So I got a sweet lil' helmet cam off of SteepandCheap.com a while back -- something like half-off of last year's model. I've used it on several outings up high to document our time in the mountains and I don't have too many complaints, other than the "phish"-eye is a lil' wacky, the contrast in low light is less than desirable, and so on. Most importantly, however, the lil' internal mic, which is fed the audio of its surrounding world via small pin hole, really really stinks. Even with the smallest wind gust resonating across that pin hole, the audio of whatever you're filming sounds like it's being drug unconscious through a concrete hallway of metal shards, jacks, glass, and other brittle materials. Not good.
To remedy this, I went digging online. Turns out, I'm not the only one who thought so kindly of this included audio enhancement / effect. Now there are tons of good tutorials out there on how to take the internal mic, solder a few ends a wire to it and extend it out of the camera, or damp the mic with foam, etc. What I really wanted was something that incorporated a clean interface to allow an additional mic source to be fed in. After an even deeper search, I happened upon this brilliant fella's mod that incorporated a standard headphone jack into the camera circuitry. What's especially convenient is that this mod only adds to the functionality of the camera itself, keeping the original internal mic intact, just in case you forget the external mic or you want to just default to the original operation.
Here are some pics from my mod. It's been a long 8 years since my last use of a soldering iron in Electrical Networks at the university, so it was good to be back with that cancer-causing stick in my hand, burning away pleasant smelling airborne metal fragments. No worries, I was not in the state of California at the time of use, so I should be okay, health-wise.
Oh Noooo! Halp. It's broken :-(
This is the key: adding one of those crafty bypassing headphone jacks into the mix. Pretty fresh, son. It barely fits in there with all the circuit board components.
Shaving the "outer" hole to fit the metal ring took the most time. Take your time and make it look good.
There's the internal mic still intact. Last move is to solder the ground connection from the jack to the mic's ground.
Here's an old mic I rigged into a pen cap.
And complete. Look at that clean interface, eh?
Finished product with external mic attached and ready.
Testing, testing, testing...
In order to figure out how to get the camera apart safely without damaging the circuit-board, look online first. There are a ton of websites that have already covered this with tutorials. Kudos to these fellas who took the time to document this:
e.g. Tips on modding the ContourHD
e.g. My Mic Tutorial on the Contour HD
ONE MORE THING... Do I even need to disclaimer this? I don't trust our legal system these days, so... If you follow what I did, realize that you will VOID any warranty on this camera. If you can't do this "sort of advanced but still simple" mod, don't even attempt it, just live with crappy audio in your videos -- it's not too bad on non-windy days, right? If you mess up, that's really unfortunate.
EDIT 5-May-2012: Took down outdated link to ContourHD disassembling instructions; added links to youtube videos of the same process.
Sigh... I feel borderline obsessed right now. For the past three days, I have feverishly been logging into REI.com to check the status of my latest shipment -- another piece to the ever-humongous mountaineering gear puzzle.
The latest piece, you ask? This time 'round, I finally pulled the trigger on trying a new warmer boot, now with full crampon compatibility! Behold, the Scarpa Mont Blanc:
Fully Gortex insulated and waterproof, with an treated suede outer. Both heel and toe bails for step-in crampons and thick, meaty vibram soles that absorb a ton of shock. Suitable for vertical pitch ice climbing by some accounts and more than suitable for my glacier ascent up Ingrahm Glacier and Dissapointment Cleaver.
I have been devoting the past month to sizing as many different boots as I can find. I feel bad for even devoting some of our recent San Diego vacation to checking out the local REI's. I love my girlfriend! And especially her very supportive encouragement :-). I think I was able to best size up my foot per the European metrics with all my prior fittings, so I finally opted to order online. As much as I would like to support the smaller chains in AZ that get a decent cut off these boots, I settled with REI in order to best ensure alternative strategies in case they don't work out... and also to get a cut of the end-of-the-year dividend. It's not much, but it helps! ;-). Now, onto finding some wicked step-in crampons! Too bad I just purchased some strap-on Grievel crampons last month -- I assumed I would be using my backpacking boots on my winter routes up Humphreys this upcoming season. Oh well... two pairs means I can hopefully rope in someone else to join me! Speaking of Humphreys, I'll have to post the snaps from my first trip up Arizona's high point in the snow this past spring (in fact, the current background image is my shot of my buddy ascending the Dutchman Glade with me). What a slow slog; but the glissading down the side of the peak was worth it!
Alright, time to go check my tracking status to see if anything has moved... Cheers!
