GoPro Jaws Flex Clamp Review
A few years ago Sam brought in a new fandangle gadget into a buyers meeting that he wanted our fly shop stores to start carrying. He made his presentation to the group on the overhead projector on a computer with awful audio quality and we were all shown our very first glimpse into the world of GoPro. Despite the Mickey Mouse type audio from computer speakers, GoPro easily made its way into our stores and the rest, as they say is history. These days GoPro is everywhere in the media from its own piece on 20/20, reality TV shows, it's huge success on social, and even winning it's very own 2013 Emmy Award for its ground breaking Hero3 camera technology, GoPro has made it very easy for anyone to capture engaging perspectives that were never before possible.
GoPro works hard on developing new mounting accessories and ways for people to wear their cameras to capture different perspectives of what they do. The Go Pro Jaws Flex Clamp arrived into our stores right before Christmas and we just had to take this out on a field trip to provide some input back to our users. I'm a big fan of long exposure photography, stop motion, and time lapses, and I wondered how this new mounting device could give us a different perspective on an all-day fly fishing trip on the Missouri River? Only one way to find out.
The GoPro Jaws Flex Clamp secures easily to pretty much any object from .25" to 2". You can mount your camera directly to the clamp itself or onto the flexible neck for a wider angle adjustability. On this trip we chose to mount it out of the way behind the oarsman, which for the most part it was. This little device was really easy to use, and it stayed put most of the day until we hit a sandbar in faster current. At that point both the camera and the back seat angler both hung off the edge of the boat a bit more than they were comfortable with (whoops, sorry about that Rob). As with anything you are using around water, I would advise to have a back-up plan such as piece of para-cord tied to the oar lock just in case it does take spill. It is one thing to lose a clamp, but quite another to lose your jaws flex clamp and your Go Pro Camera along with all your hard work.
Gauging the length of this trip, I figured it would it take us about eight hours to cover the distance, stopping for a few wade sections.
With past experience, I know shooting 1080p images with a every thirty seconds with a single battery will last about one hour with an LCD BacPac attached and about two hours without a display. A simple solution was to set the appropriate camera angle using the LCD display, then switching over to the Battery BacPac once set that takes up the same amount of space and fits securely in a BacPac compatible housing. Problem solved and I gauged it pretty close as the first set of batteries died at Stickney Creek, which is about half way. Once secured, the angle and openness of the Jaws Flex Clamp makes it very easy to remove the camera from the housing, switch the battery pack and put it right back into its original angle. The flexible neck is sturdy enough to hold the angle all day, but not so stiff that it is impossible to set.
Overall, I was really impressed with this camera mount because it is very simple to mount to basically anything, puts the camera in creative angles and I felt it was secure once in place. I see a lot of use for this in the future for different perspectives into the wide array of work and recreational products we carry. We will be headed to Augusta, MT this coming weekend to a get cow's eye view through a squeeze chute and am planning on taking it out a lot more. The GoPro Jaws Flex Clamp is currently available in all our store locations in Montana, Washington and Idaho. Give it a try to quickly move your camera between mounts and locations of the moments that matter.