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Equipment Discussions >> Video and Electronically Assisted Astronomy

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guyinthesky
sage


Reged: 04/13/07
Posts: 330
Loc: western ma.
live broadcast quality
      #2333451 - 04/17/08 10:40 AM

hi, i did a broadcast last nite on y live of the moon for a few hours, my first try,low quality webcam,i had to keep moving the telescope on tripod by hand as the moon moved across the screen some actually watched it pass by 3 or 4 times. it was alot of fun. but i notice the quality of the image sent out is much lower quality than the one i see directly on the monitor. i dont mean the stuttering/time delay, just the image. even for a cheap cam, the live video feed was impressively crisp, i would be proud to show it. but on the outgoing/broadcasted image, its fuzzier and not as real looking. it made the 80$ cam look like a 20$ cam. i tried ustream too, even with the quality slider all the way up, same thing. am i doing somthing wrong or missing somthing? does connection speed have anything to do with it? i mean, if the monitor image looked as poor as the broadcasted , i would assume the camera is the culprit. any ideas ? thanks, john

--------------------
Zhumell 12" dob
celestron c100ed-r gt cg-5
meade 5" telestar reflector
just enuf naglers
astro-tech 66ed
celestron C9 1/4
oberwerk 100-45
ALVAN CLARK and SONS 3 inch refractor
canon 350d


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Bowmoreman
Carpal Tunnel
*****

Reged: 09/11/06
Posts: 2992
Loc: Bolton, MA
Re: live broadcast quality new [Re: guyinthesky]
      #2333607 - 04/17/08 11:55 AM

You're not doing anything wrong... it is the nature of the compression algorithms used by the various methods of streaming... they use "lossy" compression to reduce the bandwidth requirements...

"lossy" means it LOSES data... this creates various types of artifacts in the image; some are better than others.

All "lossy" algorithms SUCK if quality is what you want out the other end when trying to capture and transmit what fundamentally starts out as an analog signal...

This is true for music (if you use high-compression on downloads of mp3's or Apple iTunes for example - the sound sucks)

This is true for video as well - ever checkout those nasty on-line videos?

there is no substitute for bandwidth... Good algorithms can help (which may be how the marketplace sorts this out over time - but can't solve the problem of LOSING data.

And, then consider that what we are showing here is VERY high contrast images, makes the challenge much harder.

Nature of the beast, circa 2008, I'm afraid.

But, those of us who have these cameras KNOW what is actually on monitor, and I believe we are starting to learn how to "see past" some of the worst of the artifacts.

This is similar to the issue we have when we post pictures of the monitor screens showing the images - the pictures are never as good.

Clear enough skies

--------------------
Dave
Ustream
YLive
XT10i, RTP, CGE, R200CF, TMB80SS
31T5, 22T4, 13Ethos, 8Ethos, TV 3-6 Zoom; Paracorr
MallincamColorHyperPlus,SBIG STV&237A;CanonRebel Xti
WilderSkiesObservatory(BYO #90)



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Chris SchroederModerator
Postmaster
*****

Reged: 12/11/04
Posts: 5098
Loc: N.E. WI Sky Glow
Re: live broadcast quality new [Re: Bowmoreman]
      #2333792 - 04/17/08 01:08 PM

Great explanation Dave

--------------------
Chris
Mallincam Color Hyper Plus
10" DSH with SC DSC, CPC 800 XLT
M102ED S.V., ZS 80FD 10th Anniv, ZS 66SD, PST
POD XL3 http://POD.SchroederCity.com



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guyinthesky
sage


Reged: 04/13/07
Posts: 330
Loc: western ma.
Re: live broadcast quality new [Re: Chris Schroeder]
      #2335526 - 04/18/08 09:31 AM

i think i understand, the broadcasted image seems about half the quality of the live monitor, so in order to get the quality i will like broadcasting, i need a camera twice as good as i have now. john

--------------------
Zhumell 12" dob
celestron c100ed-r gt cg-5
meade 5" telestar reflector
just enuf naglers
astro-tech 66ed
celestron C9 1/4
oberwerk 100-45
ALVAN CLARK and SONS 3 inch refractor
canon 350d


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Bowmoreman
Carpal Tunnel
*****

Reged: 09/11/06
Posts: 2992
Loc: Bolton, MA
Re: live broadcast quality new [Re: guyinthesky]
      #2339744 - 04/20/08 07:37 AM

Quote:

i think i understand, the broadcasted image seems about half the quality of the live monitor, so in order to get the quality i will like broadcasting, i need a camera twice as good as i have now. john




NO!

No matter HOW GOOD your camera is, resolution, etc... the broadcast conversion process (the process of compressing it done by SW in the streaming application) will make it worse...

this is a case of "no matter how delicious in, garbage out"

There are many reasons to get as good as possible a camera; but improving the quality of your streaming broadcast is NOT one of them.

the weakest link is the conversion/digitization/compression - all done in SW codecs in the application(s) on the PC...

clear enough skies

--------------------
Dave
Ustream
YLive
XT10i, RTP, CGE, R200CF, TMB80SS
31T5, 22T4, 13Ethos, 8Ethos, TV 3-6 Zoom; Paracorr
MallincamColorHyperPlus,SBIG STV&237A;CanonRebel Xti
WilderSkiesObservatory(BYO #90)



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