Onboard Camera's

Anybody have pictures of onboard camera setups? I am thinking the best way to go would be something that records, quality wise and price wise. What is a good system? I am looking for something that would fit in a 4" coupler tube (for a 4" vehicle). The lower half of the coupler would be glued into the lower section of the vehicle, so that could contain the camera and it could stick out of the lower section of the avionics bay. Then the altimeter(s) and tracking system will go in the upper section of the coupler bay (and the upper tube will be secured to the coupler).

Any cameras or systems that would work well in a situation like this?

I have the transmit system from booster vision set up like this:



But I just bought this



https://www2.oregonscientific.com/shop/product.asp?cid=20&scid=77&pid=709

and plan to either mount the whole thing in a pod with a matching one on the outside for balance or build a slant platform in a bay with a mirror on the outside.

I assume you mean video recording, as opposed to still photography, right?

You can get video transmitting units from boostervision.com, or Wal-Mart even (they sell a unit nearly identical to boostervision's mini gearcam). I just stuck one inside a BT-60 and flew it last weekend (see the thread here: https://www.rocketryforum.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=31107). It was absurdly simple to build the video unit, I just put a 1/4" hole in the BT, epoxied the camera to a bulkhead (wrapped tape around it first so I could remove it later if needed) and glued the bulkhead in the BT so the camera was aligned with the view hole. The 9V battery is secured by a plywood key inserted through the sides of a centering ring inside the BT, and the key itself is retained by the BT.

You should be able to use a similar mounting method in just about any payload bay.

Wouldnt that make the camera angle out? I am looking for an angle that can see whats under the vehicle (especially during descent) but will still catch the fins (looking for flutter) and the motor burning.

I like the booster vision setup but I dont know if the range would allow me to use it. On some motors I could easily get 15,000', then calculate drift and it will be well over the 5,000 range for the booster vision.

Tell me how you like the oregon unit!

Originally posted by jraice
....I like the booster vision setup but I dont know if the range would allow me to use it. On some motors I could easily get 15,000', then calculate drift and it will be well over the 5,000 range for the booster vision.

Tell me how you like the oregon unit!

Click to expand...

Hi Jordon,

I understand you have a Ham ticket right ?

Our hi power units get 10K-15K with our 15db dish.

I had a tester in Kali test moutain top to mountain top with a 24db dish and get 24K.

recording works well also and I do solid state recording myself.

each have their roles. Downlink is great in case of a failure to determine what happens. Some time I do both, and put a PVR MP4 recorder in line with the camera for the downlink so I record, and downlink at the same time.

Ill have to check out the hi-power setup, my dad renewed his HAM license so that we could use a GPS transmitter in my 54mm bird... so yeah I guess "I" do...

How much does the MP4 recorder go for? Do you think I would get the rocket all the way to the ground? First flight will only be to about 4000', apogee deploy... the highest flight so far is planned to be under 10,000' so that should work also. It is capable of higher but isn't in the current plan.

Do you think I could mount it nicely in a 4" coupler?... with little outside disturbance?

Originally posted by CQBArms
..
But I just bought this

..

Click to expand...

I think this will replace the missing small recorder slot the multipod 5-in-1 left when they quit production.

Be sure to post how you use it !

If I mount it on the outside it will look down.
If I mount it slant inside I will have a mirror on the outside to angle the view down.

There are some other cameras like at Walmart and radio shack that people just jam into the body by cutting a port into the payload bay. It's ugly but very effective. You used to be able to easily hack the CVS cam but they made it tougher now.
Like the aiptek pocket ones
https://www.aiptek.com/Merchant2/merchant.mvc?Screen=CTGY&Store_Code=AS&Category_Code=DC1

Originally posted by jraice
Wouldnt that make the camera angle out? I am looking for an angle that can see whats under the vehicle (especially during descent) but will still catch the fins (looking for flutter) and the motor burning.

I like the booster vision setup but I dont know if the range would allow me to use it. On some motors I could easily get 15,000', then calculate drift and it will be well over the 5,000 range for the booster vision.

Tell me how you like the oregon unit!

Click to expand...

Which "package" Art, on your site would you recommend? The hi-gain package is over $300's, that may be the reason I dont want to use radio transmitted video its expensive.

How do you plan (or how has it been done) to activate the oregon camera?

Originally posted by jraice
...How much does the MP4 recorder go for? Do you think I would get the rocket all the way to the ground? First flight will only be to about 4000', apogee deploy... the highest flight so far is planned to be under 10,000' so that should work also. It is capable of higher but isn't in the current plan.

Do you think I could mount it nicely in a 4" coupler?... with little outside disturbance?

Click to expand...

I don't sell recorders, but mustek pvr-1 and aiptek PVR do a good job for many of my customers.

I don't think you will get either recorder in a 4" coupler, but you can get our Mini Hi-power transmitter in their.

the camera you will either mount out in the slip stream on the eaby ring, and/or make up a shroud system for it. Some have put a shroud (only needed for super/transonic rockets) on the payload bay to cover up the cam on the ebay vent ring.

If interested, you can email me and we can talk, as prefer to do customer pre-sales support via email.

The AT-2000 CQB posted about is also a kewl tool IMHO.

FOr the oregon, you just press the button. I think it may have a self timer also...but in the end it records like 6 minutes to maybe 20-40 with a large SD card.

Just start recording, set it up, launch it, recover, turn it off.
Then in post production just edit out the parts you don't want.
I'll have to play with it and figure it out.

Originally posted by jraice
Which "package" Art, on your site would you recommend? The hi-gain package is over $300's, that may be the reason I dont want to use radio transmitted video its expensive.

How do you plan (or how has it been done) to activate the oregon camera?

Click to expand...

On my booster vision I record to my laptop. Many record to small DV recorder or minicams etc.

Analog out from the booster receiver to the PC via a Dazzle unit or on board video. There is a device made by those X-10 people that converts analog to USB signal with some software included...but I hate their website so I try not to buy anything there.

As for antennas, booster vision has a nice package but there are other option out there:
https://www.hyperlinktech.com/web/antennas_2400.php

So you need to plan to get it in the air quickly... Well there is a benifit of transmitting it, dont have to arm a recorder on the vehicle, just confirm its transmitter, press record on whatever you are using and launch...

Originally posted by jraice
Anybody have pictures of onboard camera setups?

Click to expand...

I mounted a Poloroid Studio 4 camera in a four-inch payload section which I modelled after the Cineroc. Details are at:

https://www.payloadbay.com/article-my-current-project---upscaled-cinerocomega.html

You can see the latest video from a flight on an I200 at:

https://www.payloadbay.com/gallery/v/movies/2006-11-11-nefar.wmv.html

(Make sure you have your speakers on. )

The real video from it is at 640x480 resolution at 30 fps and looks good when I transfer it to DVD. The camera records for 20 to 40 minutes on a 1GB SD card.

I recently ordered two more of the cameras from eBay for about $40 each. These are refurbished, so I'll have to see how they work out. But they'll be useful as backups.

I'll also use the extra cameras to get close ups of launches. I use a roll of masking tape as a tripod and position the camera on the ground in front of the launch pad to get video like the following:

https://www.payloadbay.com/gallery/v/movies/2006-11-11+Jolly+Roger.wmv.html

-- Roger

Here is another option, the CVS/Rite Aid "single use" camcorder. For $30 you can get a pretty nice camcorder. I've bought several and just need to find the time to mount them in a couple of rockets.

Make magazine had a great article on how to do this and make them into a multi-use camcorder. Here it is:

https://www.makezine.com/07/camerarocket/

If you use 'point-and-shoot' digital cameras to record your videos, be VERY careful.

The three flights I've done have resulted in only one recording. My belief is that the accelerations of launch are causing the batteries to lose contact with their terminals, shutting off the camera before any data could be stored.

This link will take you to the rudimentary page I've set up - it also links to my photo-album, where I have some photos of my own camera-bay setup.

The newer ones are much harder to hack to make them multiuse.

Originally posted by randym
Here is another option, the CVS/Rite Aid "single use" camcorder. For $30 you can get a pretty nice camcorder. I've bought several and just need to find the time to mount them in a couple of rockets.

Make magazine had a great article on how to do this and make them into a multi-use camcorder. Here it is:

https://www.makezine.com/07/camerarocket/

Click to expand...

I use an AIPTEK DV5100M and it is in a 4" coupler. It uses a 512MB CF card and will record an hour of video at the high res settings. The newer version uses the CF Cards up to 1 Gig.
AIPTEK DV5100Fspecs etc. Refurbished ones are only $79.00.
Since it holds an hour of video I just turn it on and walk away from the rocket.
.Video of a launch here.
I have only had trouble with the batteries coming loose when I forget to tape them in. I also tape the battery door shut and pass the tape over the card slot. I can also say it will also corrupt the file when it falls from 5122' on a 12" drouge and the main does not fully deploy.
I can view the file but I can't edit it.
I will try to get some pictures lof the pod and mount later.

Originally posted by Sailorbill
I use an AIPTEK DV5100M and it is in a 4" coupler. It uses a 512MB CF card and will record an hour of video at the high res settings. ......I have only had trouble with the batteries coming loose when I forget to tape them in. I also tape the battery door shut and pass the tape over the card slot. ...

Click to expand...

Hi Bill,

these are nice units that can fit in 4" or better, nice video BTW.

no matter how you do the video, the Rocket Video Bug bites and won't let go

That pocket DV5100F looks very nice, which video resolution do you set yours on?

It doesnt seem to be quit as high resolution as the oregon camera...

640 x 480 Pixels (VGA) up to 11 fps
352 x 288 Pixels (QVGA) up to 30 fps

The oregon shoots 30FPS at 640 x 480 I believe...

but I dont know much about cameras... I know the more pixels the better the picture, but I have not a clue if there is much difference between 11fps or 30fps.

How did you mount the pocket DV5100F? Does it seem to handle the vibrations of flight well?... The oregon unit is designed to take some bumps and vibrations... I have seen some footage of onboard cameras that looks really "jumpy" and skips (almost like a CD player when you bounce it).

Originally posted by jraice
...but I dont know much about cameras... I know the more pixels the better the picture, but I have not a clue if there is much difference between 11fps or 30fps.

Click to expand...

A video at 11 fps will look jerky with kind of an "old-time movie" look. Digital video at 640x480 at 30 fps will look (almost) like it came from a real camcorder.

The camera I use (Polaroid Studio 4) handles 640x480 at 30 fps. Like most cheap digital video cameras, it uses a lot of compression and, of course, the optics aren't as good as a real camcorder. So the picture isn't anything like you'll get from a Mini-DV or Digital-8 camcorder, but I have been pleased with the videos I've taken with the Studio 4 camera (and, at about 4 ounces, it weighs a lot less than a real camcorder).

That reminds me of one "gotcha" I ran into. The camera uses the DIVx version of MPEG-4 as its compressed video format. When I intalled the DIVx driver on my video editing computer, it caused Adobe Premiere to lock up at random times (even when I wasn't using a video encoded with the DIVx codec). Uninstalling DIVx didn't fix the problem. I had to use the Windows XP "System Restore" function to fix the problem. So now I convert the videos from MPEG-4 to a standard format on my notebook computer so that I can use them in Premiere on my desktop.

-- Roger

Wallgreens has the 5100m for $59 on sale this weekend.

One last item to add to the mix or confusion.

Target has the $150 MPVR recorder on sale for $99 this weekend.

While I don't use them for rocket cameras, I do use them for solid state recorders, as they take SD-ram cards etc and record at 640x480 at 30FPS.

Jordan, video is simply single pictures all played back to you frame by frame. Frames per second is how fast the single frames of a video are taken and/or played back. The faster the FPS, the smoother the pictures.

double post

how would 352 x 258 pixels at 30FPS look? Decent?

Originally posted by jraice
how would 352 x 258 pixels at 30FPS look? Decent?

Click to expand...

This is the resolution of a VHS tape

here is a video captured at 320x240 at 29.7 fps, and then further compressed into wmv format for display over the web.

Sample 320x240 video

Originally posted by jadebox

The real video from it is at 640x480 resolution at 30 fps and looks good when I transfer it to DVD. The camera records for 20 to 40 minutes on a 1GB SD card.

-- Roger

Click to expand...

Roger,
Do You have a link to the specs ? I cannot find any mention of 30fps, even on Polariods site.

Slack

Originally posted by slackdaddy
Roger,
Do You have a link to the specs ? I cannot find any mention of 30fps, even on Polariod's site.

Slack

Click to expand...

https://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=lang_en&q="polaroid+studio+4"+"30+fps"

I can't find a link to detailed specs, but the camera does either 640x480 or 320x240 at 30 fps.

-- Roger

Art, what is the difference with the DV5100F and the DV5100M?

Any pictures of how you mounted it in a 4" rocket?

I watched the utube video, which resolution setting was that on? You could clearly see the large pixels but I thought it was pretty good quality for under $100's...

I said I would try to post pictures of my mount. We here goes.
This is a picture of the Camera mounted in the carrier.

This is a picture of the Camera mounted in the carrier viewed from the front.