Got a 2019 4Runner two months ago, and it has the back up camera. Cool.
But, I don’t like using it. I want my eyes out the windows and look over my shoulder and in the mirrors. I’m SURE it will help with parallel parking which I do perhaps 6 times a year.
I check it now when backing up, It’s a very wide angle. I can see my own bumper. But then I must look for myself. I need to see everything.
I sort of feel like it’s a distraction. I want my eyes looking out of the vehicle when it’s moving, at all times.
I guess the poll is - “Do you have a backup camera? Do you use it?”
Yes, I have it. Yes, I use it. I also use my mirrors. The back up camera shows me things that I can’t see easily (or at all) with my mirrors. Especially with my SUV, I’d rather not run over the hedge trimmer in my driveway, and it really helps a lot with parking.
I have one and use it in addition to the mirrors, etc. I am a driving instructor and teach my students to use one if the vehicle has it, but not to be dependent on it.
I treat it as just one more place to look: rear camera view, rear view mirror, driver side mirror, passenger side mirror, back over my shoulder, general scan around everywhere. I figure it’s the place you don’t look that’s gonna getcha someday.
I don’t own one, but we have a couple of newer small trucks where I work that have them. Very useful for hooking up a flatbed trailer that we use now and then. Other than that I don’t really like them for backing, feels distracting. We have one larger truck also that has one, extremely useful for backing that one, in certain circimstances, since it has no rearview mirror and a big cargo box blocking the back window.
I have one. I mostly only use it (in addition to my mirrors) for parallel parking or backing into a parking space, where I might hit something. Just backing up out of a parking space or my drive way, I just use my mirrors.
Have it, use it. I do not look back over my shoulder when backing up in a car with a functioning rear view camera. Maybe it sounds very conscientious and careful to look at the rear camera screen and over your shoulder but I don’t see how that makes sense in practice. I look at the rear view screen and the two side mirrors. I can move my eyes rapidly among the three, safer IMO than for some reason also craning my neck around when I have the rear view camera.
Right now we park both our cars in garages but if we park on the street it’s always parallel. It’s (more) miserable to drive around here if you’re not good at it. The camera helps considerably, but also you have look carefully in curb side side mirror, and nice feature that the car tilts them down automatically in reverse to see the curb.
I turn and look because it is what I have done for decades, but the camera is a good supplementary tool especially when in a vehicle where visibility may not be optimal or in an unfamiliar one where I may not have a good sense of where the body corners are and how well it can fit. And of course in parallel/back-in parking it is a great resource.
I find the rear-view camera on my Honda is a good supplement to other views. Modern cars, due to the aerodynamic body shapes, make it quite impossible to see all four corners. Parallel parking with these cars, something I have never had a problem with for 50 years[sup]*[/sup], now becomes a challenge. The rear video helps overcome this design fault. Although it gets dirty from road grime and has to be wiped off frequently.
I took my first driving license test without ever having attempted parallel parking before, and I aced it (I was in a hurry, no time to learn or practice). I’m pretty sure I couldn’t have passed the test with 201X cars.
Rear vision is poor on my car ( 6th generation chevrolet camaro ), especially rear quarter vision. A person walking behind can be easily hidden. If I didn’t have a rear camera, I’d feel compelled to stop every few feet, get out and make sure the immediate area is clear of cars/people/objects, back a few feet more, repeat… As it is, backing is always risky in any vehicle and I make every attempt to park in a way that I pull in forward, and pull out forward.
Have it, use it, love it. It’s great for knowing whether or not you are exactly straight (yeah, I’m not a fantastic backer-upper). I also really like it for telling me how close I am to things behind me - when backing out of parking deck, I had thought I was much closer to other cars that I actually was. I do still look over my shoulder before backing out of parking places, but it’s more a side-to-side to see the perpendicular, so I know no one (car or person) is about to cross my path, but hasn’t yet.
I have one, but I primarily use the mirrors for backing up. I back into parking lot spaces, and around the moment I stop, I check the camera to see whether the red guide marks are on the line at the back of the space, as I find it hard in my current car to judge how far back the car is. I may use it likewise when parallel parking, if there are lines, but don’t find it very helpful for judging distance to the next car. I have a long curving hilly driveway that I sometimes back down, and always use the exterior mirrors exclusively for that, and it works fine. I don’t turn my head around as it doesn’t twist that far.
I have it on the same car. I couldn’t do without it. What you may not have noticed is that it gives a remarkably wide field of vision. If you’re backing out of a parking space, for example, you will pick up pedestrians well before they are directly behind your car. If there are cars parked on either side, it enables me to see a kid that I would never otherwise be able to see. Not just a toddler or someone crouching directly behind my car, but someone walking in from the side hidden from view behind an adjacent parked car when I turn my head or use the mirror.
I have one and I use it all the time when I backup and when I parallel park, so much so that when I drive a car that doesn’t have one, I end up staring at the radio for a second when I go in to reverse.
I got a car with one a few years ago, and at first I was very uncomfortable with it. Over time, I’ve come to think of it as being much more safe than looking out the windows alone. It gives me a better angle to see if a car is coming as I’m backing out of a spot, but I also look both ways for areas that the camera can’t catch (like looking through the windows of other parked cars to see traffic).
So I probably spend 75% of my time looking at the camera view, and 25% looking in the sides of the car. Zero time looking out the back.
This is what I do too, swiveling your head 180 deg to look out the back window shows you nothing that the camera doesn’t show you, and just gives you a blind spot on the side away from where you’re turning your head. So it’s a continuous scan cycle between camera, side mirrors, and turning head slightly to look out side windows.
The only thing I’d add is that before I start moving, I do first swivel my head fully around* to scan the entire area before I start using mirrors or camera, this gives you some of perspective of the larger area.
Good to hear that people aren’t depending on them. There is always something that it will miss.
I live in the mountains of Colorado. ~30 inches of snow this weekend. I plowed Friday and today. I might do it again this afternoon. Springtime in the Rockies. It’s calling for another foot. :sigh:
I drove100 miles to Denver yesterday. Denver had little snow. Yesterday, I saw at least three people with there heads up their asses (or cell phone) while running errands.
Coming home this morning at 7am we had packed snow covered roads. Two lane twisting mountain highway. No prob, just slow it down a bit. I got sort of in a caravan of good drivers that didn’t go too fast or slow. Nobody tailgating. We moved right along giving each other plenty of room. That’s a rare thing. I wanted to shake the hand of the driver in front of me. They did well.
I don’t own a car, but the last few cars we’ve rented had a back-up camera. My instinct is not to trust it, so I keep looking back the traditional way too. But I do think it’s a nifty feature.
To me, that’s rather like saying “good that people aren’t depending on the back windshield.” Yes, you use the other tools, too, but they have their own weaknesses, as well.
I love it. I never know what might be on the ground when I back up outta my garage. It helps to back up from angled parking slots in a large parking lot. Sometimes you cannot see over a higher built truck or van parked next to you. That’s when it’s amazing tech. IMO.