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Camera to replace eyeball.


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Hi everyone,

Is it possible to have a setup such that a camera takes the place of one's eye? I would like to be able to point a camera through different eyepieces and display the image on a laptop screen. I realise there may be issues regarding noise and resolution, but do you think this is possible? If anyone has successfully tried this what setup did you use?

The reason for the question is that my wife has back trouble so she finds conventional observing uncomfortable, but would be ok sitting at a table.

Next step would be to transmit the video to a laptop inside the house!

Cheers,

Neil.

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There may be some sort of adaptor, but what I have done in the past (works great with the 'cubs') is to plug my dlsr into the eyepiece holder and display the result of a 10/20s image on the laptop. I've also used a mintron video camera.

So, although I don't know if you can use the camera to replace an eye, you can certainly use it to replace the eyepiece. Under my light-polluted skies I find it produces much more satisfying viewing than at the ep itself most of the time.

HTH

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Hi everyone,

Is it possible to have a setup such that a camera takes the place of one's eye? I would like to be able to point a camera through different eyepieces and display the image on a laptop screen. I realise there may be issues regarding noise and resolution, but do you think this is possible? If anyone has successfully tried this what setup did you use?

The reason for the question is that my wife has back trouble so she finds conventional observing uncomfortable, but would be ok sitting at a table.

Next step would be to transmit the video to a laptop inside the house!

Cheers,

Neil.

Yes it is possible, but usually it's only used for 'compact' cameras, i.e. cameras without a removable lens. I can't find a link at the moment, but I've seen brackets which fix to your scope & then allow movement of the camera lens up to the eyepiece; you can also get brackets that do the same for 'smartphone' cameras some of which are very good these days. For cameras with removable lenses (i.e. DSLR's & compact system cameras) you usually use an adapter which attaches to the camera in place of the lens & then allows you to attach the camera direct to the 'scope, so that the 'scope itself IS the lens.

Hopefully someone will be able to find a suitable link for the brackets, although a quick 'Google' (other search engines are available!) should do the trick.

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You may want to consider video astronomy, this is where a camera replaces the eyepiece altogether and sends the image to a TV or computer. The images are automatically stacked real time and more detail will show as you keep watching the screen.

Some software can turn any camera that streams video into this as well. Sharpcap for example allows you to stack frames real time. This might be a good option if you can't afford a camera at the moment.

Your Mak may be a good scope for this if you want to operate it from inside as that will be easiest to set up for remote control and is already set up for tracking which will be essential for this.

Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

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Thanks all, I did not make myself clear at the start, I realise you can connect cameras to the eyepiece, I have used my DSLR and a webcam with Sharcap. My question was whether or not it was possible to get live streaming video of sufficiently high quality so that one can observe comfortably from somewhere warm. I have since found out that the term I am looking for is Video Astronomy, as in D4N's reply.

If anyone has tried this I would be interested to know.

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It can be amazing, the best I have seen was in a 72" scope but you can get good results on amateur instruments too and they can easily exceed what you would have seen with an eyepiece if you have a good camera.

Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

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Actually fairly straight foreward, remove the eyepiece and slide a webcam in.

Have to get the webcam at the focal plane so it is either alter the focus or play with some tubing so that an eyepiece and the webcam are parfocal.

Feed the webcam to a laptop/PC with whatever package it is compaable with and you should be up and running.

It is not as simple of pull one out, drop other in, at least not without some preparation.

Likely worth searching out a good webcam, likely with a big chip.

Not sure about anything else, and results probably will not be that high definition.

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Thanks all,

Having seen the price of the VA cameras I think I'd be better off investing in some more thermal underwear for the time being.

It's an interesting subject though, but a bit ott as an add-on to my current kit.

Retirement looming - I can see the Lambourghini going on the back burner!

Cheers,

Neil.

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