Review: Ordro EP8 head mounted camera
UPDATED:
A tidied-up version of the video is now the one embedded above. I also took the opportunity to add on a a public service announcement starting at 17:27 in response to a spate of lunacy.
I’ve been using this camera on and off over the last few weeks. It was a way to make a video without having enough time to make a video. I grabbed clips whenever I could. As a result there’s quite a bit of footage of me just going about my business edited into the review.
As you’ll no doubt notice in the video, the audio quality is this camera’s least impressive aspect. There’s little point attempting to EQ this during editing (even if I could). That would be missing the point. It’d be like doing a review of a terrible stills camera but then fixing up any demonstration photos in photoshop.
Anyway - that’s it, I’m thoroughly knackered now, take care and have a good week.
Comments (45)
I'm going to do another TM binge watch this weekend (bump up view stats) because the view numbers on this video are absolutely ridiculous.
I wouldn’t waste your time - they’ll be something new along soon instead. This shows why I don’t review cameras any more though. The ad revenue just about paid for the EP8 - but overall it’d have been wiser to stay in bed for the week.
Thanks for the review! I may purchase one of these as it'll fit my use-case perfectly. The previous model's video quality was far too "sharpened" and "contrasty" with a strange colour to the video, but audio problems aside, this one is good. Suggest to manufacturer if they contact you, to limit the volume as you said and also put a higher audio bitrate as it sounds terribly compressed.
Interesting as always, Mat. Did you get any 'looks' or comments when you were out in public wearing the camera ?
I kept out of the way to avoid any unwanted attention.
I notice a spam post has appeared on a local history Facebook group I belong to. Some word game, completely unrelated to the area, asking people to think of words with certain patterns of letters in them, and they may be in with a chance of winning £6000! And people are answering, of course. I've reported the post and the poster.
We must be getting on for thirty or so years into online scams by this point and despite countless exposés, reports and warnings it really does feel like ‘a sucker is born every minute’ and a ‘fool and his/her money are soon parted’. Tale as old as time.
Re the scammer issue, this is worth looking at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-vOakOgYLUI&t=969s Theo may give you the software to use and remove the crap from your comments.
The problem unfortunately can’t be solved by deleting the spam - I’d have to run that software every couple of seconds to stop gullible people falling for this. I was just having a moment to myself watching TV and then the emails started arriving. If I’d have been asleep I’d have woken up to an inbox full of this nonsense. Some people are seemingly desperate to be scammed, they’ll act on a comment telling them to jump off a cliff before anyone had a chance to delete the message.
Nice vid Mat. Noticed when you were doing intro with the 7 pointed to your face, there were compression artefacts showing, like it was using low bit rate (blocking). Also, when you were comparing the lens correction, I thought the 7's colour was richer, the 8's colour was more pastel like, softer. Interestingly, this is the first time I have ever viewed 4K video on my laptop. It 'appeared' to be sharper but then my display only supports 1920 x 1080, so it can only be as good as that. As there was more data coming through from YT, the playback buffered a lot, so changed the display back to HD. Incidentally, it would be interesting to actually 'PROVE' the video being captured was in 4K. Apart from looking sharper, and the camera saying 'this is 4K' the only way I know is to look at a black and white grid display and counting the vertical and horizontal blocks then doing some calculations. Or by looking at a 4K test pattern. Might be an idea for a video?
Be good if YouTube added some more comment control such as only allowing comments from subscribers who have been subscribers for at least 6/12/18 months. Although its quite surprising that people are falling for this nonsense. Anyway I enjoyed the video - I like these camera reviews. I remember the keyring camera reviews back in the early days of the channel.
I wonder if there's people still falling for those "pop-ups" made to look like Windows XP, that juggle around the screen, claiming they're their one millionth visitor or something?
From the emails I got - it seems they’d be plenty of people queuing up to get ripped off.
I didn't get a chance to see the first edit- but whatever the changes- a very clear and well paced review. Found it very enjoyable. Bit of a throwback to your early days which is fun. Also... could not agree more about the mortal sin of vertically shot video. ABSOLUTELY drives me insane that there is a whole popular website dedicated to horribly framed video. Just had to vent a bit. Have a great week.
Love it, superb quality
I'm kinda getting a Locutus from Borg vibe from that camera...would be great for Star Trek cosplayers ;)
About the scam issue: You might want to break out that segment and publish as its own stand-alone short video — like a PSA (or is it PIF?) After all, it is an ongoing scam and gullible people might yet fall for it. Also, like you say in the review, this episode could be viewed much later — months from now even — and at that point the scam issue might alredy have been resolved. BTW, did you have any success trying out the anti-spam scripts from https://github.com/ThioJoe/YT-Spammer-Purge ?
I don’t think it’s worth posting on its own - it’s common sense really, so nothing that 99% of people would need to hear. As for the scripts - no they are too intrusive with gaining access to my account. In my opinion they open up a massive security vulnerability. However it is a retroactive system that deletes existing spam - the people who fall for this stuff will already have dialled the numbers before I could run the software to delete the comment. Hundreds of these comments could be getting posted now as I’m typing - another fifty while I’m in the shower…I’ve got a life to lead…I can’t just stay on YouTube running scripts 24/7.
Re: updated video; it's irksome that you have to warn against idiotic spamscammers infecting YT comments. I fear for the overall safety of your viewers if they fall for these tricks, though. 🤔 Another excellent reason to avoid reading YT comments, although I did do a couple videos ago.
Marques Brownlee (MKBHD) posted a whole video about those comment spammers aimed at getting YouTube to do something about them. Clearly not a priority for them!
Unfortunately the dozen or so people who emailed me "I called the number you gave but there was no answer"! - clearly didn't see this video.
put something like this together in about 2016 for a dentist client. He wanted head mount recorder with HDMI and battery pack. We did a belt mounted Wireless HDMI and power bank so the camera could record itself, then have the images transmitted to a PC for recording / streaming and distribution around the building ( HDMI over IP) worked quite well but was only 720p30 i may suggest he replaces them with this :)
Clever use of the feedback loop as a transition. Reminded me of lining up two mirrors and trying to see down to the end.
It makes for a really nice effect.
Neat device, good review. The lack of horizon stabilization on the camera makes it a hard no for me, though.
Ooof, does it get any better? Tech review and trams? That's like my second favourite threesome. :)
You can't beat a good funicular.
"Field of view"... 😏
Yes, there's our Mat, "outstanding in his field." At least he didn't say, "Aisle of view."
The good old days are back. I first started watching your dash cam videos when you had your own domain. Do you still have that Mat ?
I had to freeze the website as it was no longer compliant with data privacy requirements etc - and Squarespace were clueless as to how to update it due to their overwhelming incompetence. People don’t tend to visit blogs any more so I didn’t feel there was any value in setting up another one elsewhere.
I think I preferred the colours on the original cam, but image stabilization is a Biggie. Love the transition via the feedback loop near the end looking at the cam live feed... Needs the batman sound effect:) Good to see you're .anaginf to do some videos still and great info and review as ever... Been a while since a cam review like this.. blast from the past.
I think I'd like to have one of these cameras, but would actually find little use for it, although it sounds like this could be a "daily driver" for Mat. I don't know about the other patrons, but if Mat were to do a few more travelogue style videos now and then--either in service to a camera review or just as a glimpse into the local area, I would be for it. Nothing in depth, really, but just Mat wandering about showing us a few sites that he finds of interest, especially at this time of year in his green and pleasant land. Oh and I guessed that you were somewhere in Wales and was amused to see that guess confirmed, even if it wasn't much more than a guess. Anyway, I always enjoy these camera reviews.
The white balance seems better on the older camera. The new one looks washed out
The good thing with the new one is that the vibrancy can be improved in editing if necessary whereas the older one has gone too far the other way to bring it back to normal.
Maybe interesting to look at difference between 4K 60 FPS Ep7 & 4K 60 FPS Ep8 on my ep7 I can’t use stuff it records on 60 fps it’s to grainy. Maybe you already did this in the video sorry if I missed it. Good to see your back to a camera review!
Now you can walk around, fooling everyone that you're not paying attention by looking at your phone screen 🤪. BTW: nice train ride in the beginning ;-).
Funny this should pop up. I've been doing 4 mile site surveys of railway assets and it's a massive ball ache trying to jot down names, places and locations of hundreds of things to then transpose it all onto separate Google Maps. I thought about a camera on my hard hat so started looking. Eventually the Google search was "a good helmet camera that will last more than 2 hours that won't make me look like a massive idiot". I might have to look at getting one of these and wrapping it in fabric tape to make it more stealthy. Hopefully TomTop get them back in stock soon as UK costs are a bit silly. Are you getting near the rated battery life with real world use?
Funny you should mention this as I used this camera to record a few things that came into my mind while driving and you’ve reminded me that they’ll be on the memory card even though right now I’ve forgotten what they were about.
What’s the name of the castle you were at? It looks amazing! As a New Zealander who has zero castles to visit haha. Hope things get a bit easier for you this week 😊
That was Conwy Castle - it’s impressive to see.
Shades of action camera nostalgia here 😀 - I almost thought I'd see some old haunts like Woo Sang, Print Works, and the Arndale Centre. The castle was more impressive, thank you. I almost lost my mind 😵💫 on the infinity monitor shot, that was great - with an awesome swirling effect to close the scene, to boot. I got a laugh out of the 'speedo' and car theft comments as well, thank you for that. The EP7 has such heavy color saturation, that it sort of reminds me of 90's VHS film quality. The camera seems very secure, but I could see my clumsy self touch the side of my head and the thing falls off to a premature demise. Does it feel like it would survive a fall to the pavement? I also thought - this seems great to function for motorcyclists if they can mount on their helmet. Great video - take care. 🤍
It could probably survive a drop, but there’s always the chance it’d land on the lens which wouldn’t be good.
The timelapse feature would be cool if mounted on a tripod in the car
nice, first started watching you for the dash cam reviews. always on the lookout for a bicycle helmet camera that won't make me look like a teletubby.