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Brinno BCC5000 Time Lapse Bundle: one-minute review
While many of the best action cameras allow you to capture short-form timelapse videos thanks to their diverse functionality, it’s the best timelapse cameras that make long-form timelapse videos possible. Here, I’m talking about days, weeks or even months in duration, and for this, you need a special kind of camera.
The Brinno BCC5000 Time Lapse Bundle is a comprehensive kit that includes the Brinno TLC5000 4K timelapse camera, a tough weather-resistant housing, and a versatile camera clamp that allows the camera and housing to be attached to a wide variety of surfaces, such as the top of walls, beams and girders.
The camera can also be attached to a tripod, but this is more suitable for shorter rather than long-term timelapse video capture. The camera can be used without its housing, but since it lacks a screen, connection and control via Bluetooth and Wi-Fi provide a greater level of precision in or out of the housing. Bluetooth isn’t perfect, and we’ll discuss that later.
Construction timelapse cameras aren’t cheap, as I discovered when I reviewed the Brinno TLC 300 and the Brinno TLC 2020. These are, however, extremely low-cost when compared to the Brinno BCC5000 Time Lapse Bundle, which costs $1,899 / £1,899 / AU$TBC. It’s not cheap, but the functionality and shooting duration on offer are greatly increased as you’d expect.
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Brinno BCC5000 Time Lapse Bundle specs
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Type: |
1/1.8-inch Sony STARVIS 2 |
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Lens angle of view: |
118 degrees |
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Aperture: |
f/2.0 |
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Interval times: |
3 sec–24 hours |
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Connectivity: |
BLE 4.0 / Wi-Fi/ 2.4GHz 802.11 |
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Camera dimensions: |
3.8 x 3.8 x 2.6 inches / 96 x97.5 x 66.2mm |
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Housing dimensions: |
6.7 x4.1 x 9.3 inches / 170 x 104 x 236mm |
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Camera weight: |
7.9oz / 224g (without battery) |
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Housing weight: |
23.2oz / 657g (without camera & batteries) |
Brinno BCC5000 Time Lapse Bundle: Design
- No screen
- Minimal design
- Large weather-sealed housing
The Brinno BCC5000 Time Lapse Bundle is the sum of two parts – you have the camera itself, and then you have the robust ATH5000 weatherproof housing. The housing allows for long-term capture, with three battery slots for extended use, with the ability to recharge the batteries in or out of the housing.
You can use the camera independently of the housing when capturing timelapse videos over several hours, or perhaps a day, in fine weather, but it’s not waterproof, so the housing is essential for longer captures.
The camera itself features an almost cube-like design that’s 3.8 x 3.8 x 2.6 inches / 96 x 97.5 x 66.2mm with just two buttons for operation: an on/off switch, a microSD card slot and a USB-C port.
There’s no screen on the camera, so you have to connect it to a laptop or smart device using Bluetooth or Wi-Fi. This allows you to take a photo when using Bluetooth or view a live feed when connected to Wi-Fi to compose the camera.
When using just the camera, a single battery can be installed in the rear, and there’s a small lens hood that can be attached to the lens. There’s also a spirit level on the front of the TLC5000 that helps you to level the camera on the horizontal axis.
According to the Brinno website, the bundle, which includes two batteries, can provide up to 200 days of shooting with a five-minute capture interval. I’m assuming this is with two batteries rather than three, but it’s unclear.
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The Li-ion batteries have a capacity of 45.4Wh or roughly 12,611mAh, and take around six hours to charge. So, although they can be charged in the housing via USB-C, it might make more sense to remove the used battery/batteries and charge them elsewhere in order to maintain the weatherproofing of the housing and the batteries in the battery compartment.
The housing is surprisingly large at 6.7 x 4.1 x 9.3 inches / 170 x 104 x 236mm, but this is split into two sections, one for the camera and another for the batteries. When the camera is used in the housing it’s plugged into the housing, and doesn’t require a battery, as power is supplied from the battery compartment.
The housing doors clip securely to make it watertight, and there are loops where locks or cable ties can be used if desired. This will only keep the housing closed, though and won’t prevent theft.
In the kit you get the TLC5000 camera, the ATH5000 housing, two batteries, the ACC5000 Camera Clamp Pro, a lens hood, a 64GB microSD card, a USB-C cable and silica gel packs to put in the housing to eliminate moisture.
Brinno BCC5000 Time Lapse Bundle: Performance
- Great image quality for this type of camera
- Bluetooth connection is glitchy in some ways
- Settings are limited with Bluetooth
The key advantage of the TLC5000 is its ability to capture long-term timelapse videos of construction sites, and any location for that matter. Setting up and using the camera is incredibly easy with the limited camera controls available. All you have is Exposure Mode for Daytime, Twilight and Night, Timestamp on/off, Sharpness, Saturation, Playback rate, time interval and schedule. This is pretty much a point-and-shoot 4K camera.
The shortest time intervals available for the different shooting modes are Daytime three seconds, Twilight five seconds and Night 10 seconds; shorter would be better. The maximum interval is 24 hours. You can shoot with the camera using the basic controls on the front of the camera to set the interval and begin shooting. These can be used whether the camera is being used independently or in the housing, since with the latter, the camera sits on a plate that slots into place easily so the composition is maintained.
To get the most out of the camera you have to connect it to a Wi-Fi network, which opens up access to all settings and remote access via the Brinno cloud. This only possible, though, if Wi-Fi is available at the shooting location. Brinno cloud access means you can access settings, including scheduling, and download captures remotely, although downloading was extremely slow during testing.
You can also connect over Bluetooth, although only basic interval, scheduling and start/stop controls are available via the Chrome browser. The take-a-photo function, for composing the camera, is extremely hit or miss – sometimes it works, often it won’t, and other times it produces an overexposed and unviewable image. It would make sense for this connection to be flawless since it’s likely the most convenient and popular way for people to connect to the camera wirelessly.
Brinno TLC5000 video straight out of camera
Browser-based camera control isn’t ideal, but it does work to be fair. Brinno has confirmed that Android and iOS apps are in development, so hopefully these and future firmware updates will fix the Bluetooth photo issue.
It would be beneficial for all settings to be available in these apps and via Bluetooth when using the Chrome browser, because the limitations here leave you unable to adjust many settings if no Wi-Fi network is available. You could, of course, set up a Wi-Fi hotspot with your smartphone simply to change more settings than Bluetooth allows, but it’s not a streamlined approach.
Brinno TLC5000 video white balance corrected
Image quality is impressive for a dedicated timelapse camera, but it’s not perfect. 4K is a fantastic resolution, and the standard to be expected these days. Even night captures are impressive, with fairly clean footage. You can only really notice the small amount of color noise when you pause night captures.
Images can look too sharp and oversaturated, so delving into these controls and adjusting them accordingly will provide more favorable and personalized results. White balance in daylight can be far too warm, but it can be corrected in video editing software. Chromatic aberration is visible along high-contrast subject edges.
You can’t take photos with the camera, but you can extract stills from footage using the Brinno Video Player, although i found this Windows-only software to be glitchy and generally awful to use. VLC Player (free) proved to be a much better video player for grabbing 4K stills from footage.
Should you buy the Brinno BCC5000 Time Lapse Bundle?
Buy it if…
Don’t buy it if…
How I tested the Brinno BCC5000 Time Lapse Bundle
- I tested the camera over several weeks
- I used it at different times of day
- I tested all connection methods for shooting
I tested the Brinno BCC5000 Time Lapse Bundle in shorter bursts rather than for long-form timelapse capture, as testing the extremes of scheduling would have taken months. I was, however, able to test basic scheduling using different interval times at different times of the day and night.
I used my smartphone, tablet and laptop for Bluetooth connection. To test the Wi-Fi control I used both my laptop and tablet connected over my home network. I also used the TLC5000 manually, and composed ‘blind’ by simply pointing the camera and starting shooting using the direct-access controls.
With nearly 30 years of photographic experience and 17 years working as a photography journalist, I’ve used many of the cameras and lenses that have been released in that time. As a working photographer, I aim to test cameras and lenses from a photographer’s point of view.
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