Latest GoPro has an edge over Contour when it comes to watersports

WE think of GoPros and rival Contours as action cams but GoPros in particular are finding other uses.

WE think of GoPros and rival Contours as action cams but GoPros in particular are finding other uses. They are being attached to drones for aerial photography and used in groups for creating new immersive virtual reality movies.

Both firms have released new models. GoPro’s line-up includes its new premium Hero4 Black while Contour is selling its Roam3.

Who better to test them than our in-house extreme sports enthusiast at The Australian, Sam Rochaix. He has been using these cameras for eight years and knows them inside out. He took the new GoPro surfing and body boarding (the GoPro had suitable attachments for these) and both cameras motorbiking.

Each scenario required a different approach. When surfing, he used a mouth mount gripped as you would a snorkel. The Hero4 Black is 14g heavier than last year’s Hero3+ Black, but he says this wasn’t an issue.

When body boarding, he used both a board-based mount for a selfie angle and mouth mount for perspective shots.

He used handlebar mounts for motorbiking.

The Hero4 Black adds 4K recording at up to 30 fps; previous GoPros with 4K shot at just 15 fps, below a smooth action threshold. HD recording has been extended to 120 fps for enhanced slow motion capability.

The GoPro can now record 1080p video at a higher 60 megabits per second bitrate — which means improved quality, and this year’s models offer Bluetooth as well as WiFi connectivity for remote camera operation.

He found a vast improvement in automatic low-light optimis­ation when used in sun to shadow situations and smooth video when shooting at 30 fps in 4K. Shooting at 1080p, 120 fps resulted in exceptional slow motion playback with GoPro’s editing software.

But 4K playback might test your computer’s hardware and software, and if you don’t have a 4K monitor you won’t enjoy its full benefit. On a MacBook Pro, he found that Quicktime could easily play GoPro 4K vision while iMovie and Aperture had troubles.

There are also two shooting modes available in a single image and a burst of 30 images. Users can set the new GoPro to take interval shots for time-lapse shooting for as long as the battery lasts.

Still photography includes long exposures, and a night lapse feature for those who love a streaking headlight or shooting star.

He says GoPro’s underwater housing made audio sound a little tinny. On land, various housing options allowed for different levels of microphone exposure.

One issue was GoPro’s decision to change the battery size and shape, which may annoy those with a supply of spare batteries from previous models.

The Hero4 has a context sensitive mode button in place of the GoPro 3’s WiFi button which in practice took getting used to. It displays settings options relevant to your shooting mode. Sam found the other action camera, the Contour Roam3, “a fantastic entry level action camera”.

Although it didn’t offer the level of flexibility of the GoPro, it was robust and simple to use.

It came out of the box waterproof to 10m without an extra housing and had an in-built standard tripod mount. The Contour delivered good picture quality at 1080p high definition and colour reproduction and frame rate smoothness were respectable, Sam says.

One of the drawbacks was the relatively limited range of mounting solutions available for Contour. The helmet mounting seemed better than GoPro’s — the cylinder shape of the contour suited side-of-head mounting better.

He says the Contour is suitable for biking, helmet/head mounting and motorsports, but for watersports the GoPro is superior to the Contour.

GoPro Hero4 Black Edition
Rating: 8.5/10
Price: $679

Contour Roam3
Rating: 7/10
Price: $299.95

Sam Rochaix tested the new GoPro Hero4 Black Edition for The Australian. The image was extracted from a 4K video taken with the camera.