GoPro Hero5 Black
Hugely powerful, but not without its flaws
GoPro has finally made its famous action cameras a bit more user friendly.
In this instance, the new additions include a rear touchscreen display, voice activation and easy one-button control, while the overall shooting experience has been abridged to make capturing the action as painless as possible.
Video resolution sits at 4K at 30fps; you get 12MP still images, and if slow motion is your thing you’ll be able to enjoy 1080p resolution at 120fps. Stills can be taken in single, burst and timelapse modes, and saved as raw files for post-production tinkering. In addition, a new WDR (Wide Dynamic Range) mode, which is GoPro’s version of High Dynamic Range (HDR), makes shooting perfectly exposed still images much easier.
The two-inch touchscreen is bright and easy to see, while a smaller screen at the front gives readouts on the shooting mode, SD card space and battery. There’s also a large red button on the top of the camera, which GoPro refers to as its One-Button Control. Press this rubbery square and the camera powers on and immediately starts recording.
The Hero5 Black is waterproof up to 33ft (10m) out of the box, no case required, but the absence of a case makes it feel a little exposed.
The small lens cover on the front of the camera is now removable, as GoPro offers a range of filters to boost footage captured when diving or snorkelling. You simply twist to remove the cover and snap on a filter; it’s also handy if the cover gets damaged.
Testing the water
The lack of a plastic casing greatly improves the exterior styling, and it also means that sound quality is now unobstructed. A Super Suit is available if you wish to take your camera deeper than 10m, but we’d suggest using it for any rigorous underwater activities, as we found that the wet stuff can penetrate the removable lens cover seal.
In fact, the camera feels a little naked without the tough plastic casing of old, but it does make access to the touchscreen nice and easy, while the buttons are just a prod away. It’s a sturdy housing, surviving bumps, drops and being submerged in water many times.
The only issue we found is with that removable lens casing, which caused a small
amount of water leakage for us, which in turn created some steaming in underwater shots.
Still, the Hero5 Black is very simple to set up and use – the rear touchscreen means your iPhone isn’t required for this process. You just swipe to change settings, although this can be a bit tricky when the device is wet (although you can control it with your voice).
App attack
Advanced users can fine-tune exposure with a new Exposure Control setting, as well as adjusting ISO, sharpness and EV comp through the ProTune settings. The sheer weight of options can be baffling, but it won’t take much trial and error to get things right.
The built-in spot metering is good, while the new Electronic Image Stabilisation is a huge boost for this camera, as it creates much smoother footage without inducing motion sickness. It drains the battery, though.
GoPro has revised its Capture app, which makes it easier to pair the camera to an iPhone over Wi-Fi and review footage. The pairing process is still a bit of a faff, but the app is intuitive and simple to use.
Editing is taken care of by two new iOS apps: Splice and Quik. The former gives you greater control over edits, and enables access to the iTunes library for overlaying proper music. Quik is a really easy way of cutting together a quick movie from pre-selected stills and footage. Quik’s desktop app is the most powerful editing tool that GoPro offers; you can overlay data captured from the built-in GPS technology for extreme analysis of speed, G-force and other data fields, as well as giving greater control over the editing process.
Those apps, plus the fantastic 4K video quality, great range of shooting options and improved usability make the Hero5 Black a brilliant action cam. It has its issues, not least the lack of a case, but it’s still a brilliant addition to any videographer’s kitbag.