So... I was 5th place at the snipershide cup this weekend and took a really cool target camera system off the prize table. I had a chance to take it for a quick spin tonight after work and thought I'd give a brief range report and review. A couple caveats: first, as I just said I've only owned it for a day. Second, being a guy, I figured I'd use it a few times before reading the manual so I could be doing a lot wrong.
First thing I did was go set up the camera on my tripod out in a hay field in front of a full size IPSC spin drift auto popper (30" tall, including 6"x6" head). You're looking at the front of the camera. On/off switch and antenna on the top. That little spot on the front is the lens, which you spin to focus.
The camera unit has what I'm assuming is a rather large, heavy battery inside it and you charge it via a port on the opposite side. I've been told to expect 5 hr run time. It took about 3 hours to charge it with the supplied charger.
Next, after stomping down a lane of waist-high hay, I go set up with my normal kit: suppressed rifle, PLRF-10C range finder, kestrel weather meter, and my pack. You can see the monitor base unit is built into a storm case, which is pretty cool. It has the LCD screen and antennae in the lid. If you lift the foam piece, there is more custom cut foam underneath that holds the camera and a special longer range antenna (the wire you see) and a charger that works for both the camera and monitor unit. As you can see I'm using the rubber duck style antenna. The target is 860 yards away and the camera is maybe 12' or so in front of it. So the more convenient rubber duck antenna works pretty dang well. Note, like a lot of LCD screens, the image appears slightly faded if you aren't directly in front of it, which I generally wasn't in these pics and especially the video. In person, the image looks bright and sharp, with good colors. However, it has kind of a funky aspect ratio which I'll probably understand after reading the manual. As previously stated the head is 6x6" square (see last pic), but in the monitor, it looks wider than it is tall. But you can still see the fresh paint on the head and make out the grass in front of it very well. It definitely seems well suited to seeing impacts from a reasonably safe distance.
In the next picture you can see my view through my scope of the target and the camera in front and left of it. The scope is a USO 5-25x58 TPAL set on 25x magnification with the side focus adjusted as well as I could get it. Still a pretty difficult image looking through a combination of hay and soupy southern air.
So, after sorting out my data for a few minutes, I took a shot at the head and got a first round hit on the right side. After the target fell down and came up, I thought, "that was neat, I should get that on video." So I carefully balanced my iphone on a pile of junk in front of the monitor and hit record. Then I went and shot again, missing twice more before I realized the wind shifted slightly. So I made a slight correction and center punched it.
Finally, I took one more shot and hit top right again near my 1st impact. In this video, you can see the system blanks out for a second every once in a while. Not sure why, but it could be me as again I haven't read the manual, and being a ham radio guy, I've got a ton of rf stuff going on around my truck etc that could be causing interference.
(second video posted below as there is a 1 video limit per post)
(bonus points for anyone who can tell me what kind of bird that is in the video)
Here's a close up of the monitor. As you can see, it's pretty simple to use. On/off switch, receiver, monitor. Some buttons on the LCD screen that I assume you use if you have multiple cameras, etc. The silver port left of the on/off switch is the charging port. The four slots you see on either side of the LCD accommodate a foam sun shade (part of which you can see tucked in the the left side of bottom of the case).
Finally, I went back downrange to collect my camera and took a pic of the target. 3/5 isn't too bad!
I really want to thank targetcam for sponsoring the snipershide cup and donating their time to RO and putting this very cool system on the prize table! Summers around here are so hazy and mirage is so bad where I shoot that it is nearly impossible to make out impacts on my 1000-1100 yard steel with spotting or rifle scopes so gathering long range data is a PITA. I'm pretty sure this system will solve that.
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