|
2012 Hunten C-22T70IR 56 count black flash
7d-5n MP digital camera review
There have been a bunch of folks chomping at the bit for this camera
that has been long advertized but slow coming.
It is here how and after the shipping box shreds
finally began to hit the floor I had a set of
batteries out and checked ready to play. This
camera case has that same great color that we
had on the red flash model. My first check was
in the dark room and with a new clean card and
fresh programming I waited for the camera to arm
and flash. The only indication of trigger was
the red motion indicator and the green write to
card indicator. The first trigger I did hear a
filter clunk but all other triggers there after
there was no clunk so it only changes on the
transition. I am not sensitive to black flash so
I could not see any indication of the array
going off. Some individuals how ever may be able
to see it but I would bet if they did they would
have to be very close to the camera. This camera
is about 7 inches tall and wide and sticks out
off the tree about three and a half inches.
There is a bark grabber/cable/strap assembly
that needs to be installed with the supplied 4
screws which takes about a minute. After that is
a short easy programming procedure to set
date/time and function and you are ready to go
for a test. I chose the 2MP setting and played a
while and the flash pictures were very good and
the day color was good with a little fuzz. The
color was true and clear.
Not paying much attention to the programming I went back and dug a
little deeper. Most every thing is standard
except for the burst, active, and delay modes.
Each of these has a section where the user can
determine the setting. This does not mean that
where this camera having a minimum of 15 second
delay can be changed to below that but it will
allow a range above that to be set. This is the
same on the active you can determine the hours
you want active. Burst can also be set above the
minimum. Every thing about the programming was
easy and intuitive. The color view screen is
nice and clear and works well. Once you apply
power the screen comes on and the review and
setup comes on and the plus and negative will
allow you to toggle back and fourth. If no
buttons are hit when on the review selection for
30 seconds the camera will go ahead and arm and
start taking pictures. Trigger is rated at one
third second and sensing is out to 60 feet.
Flash is rated out to 70 feet.
The still mode is selectable for 2, 3, 5, and 7 MPs, night stills are 5
MP when set to 7 MP. Video has one resolution
which is 640X480 with run times of 15, 30, 45,
60 seconds. The SD card size is up to 32 gigs
and all this operates off 4 C cell batteries.
There is an external port for solar and external
battery setup if you choose.
Now I have a few hours invested there are a couple of things that I
would work on with this camera. I am not too
wild about the bark grabber bracket because of
it making the camera stick out off the tree but
the weight distribution makes the camera want to
sag unless you do the old piece of limb trick
under the bottom. Maybe one of our forum vendors
could do a CNC trick and develop a flat plate
with small grabbers on the edge with cable and
strap loops that is tall enough to support the
camera. The other thing is the front indicators
which definitely need to be covered with a
couple of small squares of electrical tape. Even
though they are somewhat subdued I could see
them very easy in the dark room.
I did an internet sweep to see any reports on this camera and I did see
where some individuals stated they could barely
see the flash. Back to the dark room and placing
the camera up at eye level and being about a
foot from the camera I could just see a very
slight outline of the emitters. At three feet I
could not so I am going to have to still call
this camera a black flash. Like stated before
there will be some individuals that will be able
to maybe see the array at 6 feet but I would not
think they could see it any further than that.
One thing I did not mention is that the SD card slot and USB port are
just below the buttons and above the view screen
on the under edge of the rim. The SD card goes
in the slot with the label to the back of the
camera. It is a bit hard to access with big
fingers. The access latch for the drop down
assembly on this camera functions much easier
than the previously tested cameras with the same
latch.
This after noon I ran my monthly test on the time it takes to contact
customer service of each and every trail cam
company. The first hour I was able to contact
every single company except one. This company
answered on the second ring. Moultrie was very
slow but did answer in less than 10 minutes. The
one company that did not answer was Cuddeback
(non 800) and I gave up after 50 minutes when my
phone battery beeper let me know it was about to
go dead.
The documentation has been done with very good
color graphics and is very easy to follow.
Absent from the documentation was a good
specification chart which is only found on the
cardboard backer in the bubble pack the camera
came in. We would like to see this chart
incorporated in the user manual. I want to get
this little cam on the hill as soon as we can
get it through the lab process.
11-19-2011 update: Part of the lab
work showed that we can figure on about a second
of trigger time and the day range is pretty good
and a 200% zoom still showed sharp edges. The
color is good and with limited sun in the
picture they still showed very natural colors.
This little camera is beginning to impress me
and I think that if we dont get a lot of bad
field reported failures this camera should very
quickly become an item on some fellows Christmas
list (and
Scouting Assistant of course).
11-21-2011 update:
Night samples are good and day samples are good
but transition pictures are going to need some
help. During limited light situations the camera
wants to adjust the light conditions and we see
a light dark sequence in the pictures when we
are getting continuous triggers. This camera
would be much happier out from under the heavy
canopy.
11-25-2011 update:
I looks like we did finally get a bunch of new
day samples at the 7mp setting and we are now
set to video. We will back up after the video
samples and gather the other resolution setting
pictures. These day pictures came out very good.
12-03-2011 update:
We are continuing through the resolutions and in
the background we are communicating with the
company on some findings. For first out of the
door for this company this camera has functioned
pretty well. The question now is if our test
camera is actually a small part of the problem
because it is a very early unit. As the tests at
the factory continuing we will also continue the
process here. Look for some more advanced
updates that may be pending but not confirmed as
of yet. If that happens we will make the
announcement. Meanwhile we have also been
watching the market and some of the comments on
some of the outdoor forums. We see what looks
like a bit of shill activity happening which
makes us believe that maybe some of the
competition may have more than a little bit of
concern about some of the positive aspects that
are being reported. As of now we are on a
partial hold on this review until the factory
testing catches up and we can report further.
01-21-2012 update:
Engineers are aware of the issues we discovered
and have reported they are working to correct
this. This camera is completing its final
operation for battery life. When this is
concluded we will report the battery life.
this review is closed.
Trigger Tests
( without flash .98s)
( with flash 1.03s)
 |
