I've been using a Tactacam for a year and half now and for the most part, like it. Simple to use and the footage is pretty good all things considered. The one area that frustrates me is the shot footage. I've been using the stabilizer setup and the bow vibration makes that part of the footage useless, which for me, is the main reason I bought it, to see shot placement. Do you folks use it on the bow for shot placement? I believe the Tactacam footage you usually show is not bow mounted. Is this assumption right? Any tips on how to get better footage out this thing? Thanks guys and keep up the awesome work in the field with the show. Its one of the best out there in my opinion!
Some of it is bow-mounted, some of it isn't. A lot of us were having problems remembering to turn our Tactacams on during the heat of the moment as our focus was on our "main" camera, so we started mounting them on top of our main cameras so we don't forget about them. The advantage there is that since they aren't mounted on our weapon the shot footage is a lot more stable. To be honest with you, there's not much you can do about the shake/vibration when you shoot your bow. It's just a part of the deal. The new 5.0 camera has much better built-in vibration dampening so it's less than previous versions but you'll never get rid of it entirely.
Thanks Justin. Thats sort of what I assumed from watching the show but just wanted to be sure. I've seen some pretty decent footage from the bow mounted, good enough quality to get shot placement information. Thats all I'm really shooting for. My bow doesn't move around much at all on the shot, but does possess some high frequency buzz that distorts the shot. I know I'm not going to get rid of it all, just looking for ideas/ways to reduce it enough to make that part of the deal more useful. I may bite the bullet and upgrade to the 5.0 or wait and see if they make anymore improvements for 2019. The stabilizer mount they currently use is pretty basic and simple with zero vibration dampening of any kind.
I've personally had better success with the camera mounted closer to the riser than further away. Unfortunately I suck and haven't gotten a deer kill on Tactacam this fall but some of my turkey stuff from this spring is pretty dang good. You can see shot placement no problem - especially with a good lighted nock.
Man Justin, I've only had mine for a year and have three deer kills and a turkey kill on mine... lol. I'm going to be experimenting a bunch with mine to see if I can get it any better. I'd also really like to try it on different bows as well. I wish I had a friend or a place to try to 5.0 before I drop that kind of coin on it.3
I've gotten plenty of kills on camera with it, just not my buck this fall. It was way too dark for that camera so I didn't turn it on. Unfortunately all smaller cameras are going to lose filming light a good 20 minutes before legal light is over. Just the way it is. I got both of my spring turkeys and my doe kill on Tactacam this year plus a few last year as well. Try mounting it on the riser above your sight window. That has given me the best results. I feel like the closer you get it to the center of the bow the better off you are. Stands to reason that the closer you are to the grip/center of the bow the less it should move/vibrate at the shot.
