Any vendor, any brochure, any demo — including ours. Our own answers are printed under each question, because we insist that everyone gets asked. A real feature survives with a mechanism, a cost, and a sample image; a brochure feature responds with adjectives.
Whatever the camera’s processing does, it does it to raw data that exists inside the camera. The question is whether that original survives to reach you, or dies in a compressor milliseconds after capture. Our answer: RAW is the primary recording format. You own the file. JPEG is an export made from it, never the ceiling.
Wherever the answer is, you’ve located the exact moment extra information dies. Usually the honest answer is: immediately, in-camera, before anyone saw it. Our answer: at export, when you choose — and as often as you like, because the RAW stays.
Exposure per line is 1 ÷ line rate; physics doesn’t read brochures. And interpolated (software-doubled) lines can inflate a spec infinitely while adding no information. Our answer: up to 5,000 lines per second, chosen to match racing speeds.°
Every system looks magnificent at noon. The truth about low light is in the grain of an honest dusk image — ask for it from every vendor, and judge with your eyes. Our answer: we’ll show you — including the grainy ones, with the finish still readable.
Listen for layers: motion detection, pre-roll, continuous recording — or a pause that means “don’t miss it.” Our answer: motion detection triggers, pre-roll reaches back before the trigger, and the camera’s continuous recording holds the day anyway.
A backup that lives on the operator’s computer stops at exactly the moments backups exist for. Our answer: the camera records on-board, independently. Pull the cable mid-race; the evidence keeps writing.
With a baked JPEG: brightness reveals mush. With RAW: what the sensor caught is still in the file. Our answer: open the RAW, push the exposure slider, watch the noses come out of the dark. It has saved our own race days.
Simple paths survive diagrams. Quotes full of boxes have to explain every one. Our answer: the gun’s cable plugs into the camera. A timing box exists as an option for complex setups; the camera doesn’t need it.
Fire the start gun on the finish line: the flame in the image must read exactly 0.000. One bang tests every wire, clock, and pixel in the chain. Our answer: test-start mode is in development — until it ships, we’ll gladly run the verification procedure with you at a demo.°
The camera is rarely the slow or dangerous part; the path after it is. Our answer: a visible approval gate. Public outputs receive only what an official has approved. (Advanced)
The camera price is the headline; the total is the system. Anything “available as an upgrade” has a number — get it in writing. Our answer: the price is on the website, and the quote is itemized before you commit.
Licenses, support contracts, upgrade culture, forced repurchases — the second half of the price lives in years two through five. Our answer: Pro: nothing, ever. Advanced: €990/year°, updates included, and lapsing safely falls back to Pro.
The honest answer, from everyone in this market, is no — nobody in sports timing owns a chip fab; we all buy from the same few specialist makers. A vendor who implies otherwise has told you something useful about their marketing. Our answer: no — and neither does anyone else here. The sensor is an ingredient; compare the cooking.
Since everyone shops the same sensor shelf, real low-light progress arrives for the whole industry at once. The question is whose architecture can adopt it. Our answer: the architecture is sensor-agnostic by design. When a meaningfully better sensor exists, we can implement it.
If a vendor answers all fourteen with mechanisms, costs, and sample images — buy with confidence, whoever they are. Print the list. Bring it to every demo. Enjoy the silences.