Sound Advice
By Don Lindich
Week 8, 2018
Q. I want to buy a rugged stills camera that can take the shock of a fall when skiing. I’ve been taking my old iPhone 6 Plus with me as I consider it somewhat expendable, but still feel like I am courting disaster and want to get something dedicated to the task. I also imagine such a camera would be easier to operate with gloves on. Price is unimportant, I will be keeping it a long time!
-J.P., Hazleton, PA
A. I will start with the suggestion that if you do not have a rugged case for your iPhone 6 Plus, using one will bring you some peace of mind on the slopes. The Otterbox Defender series is a good choice and they start at $69.99.
Olympus owns the overwhelming market share of the rugged camera market, and for good reason. No one else offers the same combination of ease of use, picture quality, advanced features and bomb-proof construction as the Olympus Tough series cameras. It has been that way for years and it will likely stay that way into the foreseeable future, especially with Olympus’ ongoing support of winter sports and annual sponsorship of the Whistler World Ski and Snowboard Festival. These cameras and those who use them are extremely important to Olympus, and it shows.
The $449 Olympus Tough TG-5 has a fast f/2.0 lens for use in low-light situations, very rare for any compact camera. It is also a fog-free lens, perfect for use in cold weather. Though it is in its element on the slopes, hiking, biking, whitewater rafting, and underwater up to 50 feet, the TG-5 is good enough to be your camera for birthday parties and vacations, too. There is far more to the TG-5 than I can discuss in a single column, including 4K video, 20 frame per second shooting and many available accessories, so I suggest a visit to getolympus.com to learn more.
If you do not have an action camera like a GoPro for your outdoor activities, for the price of an Otterbox case you can get a great companion to your Olympus TG-5. At only $69.99, the SJCAM SJ4000 action camera is one of my all-time favorite budget buys and is cheap enough to be an impulse purchase. The SJCAM SJ4000 has a built-in LCD screen for composition and playback, and produces beautiful 1080p footage at 30 frames per second. It is compatible with the GoPro mounting system and includes lots of mounts and accessories, including a waterproof housing good to a 100-foot depth. Counterfeit SJ4000s abound, so I suggest avoiding eBay and getting your SJCAM SJ4000 only from SJCAM Official Store
Headphone coverage continues: This week I have the opposite of last week’s closed-back, wireless Panasonic Retro Bluetooth headphones, with an open-back wired model. What both headphones have in common is they are gems that are not as well-known as they should be.
The open-back Audio-Technica ATH-AD500X headphones have airy, natural, and clean sound quality that is quite similar to the Panasonic Retro headphones, but without the isolation of the Panasonic’s closed-back earcups. Though they list for $169.95 they typically sell online for under $80. The sound, style and comfort would be competitive at $169, so getting them for half of that makes them quite a value. I will have a full review of the ATH-AD500X on my headphones website soon.