Trail cam remote imaging

timbrayford

Well-Known Member
Are any of the Trail cams capable of remote imaging? I am intending to place the camera in a vulnerable area and it would be extremely useful to have images retained if it was to be stolen or broken. atb Tim
 
Take a look here:

http://www.trailcampro.com/

And ask any questions you have on the forums here:

http://www.chasingame.com/forum/viewforum.php?f=22

And you will get good answers. As I understand it some can send the photos as MMS message to a mobile phone using a normal mobile phone SIM while some can use a SIM with a data plan to send the images as email messages to either your computer or your mobile if it does the email thing. Clearly there will be a cost associated with the phone SIM and if you get a camera that is triggering off a blowing leaf or similar then you could be into a lot of money pretty fast even with a data contract.

I guess the ideal camera would allow you to phone it from your mobile and get it to stop taking photos, so if it went mad you could stop it before it cost you a lot of cash.

I'm currently playing with a Bushnell at the minute but it doesn't send the pictures anywhere, however the images are good and the video impressive. What I've found is that aiming the sensor in the vertical plane is very critical and that's why I haven't got a single decent photo out of it yet :)
 
Thanks for the info, having looked at the Spypoint live (expensive to buy & run) and also the Spypoint Tiny W2, I might try a different option possibly the Bushnell trophy cam HD max and use it with a security box. atb Tim
 
It might be worth considering bringing the camera in from the USA, which is what I did. I have the BTC HD, so it doesn't have the "no-glow" LEDs but apart from that is the same camera as what you are looking at. Cost in the USA is about £112. Aiming is much more critical than I expected so you will need to be careful with locating the security box as I found a few degrees tilt up or down means no photos.
 
It might be worth considering bringing the camera in from the USA, which is what I did. I have the BTC HD, so it doesn't have the "no-glow" LEDs but apart from that is the same camera as what you are looking at. Cost in the USA is about £112. Aiming is much more critical than I expected so you will need to be careful with locating the security box as I found a few degrees tilt up or down means no photos.
Thanks for the advice, did you have any problems with Customs & taxes or the delivery?
 
No problems at all - though I did get charged tax on it. Even paying delivery and tax it was a lot less expensive than they are here. In fact until very recently you couldn't get the 2012 models here at all. I specifically wanted a 2012 model as it has a much faster trigger time and a longer flash range than the 2011 models. However, if you take a look at the chasingame.com forums you will find that some people prefer the 2011 BTCs because they have less motion blur. For me faster trigger time is more important than a little blur as I'm more interested in what is there than in being able to see every small detail. The video on the 2012 models is said to be good enough to take a capture from and it said not to have any blur so that might be a solution for you. I haven't played with the video yet as I'm still trying to get the basics sorted out and get a photo of a deer!

You need to be a little careful with Bushnell model numbers as they are a pain and it can be very difficult to sort out exactly what you are buying. My advice is to look at the Bushnell web site and get yourself wise to the exact model number of the camera you want. Should you see a camera advertised online then don't buy unless the right model number is clearly stated - with me wanted the faster trigger time of the 2012 model I looked online at a few cameras I thought were the right ones, especially in the UK, before finding out they were the old model number. Don't buy anything unless you know the exact model number and it matches with what you want!

Bushnell must have a deal with SANDisk and recommend their SD cards but I bought less expensive 7DayShop cards that are working well for me. One thing though - if you want to shoot HD video then you need a class 10 card as anything less than this may not be fast enough. Going for a class 10 card also has the advantage that saving photos takes less time and so should slightly reduce battery consumption when the camera is taking photos. I bought two 16Gig cards and just swap them around when I go to the camera.

Also Bushnell say that rechargeable batteries will not work but everyone else says this is untrue. Bushnell recommend AA Energizer Ultimate Lithium which can not be recharged and are relatively expensive (take a look on Amazon or somewhere reliable if you want them as there may be some fakes or partly used ones floating about) however I went with the Energizer Lithiums and have found they work well and after a month there is no sign of any drop in voltage on them. Bushnell say the lithiums should do 12 months at 30 photos per day and they cost about £1 each so I figure if it costs me £8 per year to run the camera, or even per 6 months, then it doesn't justify the hassle of rechargeables.

Another useful tip is that most digital cameras will read the SD cards written in the BTC - so take your camera when you are setting the trail camera up and do some walk-past tests and then use the screen on your digital camera to view the images so you are sure you've got your aiming and triggering right. This saves the cost of buying a model with a screen as by all accounts the screens are next to useless on them.
 
Little acorn trail camera has mms on it. Can take up to 10 mins to send pictures but is instant SMS MSG. Tried a few and few and have found these the best.
 
No problems at all - though I did get charged tax on it. Even paying delivery and tax it was a lot less expensive than they are here. In fact until very recently you couldn't get the 2012 models here at all. I specifically wanted a 2012 model as it has a much faster trigger time and a longer flash range than the 2011 models. However, if you take a look at the chasingame.com forums you will find that some people prefer the 2011 BTCs because they have less motion blur. For me faster trigger time is more important than a little blur as I'm more interested in what is there than in being able to see every small detail. The video on the 2012 models is said to be good enough to take a capture from and it said not to have any blur so that might be a solution for you. I haven't played with the video yet as I'm still trying to get the basics sorted out and get a photo of a deer!

You need to be a little careful with Bushnell model numbers as they are a pain and it can be very difficult to sort out exactly what you are buying. My advice is to look at the Bushnell web site and get yourself wise to the exact model number of the camera you want. Should you see a camera advertised online then don't buy unless the right model number is clearly stated - with me wanted the faster trigger time of the 2012 model I looked online at a few cameras I thought were the right ones, especially in the UK, before finding out they were the old model number. Don't buy anything unless you know the exact model number and it matches with what you want!

Bushnell must have a deal with SANDisk and recommend their SD cards but I bought less expensive 7DayShop cards that are working well for me. One thing though - if you want to shoot HD video then you need a class 10 card as anything less than this may not be fast enough. Going for a class 10 card also has the advantage that saving photos takes less time and so should slightly reduce battery consumption when the camera is taking photos. I bought two 16Gig cards and just swap them around when I go to the camera.

Also Bushnell say that rechargeable batteries will not work but everyone else says this is untrue. Bushnell recommend AA Energizer Ultimate Lithium which can not be recharged and are relatively expensive (take a look on Amazon or somewhere reliable if you want them as there may be some fakes or partly used ones floating about) however I went with the Energizer Lithiums and have found they work well and after a month there is no sign of any drop in voltage on them. Bushnell say the lithiums should do 12 months at 30 photos per day and they cost about £1 each so I figure if it costs me £8 per year to run the camera, or even per 6 months, then it doesn't justify the hassle of rechargeables.

Another useful tip is that most digital cameras will read the SD cards written in the BTC - so take your camera when you are setting the trail camera up and do some walk-past tests and then use the screen on your digital camera to view the images so you are sure you've got your aiming and triggering right. This saves the cost of buying a model with a screen as by all accounts the screens are next to useless on them.
Thanks for sharing your experience Caorach, lots of useful info. atb Tim
 
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