2010
Moultrie I-35 4 MP red flash 28 count digital camera
review
A new style box this
year wearing a fall color with a little green showing.
This is a nice camouflage color and should hide very
well provided you don’t choose to use a security
enclosure. A 28 count array if tuned right should
provide good lighting down range for those night
pictures. Security is not there so an after market
system must be used if you are in an area that requires
extra caution. This is a very good match for most
applications with the exception of the minimum delay
which is not acceptable at one minute. To get around
this you must select a multi shot (burst) which repeats
triggers at a 4 second rate. The instructions tell us
that you can also adapt this camera to their game
management system (wireless) cellular for a monthly fee.
Like most companies they have upped SD card size to 16
gig which is a big over kill for a 4 MP camera but some
folks like that feature. We are very happy that they at
least offered some cameras this year that are not in
that ill designed lunchbox configuration that caused us
all the moisture and trash problems last year. We will
not be testing any of those this year because of the
strong feed back and agreement to our last year’s
findings.
You can select up to
4 different picture resolutions and two video
resolutions. A full information strip on each picture is
another standard feature. Those that use the extra large
cards and have the need for extended stays in the field
the 4 D cells should do pretty good but the external
battery port and optional panel might also be the way to
go. Make sure that if you choose one of the great
security boxes to put this camera in that you make sure
that the hole is in the box so you can access the
external battery port. All the right features are there
along with the rapid response time which we assume means
trigger time. Should this camera come in with a 3+
trigger time I will say up front this will be a very
short review. Moultrie has shown all of us they can do
great things with pictures and battery life, it is time
to also show us that they learned how to decrease the
trigger times so they become competitive with the
market. Not being situated in the lunch box this year
and hopefully having a sub 2 second trigger time we
believe the price and function will make this camera a
super seller like the first year I-40. The size is a
whopping 6X9X31/4 inches which takes it out of the mini
category.
Out of the box first
impressions were very good at a glance until I actually
picked the camera up. I almost pitched it over my
shoulder because it was so light. I carefully opened the
two plastic latches and peaked inside thinking I may
have bought an empty box. Everything was there but it
has that flimsy feel like everything is about half the
gauge in thickness as all previous Moultrie cameras we
have tested. I picked up my old D-40 from last year and
it has a lot more heft than this camera. The inside of
this camera is totally plain Jane with no frills. Of
course we are dealing with a $ 150 camera but again
looking at that old $79 D-40 and it has a look and sheen
with a more of a quality appearance to me than this
camera. Gone is the nice gasket in the groove to seal
the door and now there is just a mass of flat rubber
about a ¼ inch wide all the way around and the door must
compress into it. It looks functional but clearly low
rent compared to previous Moultrie cameras. With the
door open there is a 28 count array at the top and a
round PIR sensor lens just below that. Next there is the
camera lens and LCD for programming with its associated
UP/DOWN/OK buttons. There is also a LED aim which is not
very functional because it dies at a very short
distance. TV out/USB ports are next to the SD card slot
(up to 16 gig) and there are tubular battery slots left
and right of the LCD which hold three C cells + side
down toward the bottom of the cam. These battery holders
have a couple of shaped little plastic covers which snap
in place and appear to be real easy to loose if you are
not careful. The outside on the bottom is the port for
their system (cell) and the external battery port.
A quick trip to the
TT table and performed an hour plus of un official tests
and the trigger times look to be just over two seconds.
The IR array produces two short blips which appears to
be a light metering step to reduce washout on close
subjects. The short duration
will also help avoiding that dreaded spook factor. Below is a
list of the specifications and the fact that we have a
Moultrie that has a sub 2 second trigger time I would
say we have a good long review to do. Let’s hope that
one of those wild field mice don’t take offence to this
thing being in his domain and trashes the case. I did a
couple daylight tests to see if the “high” quality
setting was what we were going to get, well I will not
say that I would by any means call the results as being
high quality pictures, but I would say that for a $150
camera it does a pretty good job and to me the pictures
look better than last years $450 wannabe black flash
camera from another company. This camera may just be the
distant cousin of the great 07 I-40 we loved so much. Too
bad that it got dressed up in a new coat that does not
have that solid look and feel.
While I was doing those hours worth of trigger time
tests I noticed that this camera has what we would call
a definite filter clunk
Anthony listened to it and said
it was not to bad)
that can be heard not only loud to my
old ears but to his young ears I
would have expected a more colorful response. This means that we will be getting a
lot of pictures in 3 burst with the deer looking at the
camera and then heading for Dodge. Stealth cam 540 you
have a twin in that respect.
We will see if they pick up on the
noise. It is there and I am sure
that we will probably get some reaction. The sample
pictures should tell us this.
Manufacturer's Specs:
Technical Information
-
Resolution: 4.0 MP, 3.2,
1.3, VGA
-
Trigger Speed: sub 2
second
-
IR or Incandescent: IR
-
Number of emitters in
array: 28
-
Flash Range: 50 ft aprox.
-
Video: Yes 640X480
320X240
-
Video Time: 5/15/30
second clips days 5 second night
-
Internal Memory: Yes,
32MB
-
Memory Card Type: SD
-
Memory Card Size: Up to
16GB
-
Memory Card Included: No
-
Multi-shot: Yes, up to 3
shots
-
Weather-resistant:
unknown yet
-
Menu Type: LCD monitored
up/down/select
-
Programming Remote: No
-
Battery Type: 6 C
-
Time and Date/camera name
on Pictures: Yes
-
Temperature on Pictures:
Yes
-
Moon phase on Pictures:
Yes
-
Mounting Strap Included:
Yes
-
USB Cable Included: Yes
-
TV Out Cable Included:
Yes
-
Sensing range: 35 ft
-
FOV: 52 degrees
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06-05-2010 update: We have been busy with a
new load of cameras that arrived so after we get a few
more sample pictures and videos we will move this cam to
the side to just run out until dead so we can get a
battery life measurement. This has not been a very
impressive camera being that we are presently testing
other cameras that cost less with better features (delay
/trigger/picture quality) and so far have given better
results.
Flash Range
Test (camera only)
(click for full size original)
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Day Range 8
Plate Test |

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Trigger Tests
with and without flash
both are approx. 2.25 seconds |


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Photo Samples
 .JPG) 
  
  
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Video Samples (high res)
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