AURORA BLACK WITH HARD CASE

My first NV device, tho I have a good thermal scope. I bought the Backcountry kit. The storage boxes are quite sturdy and nice, the various accessories all seem well done. The Aurora seems to work quite well for most night viewing in small town/suburb/outskirts, and with the Aurora I’m able to see clearly what I could NOT see at all with naked eye. I have not yet been able to get into a large field absent of human light sources to test with only moon/starlight. In dark shadow the illuminator is necessary, as expected. The unit is a nice size and weight. It seems to be functional as a rifle mounted clip-on with red dots. I recommend getting the better/smaller Picatinny mount from FarrowTech if you want to mount in a Pic rail. Wish I’d known about FarrowTech before I bought the OEM Picatinny adapter. The “greyscale” option works looks better for me than the “night color” or the “green” when in Night mode. But Night color is needed to see a red dot if you are using Aurora to look thru a red dot optic. For me, best role as yet is using as a hand held NV spotter. I’m still working out rifle mounted options. I may update this after more test & eval. My illuminator did not function on arrival, and SiOnyx is replacing it. I contacted both the seller and Sionyx. The seller was excellent to work with and SiOnyx was excellent as well. I’m very pleased with my purchase and would do so again with no hesitation.

Nightvision for those of us who can't afford $3k+ analog setups, plus its in color! The unit comes with 2 hardcases, one for the camera and one for the IR light. Both are top notch in quality and are solid. The camera comes with 2 batteries, lanyard, charging cord, microSD card all nicely placed in cutout high quality foam. the IR light comes with two batteries and a charger along with a rail attachment. The camera is quite nice with lots of features (photo/video/etc..) that I probably won't use much but are nice to have. I live in an area with quite a bit of ambient light so the nightvision works almost to well. The IR light itself is high quality and actually to powerful in my opinion. If you are trying to light up an entire empty field at night it might be ok, but for use around trees and smaller spaces its so powerful that it overpowers the camera a bit. I find I need to hold it away from the camera a ways to be the most effective. I might look into something with a bit less output and more of a general IR flood. The best thing about this system was the price, I got everything for less than the camera is normally by itself, so you can't go wrong.

(The two attached images are of the device with and without supplemental IR illumination for comparison respectively, review below) The Sionyx Aurora Camera is an excellent night vision camera, it helps extend your capabilities for action photography and videography in the dark. Great for photoshoots and videos at events like Milsim West or taking fun videos on hiking and biking trips where the use of IR light is less of a problem. DO NOT BE MISTAKEN, this is absolutely NOT a night vision device, it will absolutely never replace or even compare to an analog NVG (even budget tubes like Gen2 or Gen2+ image intensifiers). This is an excellent value CAMERA, it's not an image intensifier tube, dont be fooled into believing you can use it as one or you will be horribly disappointed. If you do not have that use in mind you will be very pleased with the value you get out of this package. What's good about the Sionyx Aurora Camera? It makes an amazing low light action camera especially for the price. Its small, the battery lasts a decent amount of time (and you get several in the package), it's easy to figure out without the need of instructions, and it works leagues better than the naked eye or a traditional action camera with an IR filter. What do I dislike about the Sionyx Aurora? To begin, the video can sometimes be choppy or intersected with brief spurts of grainy or unintelligible frames in extreme low light conditions (no moon/starlight and or heavy tree/cloud coverage). There is a VERY clear cutoff once you hit a certain light level, the video goes from great quality and easy to see, to pitch black and grainy. I imagine this is to be expected of a budget night camera, and can be remedied with the use of IR light (supplied in the package) when safe and applicable. The app is unusable and you have to use a data transfer Micro USB cable to get any images or videos off your device (and the cable included didn't work for me). These are the reasons I knocked a star off the review. Overall I think for the value you get in this package is astounding, just understand the limitations of the technology and understand the use case you need this for and you won't be disappointed.

Great small night vision camera, 720 p, I wish it was 4k but for mid 300 price point I can't complain. The Pro to expensive at 8 plus for little extra features. 5 stars for this model

If you’re only looking for a color night camera, this product is pretty cool. If you’re looking for functional night vision capabilities (ie for tactical purposes) this is absolutely not for you. There is a latency and blurring in the viewfinder with movement that makes it very difficult to use as a helmet or weapons mounted device. Also, it is not true night vision since it needs substantial ambient lighting relative to what’s required by true NVG’s like the PVS-14’s (which I have years of experience with). Overall, it’s fun to use just for fun, but has no tactical application, which was my goal. Seems well built and the battery seems to last for a while.

This product is truly the most bang for your buck and that statement is not empty. I am familiar with far more expensive night vision products as I am required to use them for one of my jobs. For at home use this camera kit is the most practical thing I could imagine and is very versatile. The kit come with an adjustable IR illuminator which allows it to be function in zero light situation which works surprisingly well. This is perfect for filming you tube videos in low light situations. like all other night vision products, this camera requires some type of ambient light to work well. The sionyx does need more light than something that cost 5k-8K but since they include the IR light, it's not even an issue and again, you can't beat the price. The camera is color night vision which is new to me and amazing. The color does become less vibrant and have less range with less light and becomes more of a grey-scale color when you are approaching zero light conditions but still has good picture quality. A rifle mount is not included but is available on Amazon. When paired with a 3x magnification sight mounted in front of this camera the application for night time hog and coyote hunting even airsoft is perfect. This I have tested hitting targets at 150 yards and can see for a distance greater yet than that. Night vision Scopes at the cheapest are much higher priced than this sionyx camera and are notorious for losing their zero and image quality. That is not an issue with this camera because it is a stand alone unit or so has been my experience. The battery life hase never given out on me when I've had it out using it so I don't know how long it will last with continued use, I only know it last plenty long enough. If you are using it for super extended amounts of time, this kit comes with two batteries which is a great bonus. Being digital night vision, they say there is no risk of ruining the tubes from light exposure. It can be used in broad daylight, dusk and night and I have tested it in all condition without disappointment. Some people online claim that there is some video lag when helmet mounting this camera as a monocular but in the applications I have use it I have not found such an issue. I really would recommend this product to anyone who was wanting to get into night vision on a budget or who wanted a way to shoot video at night with very pleasing results.

With a ir light looks amazing. If you are expecting them to be military grade nvg’s you will be disappointed. Needs more light to see at night compared to an-pvs14’s; But it doesn’t suffer from burn in and the tube won’t burn out. Also it’s in color, and does look fantastic with an ir light. And the price is amazing compared to used an-pvs14’s that go for over $2000

Takes a bit of playing with to get all the settings right, but is able to deliver good quality pictures in very low light conditions. Definitely maxes it's stats in the video department, but it's only 720p, but does stuff other video cameras, even those with removed hot mirrors do. The picture was taken on a low moon night of little spot fires. This is not a replacement for a real night vision device, you will be disappointed if you try to mount it on your head.