The fourth of the HERO3+ Adventure Series.
Inspired by Alex Chacon’s GoPro travels through the Pan American Trail. GoPro Production Artists James Kirkham and Zak Shelhamer join Alex in India on a journey from Jaipur to the highest road in the world, Khardung La.
Shot 100% on the HD HERO3+® camera
Side-country adventures provide the benefits of both letting the lift do the uphill work for you and getting fresh untracked turns. However, when you are ducking boundary lines you are leaving the safety net of the ski patrol. With the proper training and knowledge this can be a fully rewarding and safe risk. But you will need some equipment.
When all you need is the essentials the Gambler has got your back. Carry a shovel, avalanche probe and 3L water in a compact, glove-friendly pack with a Therminator harness to help prevent freezing.
CamelBak.com
$95
In its perennial round-up of the year’s hottest gear,Backpacker Magazine has chosen the PowerPot V by Power Practical for the Snow Award. The award recognizes products that lead the way in the outdoor industry.
“When you’ve got a flat-top wood-burning stove and you’re heating up a hut or yurt… you’ve got a never-ending supply of juice at your fingertips,” Backpacker Magazine’s official tester said of the PowerPot.
The PowerPot V is a portable thermoelectric generator. It serves as both a power source for USB devices and a cooking pot for preparing soup, tea or MREs. It uses thermoelectric technology to convert excess heat into electricity while cooking.
“We wanted to make something that harnessed the immense energy of fire so it could be used to power electronic gear,” said co-inventor David Toledo.
After three years of development, Toledo and co-inventor Paul Slusser turned to the popular crowdfunding site Kickstarter to help fund production of the PowerPot V.
“We knew the idea would be a hit, but we needed the support of the crowdfunding world to make it happen,” said Slusser.
Launching on Kickstarter in April of 2012, the duo raised over twice their original goal of $50,000 and pre-sold nearly a thousand PowerPots. They went to work on the production of the PowerPot and built a team to help run the company, now called Power Practical. This would lead to a commercial sales debut at the 2013 Winter Outdoor Retailer.
Just nine months later, the product was given the nod by Backpacker Magazine, receiving the prestigious Editor’s Choice Snow Award for 2013. The PowerPot’s rapid climb from idea to crowdfunding, commercial launch and now receiving this accolade demonstrate its popularity.
“It only took twelve months from shipping our first PowerPots out to receive this award,” said Toledo, who now sits as President of Power Practical, “and better yet we received it just nine months after we launched into commercial retail. We’re overwhelmed by the support and can’t wait to show everyone what we are coming out with next.”
To learn more about the PowerPot, check out the product’s official website at http://www.thepowerpot.com. Power Practical is a Salt Lake City based group of engineers, entrepreneurs and outdoor enthusiasts who emphasize diversity in energy resources by developing innovative, effective and affordable energy products to keep you connected anywhere, anytime. There are areas of the world that simply fall off the grid, suffering from power outages and unavailable energy resources. With Power Practical, you are never off the power grid and always powered up, no matter where in the world you are.
UKPro Flex Grip is a must have accessory for GoPro users everywhere. A telescoping arm that bends into nearly any angle with attachment points for two GoPro cameras, the Flex Grip gives you access to a whole new world of filming.
The grip can hold two GoPro cameras, or one camera and a light for night time filming. The textured grip provides an ergonomic handle, perfect for long periods of filming. Two cameras can be mounted on the grip pointed in opposite directions for maximum coverage.
Clamp your GoPro to objects ranging in size from .25″ to 2″ (.6cm to 5cm) in diameter. Attach your camera directly to the clamp for low-profile mounting, or use the optional neck to achieve a wider range of camera-angle adjustability.
FEATURES + BENEFITS
• Versatile Mounting – Clamp your GoPro to a variety of objects .25″ to 2″ (.6cm to 5cm) in diameter
• Two Ways to Mount – Camera can be mounted either directly to the clamp, or to the adjustable neck for a variety of shooting angles
• Adjustable Neck – Makes aiming the camera easy and enables a variety of shooting angles
• Strong Bite Force -Clamp grips objects securely for strong, steady mounting
• Adjustable Strap – Can be tightened to increase grip on irregular- shaped and super-slim objects as thin as a pencil
Compatibility:
All GoPro cameras
What’s Included:
Jaws: Flex Clamp
Adjustable Neck
It is not often that we talk about ourselves. The life of a sales rep agency if often one that feels behind the scenes. Wearing the badges of our vendors and voicing the opinions, insights and feedback of our dealers; we stoke and put out fires.
That is what we do and we love it!
I usually have the privilege of talking about brand new products or trying to better educate on current ones. It is with rare exception that we, PRW, are the topic of note on this here site.
Today is one of those exceptions. We had a banner year servicing client GoPro.
We were selected as the 2013 Agency of the Year at GoPro’s annual sales conference.
Check out the following article from InsideOutside.com:
Pacific Rep Works represents the Pacific Northwest for GoPro and boasted the top overall sales growth for the year. The agency was in the top three in both core distribution channel growth, which includes bike, boat, ski, and outdoor shops, and secondary distribution channel growth, which includes hunting, hobby, camera, diving, and performance auto shops. The agency was also number one in territory adoption of GoPro’s training application.
“It’s incredible to win this award,” said Mitch Lemas of Pacific Rep Works. “The sales groups working with GoPro are all top-notch agencies. Being named the best-of-the-best is definitely a pinnacle moment in our careers and a wonderful recognition of the hard work of our entire team and the structure of our organization overall.”
Of the three GoPro sales growth categories – overall sales, core distribution channel, and secondary distribution channel – Pacific Rep Works was the only agency to place in the top three in all.
So the HERO3+ is here. Rad right? Yeah it is. But what exactly does that “+” get you? Well one of GoPro’s production artists, Abe Kislevitz, broke-down all the differences and benefits on his personal blog. Below is what he has to say, for more from him check out abekislevitz.com.
The GoPro HERO3+ isn’t a huge leap in technology or major overhaul; however, it is indeed a solid improvement over an otherwise stunning product – the HERO3. When the HERO3 was created we poured in everything to push the boundaries of image quality and technology for a little box. The HERO3+ is built upon the same platform of the HERO3 utilizing the same sensor and processor combo. There are plenty of new great features which I will list below. When I mention HERO3+, it is assumed I am talking about the Black Edition unless otherwise noted.
HERO3+ is sporting a new WiFi chipset. It’s one of the biggest practical updates you’ll experience. Using the GoPro App on an iPhone 5 the “Live Preview” is down from a full 4 seconds of lag to just under a second. If you’ve experienced the old lag, the new will actually feel almost live. Check out the video below also showcasing photo download speeds – this is huge! The same SD card is used in both the 3 and 3+. 3+ download speeds are over 4x faster. This will come in handy with possible future improvements to the app which will start enabling easy video sharing.
One of the biggest improvements in the lens is the reduced CA (chromatic aberration). CA is the yellow/blue fringing you may see in photos or video up close in areas of high contrast. It happens when not all of the wavelengths of color focus at the same point, giving the appearance of blur in certain colors. Higher quality lenses have less CA. The following sample was shot in 2.7K ProTune on both cameras. See the yellow and blue/purple fringing on the edges of the windows in the detail photo below, showing a 100% full size crop of the video frames.
GoPro is claiming 33% improved sharpness which is actually a measurable thing using the MTF (some fancy mathematics using sine charts & measurable contrasts). Anyway, it’s true, the lens is in-fact sharper. The tests they do in the lab to measure the sharpness is at a distance of around 2 feet from the subject. In the HERO3+ samples I’ve used and tested it has incredibly sharp closer focus, but is similar in focus as the HERO3 at far distances. See these two samples below. I setup a faux still life and had each camera in the exact same housing and used the app to snap the photo so there’s no chance of motion blur. Both of these are crops of the full photo and presented at 100% with no adjustments in post . The cameras were at a distance of 6″ from my business card and the lighting was consistent for both photos.
Distortion is difficult to measure unless you’re looking at perfect gridlines. The distortion profile is certainly slightly different than HERO3 – not necessarily better or worse. There seems to be a bit more curvature at the edges in HERO3+ which tells me there’s slightly more distortion; however, the center seems to yield a straighter horizon. These two photos were taken in identical positions inside a static single housing.
Our image quality (IQ) team at GoPro has been hard at work bringing you an all new color profile for the HERO3+ that renders scenes more real than ever before. GoPro started out a few years ago with the ‘hyper-real’ colors of HD1 and HERO2, and we’ve finally stepped away from that with HERO3+. You’ll notice tones are slightly warmer than HERO3 and images have less of a fluorescent green ‘sheen’ that HERO3 tends to have. Some other things you’ll notice is better color representation in the sky, tendencies for white horizons is reduced, and more. The HERO3+ has some internal software restructuring from the ground up to give the IQ team better control over how color is processed in the camera so it’s more than a simple hue change one direction or another. Major hats off to the IQ team for delivering a stunning image in this new camera. The following are all photos straight from the camera. *Note that video modes reflect photo color very closely
Those that know the HERO3 will know that 2.7K is one of the most stunning modes. We’ve brought the ever popular medium FOV option into 2.7K for awesome high resolution video with less distortion and more “zoom”. Remember, this isn’t a digital zoom, but a crop of the sensor. You will see slightly more noise & grain in this mode since there’s less scaling from the original sensor capture.
So the GoPro sensor is a full 4:3 (almost square) aspect ratio, yet most video modes like 1080P are 16:9 (widescreen). This means you’re cutting off important visual data on the top and bottom of your video that could actually be captured! In the GoPro we have 4:3 modes that take care of this in the form of 1440P and 960P, but if you’re not a computer person, getting those to playback at 16:9 can be pretty confusing. Superview automatically captures a 4:3 aspect ratio (so full height, sky and feet) and dynamically stretches it to fit a 16:9 aspect ratio. It doesn’t just stretch it down, everything would look fat, but pinches the center so anything in the center of the frame looks good, while it stretches out the outsides. I explain this and how to do it manually in great detail in this post. Superview has the potential for great results as well as some pretty funky looking video. Basically anything POV without a ton of important visual items in the edges of the frame will look good – examples are motocross from the head, downhill mountain biking from the head or chest, skiing on the head or chest, surfing from the nose of the board, etc. Anything where you start interacting with people or holding it in your hand will end up with some stretchy looking figures. Bottom line for this mode is the more view you have in any of your sports the more immersive and smooth your video will be – try it out and see how you like it. If you don’t like it, you’ll know how to do it manually by filming in 1440 or 960 and using the methods I describe in “4:3 Footage Explained“. It’s actually not as weird as you think – we’ve been doing it to every POV motocross video since 2010
In the example below notice how the cars in the center of the superview frame stay at relatively the correct aspect ratio while the cars on the left and right edge are stretched out horizontally. Also take note of how much more vertical space exists in the superview frame. You can imagine if you’re skiing you’d see the horizon, the ski trail, and your skis while in regular 1080 you’d miss the horizon or the skis, or both. Take a look at the POV examples below as well – these are all shot in SuperView and are straight out of the camera. You get a sense of what kind of shots work really well for it.
When auto low light mode is activated and you’re filming at a high frame rate, the camera will dynamically change frame rate on the fly within your video clip to allow for more light. If you’re in 1080-60 and it gets REALLY dark, it will switch into 1080-30 (giving all the benefits of 1080-30) but still keep the 59.94 timing. It does this by duplicating frames. I don’t know the threshold values for it to activate, but it’s usually pretty dark. Once it activates, it stays in low frame rate constantly so it’s not swapping back and forth on you. Now I know most of my readers probably say they’d never want it switching frame rates on them, which is what I initially thought as well. There have been plenty of times I’ve gone into really dark situations and I have ruined footage because it’s dark and blurry filming at 1080-60. At that point high frame rate does you nothing! That being said, I’m not a huge proponent of this mode, but for the average consumer it’s a nice to have as a ‘set it and forget it’ mode. One thing to note is the HERO3+ will not have ‘better’ low light capabilities (as in it looks better at night). This mode simply gives you the benefit of switching to a lower frame rate without having to manually change it.
The new housing is 20% smaller and much sleeker. After using this housing for the past few months I look at the old one and laugh! It sounds funny now but the new one is awesome. The buttons are SO much easier to press. It feels quick and responsive. Also the wifi button is recessed inside the plastic so I haven’t ever hit it on accident yet. The latch is a welcome change from the burly locking enclosure from the HERO3. I’ve never had a latch bust open on HERO1 or 2, so it was surprising to see the lock on HERO3. With thinner walls, audio comes through the housing better even with a closed back door. You’ll hear more of the surfing sounds in the ocean. For now, Errorik on reddit created an awesome image gallery of the new housing so I’m going to link that here for you all!
HERO3+ Slim Housing Photos by Errorik
I’m not a big audio guy but the original HERO3 actually had really good audio compared to previous generations. The HERO3+ continues this trend with similar audio specs only now it’s implemented AGC – Auto Gain Control. This means it’s constantly listening and adjusting the levels for what it’s picking up. I haven’t put this to the test to be honest and I’ve heard mixed reviews about AGC in DSLRs. We’ll have to see how this fares.
HERO3+ Silver got a big bump in specs by utilizing an all new processor that allows it to do 1080-60 and 720-120. It doesn’t have 4K-15, 2.7K, or 1440 and also doesn’t have ProTune settings. One thing I wanted to make note of is the quality difference between Black and Silver even in similar modes. As you may know from reading ‘Understanding Your New GoPro’, just because it says 1080-60 doesn’t mean the quality is the same as any other 1080-60. The quality of 1080-60 in the Black vs the Silver is quite a big difference. That said, it still is a huge leap in quality from the original Silver and looks great scaled for the web. See the example below.
Many are wondering about the future of both of these products and whether or not the additions to HERO3+ could be carried over to HERO3 with a software update. The good news is GoPro has been continuing software support for almost all of its cameras to this day so if there are major bugs to work out in any of the models, they will still be worked on. Unfortunately most of the improvements I’ve mentioned above are either a hardware change or a major software overhaul. SuperView, auto low light and the color profiles are major software architecture changes from the ground up and I don’t think will be ported over to HERO3. Looking to the future of the HERO3+, there is opportunity to build on some exciting new features but we’ll all have to wait and see if anything comes to fruition (including me!)
A word to leave with – the HERO3+ is a great camera; however it does not mean your HERO3 is obsolete. If anything it proves that the HERO3 is still an amazing camera with awesome features. I honestly would use a HERO3 all year if I had to and not ever think anything of it. I’m stoked GoPro has taken a deep breath to release a solid product with a good step in the right direction. We’re all aware there were some software issues with HERO3 and it’s comforting to know that the teams have taken a good look at what’s going on under the hood and smoothed things out! Good news is I haven’t come across a single problem yet (that doesn’t mean there are none), but it’s a much more mature product than the HERO3 was at launch.
Thanks again to Abe Kislevitz, check out his site at: abekislevitz.com
From GearJunkie By Stephen Regenold
On Friday afternoon, I plugged my water bottle into a laptop USB port for a charge. Saturday found me in the woods of Wisconsin, dipping the bottle into a lake then pressing a button to purify its contents for a drink.
The $99 bottle, called the All Clear UV Microbiological Water Purifier, is made by CamelBak. It uses UV light to render microbes harmless, letting you grab a drink almost anywhere.
Specifically, the UV light “destroys microbe DNA,” as CamelBak puts it. Bacteria, water-borne viruses, and protozoan cysts, including the troublesome cryptosporidium breed, are rendered benign by the light.
This technology is not new. Municipal water plants have long used UV light to make mass quantities of water safe.
In the outdoors industry, Hydro-Photon has sold its UV-based SteriPEN product for more than 10 years. You dip the wand-like SteriPEN device in water and stir as UV light streams and purifies.
CamelBak’s All Clear is a similar concept but with a different design. The all-in-one bottle and purifier comes as a kit with two caps — one with the lamp mechanism, one a normal plastic lid.
The goal with All Clear is simple and quick purification. You fill the 0.75-liter bottle up to near the top then screw the cap on tight. Press a button and gently shake the bottle as light glows and a digital counter ticks from 60 seconds to 0.
That’s it. The water is rendered drinkable in a minute, CamelBak guarantees. You can pour it from there into another container or drink straight from the bottle.
The system is slick. But there are a few caveats. Make sure and wipe off the threads of the bottle, for example, so that you don’t ingest untreated drips.
Also, not all water works in the system. Water must be mostly transparent for the All Clear to function — it’s not a filter and any sediment or specs floating will remain. (The company sells a $15 optional filter cap if “chunky” water is likely on your trip.)
CamelBak recommends water that is “at least as clear as lemonade.” Anything funkier and you need a pump-filter or other product to work the H2O clean.
Personally, I’ve used UV purifiers around the world, from Patagonia to Nepal. My test this past month was not as exotic. But even water from a lake in northern Wisconsin can make you sick.
How do you know it works? CamelBak cites independent lab tests and EPA protocols. You can openPDF documents on the company website and read detailed reports on “ultraviolet light as a sanitizing agent,” stats about reducing bacteria by 99.9999%, and so on.
In the end, you need to trust that the brand is telling it straight. I drank a few bottles’ worth of lake water and am still standing and functioning fine.
As noted above, the All Clear costs $99. This is on par with some of the competition, meaning mainly SteriPEN, which has products that run between $49.95 and $99.95 depending on weight, size, and functions.
As for the All Clear design, I like the integrated form of the purifier and bottle in one. But it is heavier than SteriPEN products — the UV cap weighs 7 ounces.
Together, the bottle and UV cap measure 10.8 ounces on my scale. This may look heavy to a backpacker counting every gram.
However, my use of SteriPEN models, which weigh 2.6 to 5.5 ounces depending on the version, has usually been with a 1-liter Nalgene bottle. That extra bottle and the SteriPEN unit added together equal the approximate same weight of the All Clear system.
Despite the ounce counting, CamelBak made the All Clear more as a camping and traveling tool, not necessarily for the ultra-light crowd. You can use it in iffy hotel rooms or at water pumps in remote villages as well as at wilderness lakes and streams.
Its lithium-ion battery lasts for 80 purification cycles, CamelBak cites. You can plug it into a wall outlet or a laptop via USB for a charge.
The company notes 16 gallons of water can be made pure for each battery cycle. That’s a lot of liquid, a lot of Wisconsin lake water for me to drink.
—Stephen Regenold
Introducing the HERO3+ Black Edition. With improved image quality and powerful new features geared for versatility and convenience, it’s the most advanced GoPro yet.
20% smaller and lighter than its best-selling predecessor—the HERO3+ Black Edition is the most mountable, wearable and versatile GoPro ever. Its all-new, ultra-slim housing is waterproof to 131 feet, or 40 meters. Featuring a flat glass lens, you’ll be sure to capture super sharp images—whether shooting above or below the water.
New Features:
• 20% smaller and lighter housing (waterproof to 131’/40m)
• SuperView video mode captures the world’s most immersive wide angle perspective
• Auto Low Light mode intelligently adjusts frame rate for stunning low light performance
• 33% improved image sharpness and reduced distortion
• Faster built-in Wi-Fi for enhanced connectivity to the Wi-Fi Remote (included) and GoPro App
• 30% longer battery life
• Wireless camera software updates via the GoPro App
• Upgraded audio performance
Along with new HERO3+ cameras, GoPro is proud to introduce a fresh lineup of mounts and accessories that enable you to capture immersive footage during your favorite activities in all-new ways.
For more information about the new HERO3+ Black Edition camera, and new mounts and accessories, visit http://gopro.com.
pacificrepworks.com 
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