(dramatic music)

Hey guys, I'm Brent Rose

Writer and observant antelope.

And today we're testing out the brand new

HERO5 Black and HERO5 Session.

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So these are the two new GoPro cameras.

This is the HERO5 Black,

which is the flagship model.

And this is the diminutive HERO5 Session.

Which is smaller and a little bit cheaper.

Let's start with the HERO5 Black.

Here's what's new and what's different.

First of all it finally has a touch screen,

and it's really nice, very very responsive.

The HERO4 Black didn't have a touch screen,

but it had the high frame rates.

The HERO4 Silver had the touch screen,

but the lower frame rates.

So finally GoPro wised up

and they combined the two into one,

and it's definitely a good decision.

Another big difference is this

is the first flagship GoPro that's

waterproof by itself without a case.

Now its just waterproof to 33 feet

but that should be good for surfing,

snorkeling, most water sports other than subadiving.

And that means you can get away with

just a smaller frame case for it,

so it's a little bit lighter

and it preserves much better audio.

Audio check, how do I sound?

What they did is they put in

these innovative tiny mics that clear themselves of water.

Mic clearing. (muffled vocalization)

(vocalization)

As far as resolutions and frame rates go,

it's all the same as it was with the HERO4 black.

You've got 4K at 30 frames per second,

and 1080p at frames of up to 120 frames a second

for really nice slow motion.

That said there are some new shooting modes.

For starters there's linear view.

Now you know GoPro has that kind of

classic fish eye warped point of view,

well linear mode crops 10% of the edges away

and gives you a very very straight very flat look.

It does a great job and it looks really good

it's just not quite as wide

as you're used to from a GoPro.

So if you need that extra wide look, leave that off.

There's also a new option for stabilized video.

Now same thing holds, it crops about 10% off the edges,

but it does make it a much smoother shot.

It's not perfect but it is an improvement,

so if something is really really shaky,

it might be worth turning it on.

But again if you're doing POV,

you're gonna lose a lot of the edges and the top and bottom.

So again I'm not totally sure it's worth it.

For those who have used the action cameras before,

you know that the moments you're white knuckling it

on your mountian bike

are the moments you just want to start recording

and it's also the moment you don't want

to take your hands off the handlebars.

Well, the gods have heard you

and now the GoPro can hear you too.

GoPro start recording. (beep)

GoPro stop recording. (beep)

GoPro shoot a burst. (rapid beeping)

Both the HERO5 Black and the HERO5 Session offer

about ten voice controls

and they can do it in seven different languages.

GoPro (speaking Spanish)

(rapid beeping)

GoPro (speaking Japanese)

(beep)

International gangster.

In a first for GoPro,

the HERO5 Black now supports raw photos.

This gives you way more flexibility

with things like exposure, color and detail

when you're editing later.

There's also an option for raw audio,

which when enabled,

records a separate higher fidelity wave file.

You can also choose to

have wind filters added to it automatically.

Not night and day, but it's an improvement.

This is an audio test,

first is using the regular track

and now we're going to switch over to the wave track,

how do I sound now?

Sound better? Richer? Fuller? Hopefully.

One big physical difference you'll notice

from all previous GoPro's,

is there's no more power button up front.

They moved to the side

where the Wi-Fi button used to be.

Now you can still use it to scroll through commands

and change modes and all that stuff,

which is good because when touch screens are wet

they don't work at all.

One other physical difference,

and this one on the negative side,

you can easily see that this one is rolling

by the big red flashing light.

Up here, this one is rolling too

but it's almost impossible to see.

This is really tough in bright sunlight

and it's a definite miss.

This is GoPro's new competition.

This is the Garmin VIRB Ultra 30.

Basically it looks just like a GoPro,

it has all the same frame rates and resolutions,

touch screen, voice commands,

though not as many commands and only in English,

and in general it's a really high quality.

There are some advantages and disadvantages though.

The case is designed

so you can actually use the touch screen,

even when it's in the waterproof case,

but ultimately it doesn't work that well.

In fact even outside of the case the menu system

is a little bit clunky and it's a little bit slow,

at least compared to GoPro's.

So that's a big win for the HERO5 Black.

The Garmin also has Bluetooth and AMP plus radioses.

So it can connect to

a whole sleu of external accessories,

like heartrate monitors, bicycle power meters,

so that's definitely a win for the Garmin.

Let's compare image quality,

This was shot at 1080 60.

The colors are definitely better on the GoPro.

For some reason the Garmin makes it look

like I had a bad sunburn.

Now, lets pause it right here,

look how much sharper the GoPro is.

It's much easier to see the creases

and writing on my wetsuit,

the rugged yet refined stubble on my chin

and even the definition in the mountains behind me.

Now, backlighting is one of

the tougher challenges for smaller cameras like these.

This was shot at 2.7K 24

and it's an even clearer win for the GoPro.

The dynamic range is just vastly superior

and you can see more detail in my face

and in the background behind me.

The Garmin's image looks extremely soft here.

What's really surprising is that all of that

is flipped when it comes to shooting in 4k.

Suddenly it's the Garmin

that heavily beats the GoPro in sharpness.

Further, GoPro's colors become way less accurate,

skewing toward pastel.

I have no idea why this happened.

Now, personally when I shoot action

I use 1080P almost exclusively.

So I'd still lean towards the GoPro,

but if you actually think you

might shoot more 4k than 1080,

then these are big points for the Garmin.

In low light the Garmin is brighter,

but it also has a lot more digital noise,

which I find to be distracting.

The GoPro is slightly dimmer

but the smoothness of the image is more pleasing to the eye.

Both cameras are capable

of shooting 1080p at 120 frames a second,

so if your final mix is gonna be 24 frames per second

that means you get buttery smooth 20 percent slow motion.

Both cameras do a good job,

but detail is slightly better with the Garmin,

while color is slightly better with the GoPro.

Let's call it a toss up.

Audio test 1, 2, everything outside of

their respective cases,

high notes, low notes.

Audio test 1, 2, everything outside of

their respective cases,

high notes, low notes.

1, 2, 1, 2,

everything in it's respective waterproof or frame cases.

Testing, high notes, low notes.

1, 2, 1, 2,

everything in it's respective waterproof or frame cases.

Testing, high notes, low notes.

It's definitely a close contest,

but we're giving the win to the GoPro HERO5 Black.

In most cases the image looked a little better,

audio is definitely better, especially for watersports,

and the GoPro is just much easier to use.

We wish you could do the same intricate sensor data overlays

like Garmin can but hopefully

at least some of that is coming soon.

So let's talk about the HERO5 Session.

This is GoPro's tiny little cube of a camera.

It's light, it's really easy to mount.

Physically it's identical to the HERO4 Session,

but there are some key upgrades to the brain.

For starters it now does 4k at 30 frames a second

and 1080 at speeds of up to 90.

It's a big upgrade from where it came from.

Photos have been upgraded

from eight megapixel's to 10 megapixel's.

Like it's big brother it has linear view

and stabilization options and it also has voice commands,

which is really awesome.

Also a big upgrade from last year

is you can now use the rear button and the button on top

to change the modes in the camera

and adjust all of the settings.

Previously you had to pair it with an app or remote control

which was a huge pain in the ass.

This is much, much better.

Video quality has just gotten massively better.

There's just so much more detail

than there was in the first generation of Session.

Shapes are more defined,

it's dynamic range is wider

and it simply looks like a higher end camera.

The image is a little bit darker,

which is what happens when you swap in

a sensor with higher pixel density,

but it's absolutely worth the trade off.

(upbeat music)

Audio test, 1, 2,

everything outside of their respective cases.

Audio test, 1, 2,

everything outside of their respective cases.

Lastly being able to crank the frame rate

up to 90 at 1080P means you can

get much smoother slow motion compared to

the HERO4 Session which is stuck at 60.

It's not as fast as the higher end cameras,

but it's a noticeable improvement.

Overall it just looks so much better.

So, what did we learn here today?

Well, if you watched our HERO4 Session review a year ago

you know that we love the size and form factor,

we just didn't like the resolution or the usability.

We're happy to say that a year later,

they fixed almost all of those problems

with the HERO5 Session.

Coming in at 300 bucks,

it's actually a really good deal for a really small camera.

So if you need something small and easily mountable,

this may be a good thing to look at.

If you want our pick for

the number one action camera,

we're gonna have to go with the HERO5 Black.

VIRB comes close in a lot of ways

but for overall ease of use,

durability, and image quality,

we think the GoPro HERO5 just can't be beat.

It's very flexible and it's gonna work

with GoPro's new Karma Drone,

which we'll be showing you in a video very soon.

But what do you think?

Let us know in the comments below,

subscribe to WIRED if you haven't already

and with all of that being said,

there's only one thing left to do.

(video game sounds)