What Camera Do I Use For Vlogging

In the past couple of years I’ve regularly made videos, especially in the form of daily or weekly Vlogs. More recently I’ve been doing event based videos which I think is probably the direction I’ll take future videos.

My YouTube channel is here if you’d like to see the sort of thing I create https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCSc6vONUTFrfMFB7TiqHfRw

One thing I’ve been asked a few times now, is what equipment I use for creating these videos. People often think I’ve got some top end vlogging specific gear but that’s far from the reality. The main camera I use for my Vlogs is a GoPro Session 4. The biggest reason I use this, is because of its one big advantage over any other camera I’ve ever used; it’s size. This thing is tiny! It’s a small cube that measures around 33mm on each side. As it’s so small, you actually carry it everywhere, and can have it out of your pocket and recording in a couple of seconds. That’s a huge advantage over a bulky SLR or similar that needs to be in a bag.

Because it’s a GoPro, it also has stacks of accessories available. It fits in a small cage that then fits the 100’s of different mounts already available. I often use it on a helmet mount, bike mount, and suction mount. There are loads of these mounts for just about anything imaginable. Using these kind of mounts means you’re able to get lots of (better) footage you wouldn’t normally be able to.

It’s also waterproof (to 10m) even without a case, and just about indestructible. I say “just about” as in a couple of years, I’m now on my second one. My first one took over a year of abuse, and I do mean abuse. It travelled all over the world with me and wasn’t exactly well looked after. It even survived being attached to a drone that dropped out of the sky from about 200 feet. The GoPro survived with just some scratches to the case and was still recording when I found it! So what killed it? Unfortunately 2 tonnes of car driving over it (accidentally I might add!) was just too much for it to take :(

So what are it’s limitations? Firstly, it doesn’t have any way to zoom, so although great for either close up or landscapes, if there’s something in the distance you’d like to highlight, you can’t. It doesn’t have a viewfinder screen either but that means you get decent battery life (typically 2 hours) for something so small. You can however connect your phone to it as use that as a viewfinder, which is really handy for setting up specific shots. It’s image quality is typically fantastic (it records HD and it’s more expensive brother, the Session 5 records 4K), but it does struggle in low light.

Of all the camera equipment I’ve ever owned (which is quite a bit), the GoPro Session 4 is definitely my most used, which has got to be a good thing :)

Thanks

Richard