Up until this fall, Tachylon’s core competency was camera helmets, particularly specimens built to survive (and, in kind, record) ones probable end of days. Their none-too-discrete, dual POV and, hence what the company calls 3-D, recording system was the first consumer compatible model we’d ever heard of and has met with considerable success in the expendable income bracket like with motorcycle riders or people who jump off of bridges or those coasting into retirement.
So, it’s no big leap that the Texas based tinkerers would start offering gun mountable cameras too. Since the 90s, US law enforcement agencies have used car mounted cameras, gun cameras and the like “to help keep everything honest” and video feeds are fast becoming an inextricable facet in modern warfare as witnessed with the use of helmet cameras in both Iraq and Afghanistan. And every once in a blue moon we’ll hear, usually from a somewhat colorful character perhaps at a bar or in the forgotten corner of some gun show, about some far-fetched and abstruse government conspiracy that aims to fit every gun with a camera.
And though the gun camera hasn’t entirely lost the novelty of its helmet mounted cousin, we can definitely see the practical allure for hunters. With so much detail to be missed when you’re in the field and opportunities to take game comparatively “rare” (and coupled with a memory obliterating rush of adrenaline), a moderately priced gun camera built like a nuclear bunker could become a valuable teaching aid. Plus, you can watch your hunts with friends and relive the glory of a successful hunt or Monday morning quarterback the detailed footage of your own incompetence.
Engadget, a venerable reviewer of gadgets, didn’t necessarily give Tachyon’s helmet mounts gold stars when it came to their Video Graphics Array quality but a recently developed 720p sensor featured in the new Tachyon XC HD camera mount promises to crisp things up a bit. And Tachyon wisely retained the housing on the gun mount they used on the aforementioned twin lens number. This mount gets high marks from us for it’s upgraded waterproofing to up to 100 feet—I know I wouldn’t take electronics into the soggy woods of Appalachia in late November unless it was seal skin waterproof.
The Tachyon XC HD with Picatinny rail mount costs about $205, which is close to what you’d shell out on competing models like GoPro‘s HD Hero 960. Unless you’re a cop.