wes
scholastic sledgehammer
Reged: 11/13/03
Posts: 982
Loc: Oklahoma
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Hi,
This is an image (Rimi Hyginus) from my first night out with a new camera,the camera is an ImagagingSource DMK21F04 B&W Firewire video camera , this camera has the B&W version of the chip in the Toucam Pro and has almost three times the sensitivity and can image at 30FPS with NO compression.
Even at full gain this camera has very little noise and it also does no in camera sharpening of the image, so far I plan on just using this camera on the Moon and the
ISS, if I ever get some more clear skies and hopefully good seeing I will post some more images from this camera.
A downside to 30FPS is an uncompressed 30 second file is 1GB and it needs a very fast computer .
The seeing was actually not very good and I could only get
25 frames worth stacking .
Thanks,
Wes
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Emanuele
Lord Pentaxian
Reged: 11/19/03
Posts: 4163
Loc: Miami, Florida
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IMpressive details there! WOW.
Too bad the camera costs a lot though, otherwise I would picking it up! 
Great shot!
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http://www.backyardskies.com
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gazerjim
Postmaster
Reged: 02/12/04
Posts: 7776
Loc: About where I thought I was......
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Veery interesting. Could it also be used with external filters for color imaging with higher signal to noise ratio than a webcam? As is, looks like the ultimate tool for lunar work.
Jim
--------------------
Jim Fisher
If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the precipitate.
Henry J. Tillman
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Suk Lee
Post Laureate
Reged: 10/07/03
Posts: 4319
Loc: Pleasanton, CA
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Pretty impressive.
Where did you hear about the camera?
Suk
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http://www.siliconvalleyskies.com
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wes
scholastic sledgehammer
Reged: 11/13/03
Posts: 982
Loc: Oklahoma
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Emanuele,
Thanks!
At $580.00 US it is pretty expensive when compared to the
Toucam Pro, it's still to early to tell if it is actually worth the extra cost.
Thanks,
Wes
Quote:
IMpressive details there! WOW.
Too bad the camera costs a lot though, otherwise I would picking it up!
Great shot!
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wes
scholastic sledgehammer
Reged: 11/13/03
Posts: 982
Loc: Oklahoma
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Jim,
I think this camera imaging at 30FPS uncompressd would be just the ticket for RGB or LRGB imaging of the planets.
You could image for two minutes and still have a little
under 1200 frames for each color depending on how much time it takes to change the filters .
Thanks,
Wes
Quote:
Veery interesting. Could it also be used with external filters for color imaging with higher signal to noise ratio than a webcam? As is, looks like the ultimate tool for lunar work.
Jim
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wes
scholastic sledgehammer
Reged: 11/13/03
Posts: 982
Loc: Oklahoma
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HI Suk,
I started looking about a year ago for a Firewire camera that had the same CCD as the Toucam Pro 740 and came up empty handed until about a month ago when I found this
camera while surfing the Net .
Thanks,
Wes
Quote:
Pretty impressive.
Where did you hear about the camera?
Suk
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Emanuele
Lord Pentaxian
Reged: 11/19/03
Posts: 4163
Loc: Miami, Florida
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Wes,
at this point the "Webcam Imgaing crowd" is just waiting for your impression and images to see if it is worth the extra money.
So keep up the splenid work at imaging and report here a lot!
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http://www.backyardskies.com
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Bird
Carpal Tunnel
Reged: 08/07/03
Posts: 2628
Loc: Canberra, Australia
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Definitely interested. I've been wanting something like this myself for a while.
mmmm. C'mon wes - lets see what that baby can do!
Bird
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Deep Sky Optics 13.1" f/5.5 newtonian,
PGR Dragonfly Express, PGR Dragonfly 2
RedHat Linux + Coriander
http://www.acquerra.com.au/astro/
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Bird
Carpal Tunnel
Reged: 08/07/03
Posts: 2628
Loc: Canberra, Australia
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I guess that once you put filters back in front that the sensitivity will drop down to the same as the toucam?
Bird
--------------------
Deep Sky Optics 13.1" f/5.5 newtonian,
PGR Dragonfly Express, PGR Dragonfly 2
RedHat Linux + Coriander
http://www.acquerra.com.au/astro/
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wes
scholastic sledgehammer
Reged: 11/13/03
Posts: 982
Loc: Oklahoma
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Bird,
Each pixel sensor in a CCD designed for color has a red, green or blue color filter over it, the most common layout or array is called the Bayer pattern which has alternating rows of RGB filters with 2/3 being green. The use of a filter array cuts the color resolution of the CCD down to about one third of the original resolution because about a third of the CCD pixels are used for each primary color.
Another limiting factor is that due to the layout of the
Bayer pattern not all of the information is received,
the missing values are recovered using interpolation
which is just an algorithm for guessing at the missing
values.
When tri-color imaging with high quality RGB filters and a monochrome CCD you should only loose around one or two
percent due to light loss .
Thanks,
Wes
Quote:
I guess that once you put filters back in front that the sensitivity will drop down to the same as the toucam?
Bird
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Emanuele
Lord Pentaxian
Reged: 11/19/03
Posts: 4163
Loc: Miami, Florida
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Hey Wes,
how is it going with the new webcam? Any improvement/new discoveries in imgaing?
Can`t wait to hear from you.
Emanuele
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http://www.backyardskies.com
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Bird
Carpal Tunnel
Reged: 08/07/03
Posts: 2628
Loc: Canberra, Australia
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Thanks Wes - in theory I already knew that stuff, but I posted that comment without thinking. :-)
You probably won't know the answer to this, but if it's using the same sensor as the toucam, how can it be 3x more sensitive? Is it just the quality of the electronics in the camera?
Or did you mean 3x the resolution? That I can believe since it's monochrome.
After thinking about using one of these babies in practice I've decided that I'd have to buy/build a colour wheel. There's no way I'd be pulling the camera in & out each time I wanted to change colours :-)
cheers, Bird
--------------------
Deep Sky Optics 13.1" f/5.5 newtonian,
PGR Dragonfly Express, PGR Dragonfly 2
RedHat Linux + Coriander
http://www.acquerra.com.au/astro/
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gazerjim
Postmaster
Reged: 02/12/04
Posts: 7776
Loc: About where I thought I was......
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Wes: anxious to see how your experiment w/new cam works out. My first question was how the camera manages lower noise levels using the same chip as webcam. Maybe due to the fact that all monochrome pixels are used at full sensitvity?
Jim
--------------------
Jim Fisher
If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the precipitate.
Henry J. Tillman
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wes
scholastic sledgehammer
Reged: 11/13/03
Posts: 982
Loc: Oklahoma
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Hi Bird,
I thought you probably knew all about Bayer filter mosaics.
Peter Katreniak the author of K3CCDTools has a comparison
graph of the sensitivity of several Sony CCD at his web
site (see link below)
http://www.pk3.org/Astro/index.htm?k3ccdtools.htm
The almost three times Sensitivity statement came from
my interpretation of the graphs that Peter made, in real
conditions I have no idea if that is accurate though.
Thanks,
Wes
Quote:
Thanks Wes - in theory I already knew that stuff, but I posted that comment without thinking. :-)
You probably won't know the answer to this, but if it's using the same sensor as the toucam, how can it be 3x more sensitive? Is it just the quality of the electronics in the camera?
Or did you mean 3x the resolution? That I can believe since it's monochrome.
After thinking about using one of these babies in practice I've decided that I'd have to buy/build a colour wheel. There's no way I'd be pulling the camera in & out each time I wanted to change colours :-)
cheers, Bird
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wes
scholastic sledgehammer
Reged: 11/13/03
Posts: 982
Loc: Oklahoma
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Hi Jim,
My lower noise level statement was strictly from my
first use of the camera as compared to the Toucam Pro
and admittedly I need more experience with the camera
to make a fair comparison .
Thanks,
Wes
Quote:
Wes: anxious to see how your experiment w/new cam works out. My first question was how the camera manages lower noise levels using the same chip as webcam. Maybe due to the fact that all monochrome pixels are used at full sensitvity?
Jim
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Anonymous
Unregistered
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The Sony ICX098AL CCD is the monochrome version of the ICX098AK colour CCD used in the ToUcam. Without the built in filters it would be much more sensitive.
Edited by DenisT (05/03/04 08:01 PM)
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wes
scholastic sledgehammer
Reged: 11/13/03
Posts: 982
Loc: Oklahoma
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Hi,
The Toucam Pro 740 and the newer 840 both use a Sony ICX098BQ and the Monochrome version is the ICX098BL,
the Sony ICX098AK is used in most of the Phillips Vesta Pro
web cams , I think that some of the Vesta Pro's did have the
ICX098BQ CCD though.
Regardless of what CCD they have I agree as you said the
monochrome version will have more sensitivity .
Thanks,
Wes
Quote:
The Sony ICX098AL CCD is the monochrome version of the ICX098AK colour CCD used in the ToUcam. Without the built in filters it would be much more sensitive.
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gazerjim
Postmaster
Reged: 02/12/04
Posts: 7776
Loc: About where I thought I was......
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I think you are onto something there, Wes!
--------------------
Jim Fisher
If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the precipitate.
Henry J. Tillman
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Anonymous
Unregistered
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Wes
What happens when you use the black and white mode in a CCD web cam? Does it become more senstive or is it just doing some digital filtering and using the built in colour filters?
Looking forward to seeing more pics from your cam.
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