evilC's Miniket FAQ

This page is deticated to Samsung Miniket sports camcorders. Specifically the VP-X300L at the moment, as that's all I have.
Ultimately, this page will probably move to the Remolition website as part of an extreme sports video making section.
Please note that this page is largely UK (And therefore PAL rather than NTSC) specific.

About
The Samsung VP-X300L is a solid state ("No moving parts") MPEG-4 digital camcorder. It records directly to SD card as DivX AVI. It is the first consumer (ie all bits needed for a headcam come in the box) headcam that I am aware of that shoots in full SD (720x576 @ 25 FPS in the case of PAL) and can shoot in interlaced or progressive.Quality is pretty damned good (As long as you set it to "Super Fine") - certainly good enough to consign my bulky miniDV to the drawer.

Niggles
Here is a list of the issues I have with the camera. Hopefully someone at Samsung will see this and correct these in a firmware update / future camera.

• Black Bars:
  I get black bars at the left and right of the image with the headcam. I have verified that other people get this with their unit so it appears to be a design fault not a manufacturing one.
  Suggestion to Samsung: Fix this issue please
  Workaround: Zoom the video in your editor. Be careful to make sure you don't zoom interlaced footage as this will cause issues.
  
  
• FourCC code:
  The clips output by the camera are DivX compatible MPEG-4 ASP and can happily be decoded by the DivX codec.
  However, each AVI file has a "FourCC" - literally Four Character Code - 4 characters at the start of the file to tell the decoder (eg Windows Media Player) which codec to use to decode the movie.
  The Samsung VP-X300L sets these four characters to "SEDG". This is why, if you do not install the codec from the CD that comes with the camera, you cannot watch the videos. However, if you change the fourcc of any given file to "DIVX" then it will play using the normal DivX codec you probably have installed on your PC.
  This would probably not be an issue, however, various editing applications (eg Adobe Premiere) will not be able to edit the files if the FourCC is set to SEDG.
  I guess this is probaby a licencing issue? Samsung didn't want to pay DivX inc a fee to put a "DivX compatible" sticker on the product? AFAIK nothing is stopping them setting the FourCC to DIVX though, xvid do this by default so I do not see why Samsung can't.
  Suggestion to Samsung: Put an option in the menu to pick which FourCC to put in the file.
  Workaround: Use abcAVI to change the FourCC from SEDG to DIVX. I suggest you store this app on the memory card you use with the camera so that you can change the fourcc on another PC should you need to.
  
  
• Head strap:
  The included head strap slips off a helmet very easily.
  Suggestion to Samsung: Add silicone bead
  Workaround: Get some silicone tile sealant (For bathrooms) and squirt some on the back of the strap.
• CCD sensor quality:
  The quality of the CCD seems OK, until you point it at light. At which point it over-exposes for a while. I guess this is because of cost limitations meaning a cheaper CMOS sensor had to be used.
  Suggestion to Samsung: How about releasing upgrade headcams (eg a 3 CCD unit  please!!) that you can just plug in?
  Workaround: When mounting the head camera, point it a little more at the ground than the sky. It is quite wide angle, so this shouldn't affect your shot too much. There is no actual adjustment for the angle on the headstrap, but you can twist thestrap so that it passes through the plastic head mount at a diagonal angle.
  
  
• "720p" / "720i" in display:
  A bit pedantic this one... On the main display, the width of the shooting mode is shown together with a p for progressive or i for interlaced.
  In moderen terms, "720p" means 720 lines and progressive, not 720 columns and progressive - so this display is implying that you are shooting in 720p HD.
  Suggestion to Samsung: This should be changed to 576p or 576i (in the case of PAL)
  Workaround: None required.
  
  
• Head cam connector:
  The connector for the head cam is a little exposed.
  Suggestion to Samsung: It should probably be more flush with the body. I would also reccomend that there is a clip included in the cable which attaches to the body, so it is impossible to put strain on the plug.
  Workaround: Not come up with anything yet. Had to have 1 motherboard replaced so far due to a fault with this connector.

Feature Requests
Stuff I would like to see in an update or on a future model...

• AVI Split function:
  There is no function on the camera to split AVIs.
• USB Host:
  The X300L would rock even more if it was a USB host. The existing joystick would be sufficient to select files to copy to a hard disk, so it would just be a case of upgrading the USB controller and a bit of software. You had the foresight to include a charging connector and a USB connector, so if you made the X400L a USB host device we could plug it into power and a USB HDD and record for days or weeks on end!!
• Timelapse:
  There is no time lapse function on the camera. Would be quite nice given the weatherproof lens to be able to leave the camera somewhere and record a movie over hours or days.
• High Definition:
  Even if the shipped CCD was SD, maybe consider making the main unit capable of recording HD and provide aftermarket lens upgrades for sale?
• Full SDHC support:
  Up to 32GB+ please as supported by proper SDHC.

Accessories

• Spare / Extra batteries:
  It can be a little hard to find batteries in the UK.
  I have found this vendor in the UK for regular capacity (SB-P120A : 1200mAh) 3rd party batteries - I own one and they work fine, although being silver in colour.
  I have also found this vendor in Holland that sells the higher capacity batteries (SB-P190A : 1900mAh).
  The charger I see commonly sold with these batteries (Pictured on the dutch site) works fine and comes with a car cigarette lighter adapter too.
  
  
• Storage:
  In order to pull data off an SD card "in the field" one would need one of two things:
  

1. A USB storage device that can act as a USB Host. Note that most external USB drives will not do this! If you see a "USB to Go" label, you should be good.
2. A storage device that has an SD card slot.

Any device you use would need to have some controls on it to "Pull" the files from the card or from the USB port. Most devices that will do one of the above will also do another and they are typically marketed as a "Portable Media Player". Typically there will be two price brackets: Ones that are "One touch" and will only back up all the contents of the SD card or ones with more controls that you can chose to pull off only specific files. The latter are typically more expensive. A laptop will obviously do this but it is rather bulky. I do not have a device like this currently.

• Tripods etc:
  Both the headcam and the main unit have a standard tripod mount on them. The headcam detaches from the head band so you can attach the lens onto the end of a tripod / Monopd.
  I can heavily recommend a Quikpod in combination with this camera.
  The regular (plastic) quickpod is maybe a little short, but is great for filming yourself, collapses down very small and is very light.
  The Pro SLR (metal) quickpod is much longer, maybe a little too long for filming yourself, but is very useful for getting interesting angles. As the head unit for the VP-X300L is on a length of wire, you can have the lens on the end of the pole, but still be able to see what you are filming on the screen of the main unit. You can also still start / stop filming from the inline button. Great for getting high or low shots.
  
  
• SD Cards:
  SD (All capacities) and SDHC (Up to 4GB) are supported. MicroSD in an SD adapter is confirmed as working.
  I recommend you buy 4GB micro SD (Not SDHC) cards as these will be compatible with any SD or SDHC device through adapters (microSD is the smallest, so you can put it in a miniSD adapter and that inside an SD adapter, russian doll style).
  When buying SD cards, buy the fastest possible card you can as if the write speed of the card is too low the camera may have to degrade the bitrate (Quality) of the footage to enable the card to keep up.
  For SD cards, speed is rated like 133x or 150x - try and get 150x or better.
  For SDHC this is rated like C2, C4 (Class 2, Class 4) - try and get at least C4, but get C6 or C8 if you can.

Trick n Tips

• Double FPS footage:
  This is a trick you can do with most cameras capable of shooting in interlaced mode. Interlaced mode is accessed on the X300L by setting "TV" mode instead of "PC" mode.
  Interlaced mode is not actually 25FPS as with interlaced mode half the screen (each alternate line) is stored per field and there are two fields per frame. Therefore it is actually storing alternate lines of the picture 50 times a second. Software can look at each of these 50 fields and "guess" what was in the missing lines in between. Therefore, if you de-interlace right, you can get slowmos at double the smoothness than you would otherwise.
  This trick works fine on the Miniket, you need to use the technique detailed here, use method 4b.
  The link to the DeinterlaceSmooth filter has changed, it is now here..
  
  However, with the miniket, adjust the AVISynth script to:
  
  AviSource("somefile.avi")
ComplementParity
SeparateFields

  If you forget the "ComplimentParity" line then the field order will be wrong and it will look all jerky.
  
  It is also possible to do this without having to use vdub to render out the double rate footage, as long as you have a way to import AVS files (AVISynth scripts) into your editor:
  There is a Deinterlace Smooth filter for AVISynth here.
  There is an avs plugin for Premiere here.
  Use an avisynth script (text file with .avs extension) like this:
  
  LoadPlugin("SmoothDeinterlacer.dll") AVISource("somefile.avi")
SmoothDeinterlace(tff=true, doublerate=true)

  Then simply drag the .avs file into the editor, it will appear as a double frame rate version of the source.
  When doing this with some editors (Such as Premiere), the footage will seem squashed horizontally. This is because it thinks the footage is square pixels, when they are in fact  not. (PAL and NTSC pixels are rectangular). In premiere this is fixed by selecting the source clip and chosing "Interpret Footage" and forcing it to the correct aspect ratio (1.067 for PAL)
  
  I will clarify this section at a later date.
  
  
• Interlaced ("TV") mode caveat:
  Most miniDV cams film in interlaced. Interlaced fields are either stored "top field first" (tff) or "bottom field first" (bff). PAL DV for example is normally bff. I think NTSC DV is bff too. The miniket is tff! So be careful mixing miniket interlaced footage and miniDV. Your project likely has to be one or the other, but for example in Premiere you can right click a clip and select "Reverse field order". If you see wierd stuttering of motion (eg a moving subject goes forwards most frames but backwards in some) then you likely have a field order issue.

Links

Samsung's Miniket Page

My Miniket Forum
Quikpod
Contact me

Linkback to this page for google: Miniket VP-X300L FAQ Samsung DivX Camcorder SD