throughout the video.

Yes, the image stability on that video was quite impressive. Can you post a photo of the setup?

i'll get some pics up later today. i wish i could figure out why, if im uploading video at 720 or higher resolutions, they get published at 320 by youtube. EDIT: i changed uploads and was able to get one to be shown at 480p, but a far cry from high def.

For those that own Contour cameras or were contemplating purchasing one, bad news. Contour has gone out of business.

Link

[h=2]Seattle camera maker Contour shuttered, apparently[/h] Posted by Brier Dudley
Seattle sports camera maker Contour apparently has closed, laying off around 60 employees.
Contour was a homegrown startup that emerged from a University of Washington business competition in 2004. Founders Marc Barros and Jason Green are avid skiers who developed helmet-mounted cameras used for capturing and sharing action-sports videos.

By 2011 the company had annual sales of $15 million and was named one of the most promising companies in the country by Forbes magazine. But it struggled to compete against category-leader GoPro and other companies such as Sony that offered similar, wearable cameras.
I’ve been hearing for several days that the company held a meeting Friday and informed employees the business was closing, but executives and investors didn’t return calls or messages seeking to confirm the situation.
“We’re all unavailable to comment on it at this time,” said Annie Johnson, who handles investor relations at Seattle venture firm Montlake Capital, which contributed to a $5 million funding round for Contour in 2010.
Contour is no longer listed among Montlake’s portfolio companies on Montlake’s website and references to Contour were removed from the page of Managing Director Dale Vogel, who had been on Contour’s board.
Barros, who stepped down as chief executive in February, confirmed the closure, saying he’s talked to a number of employees about what has happened.
“From what I can tell everybody’s out of a job,” he said.
“It’s sad to see it go. People spent a lot of time building a great company,” he said. “Watching it disappear is sad.”

Wow.