Web: Tel: Fax:

Transcription

1 PD Colour Astro Video Camera QUICK START MANUAL Introduction 1 phildyer@hotmail.com Web: Tel: Fax: Congratulations on your purchase of a PD Camera. This camera is so versatile, you ll find so many different uses for the camera in observing the night sky. PD cameras are the latest generation Huviron CCTV cameras, selected for their supreme sensitivity, and modified by us for astronomy uses. The PD video camera is so wonderfully versatile, that you will quickly find it indispensable for most of your astronomy activities. First of all, it s so easy to use. You don t always need to connect it to a telescope. You can use it with small lenses, camera lenses and the like, on small photo tripods. Very light, very transportable. Easy to set up (plugs to any TV). It s powerful. It packs a lot of power into its small size. Whatever lens system you use it with, will seem 4 times bigger so your 50mm camera lens will match any 200mm scope in magnitudes. And even the small lens supplied will show wide views and all those stars you miss out on due to light pollution. It s flexible. It has the sensitivity to display deep sky objects in real time, but also the speed and flexibility to display brighter objects like the moon and planets, and even fast moving objects like meteors and man made satellites. It s adaptable. You don t need to connect the camera to a PC/Laptop, but you can if you like. All cabling, software, etc is provided. Then you can process your observations and dramatically increasing the sensitivity and sharpness of images. It s shareable. You can easily share with others. A whole crowd can view on PC or TV screen even indoors with the telescope outside. No more standing around in the cold waiting for a short turn at the eyepiece. All this might sound quite complicated but its simple really, and these specially written instructions are designed to have you up and running within a few minutes. The PD Camera package (Full Kit): PD Colour Camera Wide-angle lens 12V mains adapter Cable and connectors for TV/PC display Capture device for PC Display and Capture 1.25 Eyepiece Adapter for telescopes

2 2 Phil Dyer (PD) Colour Astro Video Camera INSTRUCTION MANUAL Contents page Connections and initial Set-up 3 For display on a TV set 3 For Display and capture on a PC or Laptop 3 Install Capture Device drivers 4 PC Display and Capture using POWER DIRECTOR 5 Setting up the camera in Power Director 5 Capturing Video and single frames 6 PC Display and Capture using MEDIA PLAYER CLASSIC 7 Setting up the camera in Media Player Classic 7 Capturing Video and single frames 8 Image Processing 9 On Screen Display (OSD) Camera Settings 9 11 Specifications 12

3 3 Connections and initial Set-up To start with, use the camera with the small lens provided. Then, connect the video cable, and power cable from the mains adapter, into the back of the camera as shown. Note: Power supply is connected regardless polarity. As necessary, press with fingernail (as shown) to connect/disconnect wires. For display on a TV set After connecting the mains adapter power cable and the video cable to the camera as shown above, connect the other end of the Video Cable to the Video In socket on the TV (see right). Use the TV remote to change the TV channel to AV. Plug in and switch on the mains adapter, and you re done. You then need to adjust the Brightness and/or Contrast settings of your TV in conjunction with the OSD settings on the pages Image on the right is a snapshot of the TV screen, taken with a small digital camera. For Display and capture on a PC/Laptop Connect the power and video cables to the camera as shown at the top of this page. Switch on your PC/Laptop and wait till it s fully booted up. Connect the video output from the Camera to the KWorld DVD Maker, and then plug the DVD maker into the USB port on your PC/Laptop. Plug in the mains adapter and switch on. The green light on the back of the camera should light up. If the windows Welcome to the Found New Hardware Wizard pops up, then cancel out of the screen.

4 For the first time only, you will need to install the drivers and software:- Insert the Kworld PlusTV Driver Installation CD-ROM into your PC s CD or DVD drive. 4 Select Driver Installation, and follow the on-screen instructions. Once Driver Installation is complete, you then need to install software for viewing live output to your PC/laptop, and for capturing video and images. You have 2 choices (2 CDs) - Media Player Classic, or the Power Director 5 software. Media Player Classic gives full screen viewing, and is all you need for astronomy use. And is easy to install, you simply copy the exe file from the CD to any folder on your PC. Double-click the exe file to run the application. Power Director is a full movie editing suit, but does not offer full screen viewing, and may not work with Windows 8. If you install it from the CD, you will then need to Restart the computer.

5 PC Display and Capture using Power Director 5 TV Change Folder LIVE DISPLAY Profile Record/ Stop Snapshot Settings Setting up the camera in Power Director This Power Director program is very comprehensive and will capture any analogue input, from old Video Cassettes for example, and turn them into digital format, which you can then burn to DVD using the Power producer program. Power Director may not work with Windows 8, however. If you decided to install Power Director, this section describes how you use it. Otherwise, skip to next section "Media Player Classic". Connect the camera to your PC/laptop as described in Page 3. Then in Power Director, you will see the first screen as shown on the right. The first thing to do is to set up the camera in Power Director Start by clicking the Capture button. Then click on the Capture from TV button

6 6 Newest Version of Power Director should detect the camera Automatically. If camera is not detected, then - Click on the Settings button Then set Capture Device and Capture Source as shown on the right. A live video picture should appear on screen. You can adjust the screen picture (brightness, contrast, etc) by clicking the Settings button, then Adjust Video Click on the Profile button Then set Profile. The settings are a matter of personal choice. Some good settings are shown on the right. These particular ones capture raw data, ie no compression (which you can check by clicking the Settings button (shown on the right). That completes the camera set-up in Power Director Capturing Video and single frames To record video, click on the RECORD button. Use the same button to stop recording. Alternatively, you can pre-set the duration of the video capture by ticking the Time limit box (see right), and entering a time in hours:mins:secs. Then click the RECORD button; the video capture will stop automatically when the set time is up. To Capture a single frame, click on the SNAPSHOT button. NOTE: Your captured videos and single frames are shown in the Captured Clips window (see right). The files are saved, by default, to the MyWorks folder on your computer Hard Drive. Before capture, you can change where your files will be saved, by clicking on the Change Folder button.

7 PC Display and Capture using Media Player Classic 7 Media Player Classic is a simple but effective freeware program which does a good job of displaying video full screen. And it will capture still images and video streams from the PD camera. The program is stand-alone. This means that no installation is necessary you simply copy the program exe file (supplied on the PD Camera computer disk) to a suitable folder on your PC/laptop. To run the application, simply double-click the exe file. Setting up the camera in Media Player Classic Once Media Player Classic is up and running, set up the camera as follows. Connect the camera to your PC/laptop as described in Page 3. Open the camera in Media Player Classic by clicking File, Open Device (as shown on the right) Then choose the 2860 Video device (as shown on the right). Then click OK.

8 Capturing Video and single frames in Media Player Classic 8 To save the current display as a STILL IMAGE, click File, Save Image (as shown on the right) To save the current moving display as a VIDEO STREAM - click File, Capture (as shown on the right) Then set the parameters as shown below Choose frame size (640 x 480 is good) But frame rate must be Then click the SET button. Choose uncompressed Choose folder for saving video Click Record to start, and Stop to finish.

9 9 Image Processing Free Processing Software Now that you ve captured your video, you ll want to process it. Single image snapshots can be processed with any imaging software. But to get the most from you images/video, it s best to combine many images, or a complete video stream, into a single image. This process has the effect of dramatically increasing the sensitivity and sharpness of images produced with the Camera. Other Software Other software, which is not free, but has the advantage of combining the processes of capturing and processing in a single program, are: A very good application for this purpose is the completely free DeepSkyStacker, which can be downloaded from here: lish/index.html Also good is the free Registax, which can be downloaded from here: nload.html Astrovideo htm K3CCDtools k3ccdtools.htm On Screen Display (OSD) Settings What are important are the 5 push buttons labelled ENTER, U, D, L, R (up, down, left, right) Pressing the middle button (ENTER) activates the OSD menu. Select the individual functions via the UP and DOWN buttons. Change a parameter by pressing the LEFT and RIGHT buttons. after a selection, indicates that there is a sub-menu; this is activated via the middle button. RETURN takes one to the previous menu. The screenshot shows the Main menu. Exposure Menu - LENS Set LENS to MANUAL, as shown.

10 10 Exposure Menu - LENS Shutter speed default value is 1/50 sec, and this is fine for Deep Sky viewing. For brighter objects, (provided the SENSE-UP is set to OFF), the LENS, MANUAL sub menu allows you to set the shutter speed to any value from 1/50 sec down to 1/ sec. Exposure Menu AGC, and SENSE-UP AGC can be set to LOW, MEDIUM, or HIGH, to increase the sensitivity of the camera. SENSE-UP can be set to values up to 1024x fields, (up to 20 seconds). Higher values of AGC and SENSE-UP bring some increased noise, particularly if the camera is used in warm conditions (eg indoors). Exposure Menu 3D-DNR Digital Noise Reduction can be set at Auto, or Low, Med and High. White Balance Menu ATW is the default value, and the default values are fine for most imaging purposes. A fully MANUAL option is also available. In each case, the R-Y B-Y colour balance of the image can adjusted manually. Day Night Menu D&N MODE should be set to COLOR. The Camera s original design incorporated an IR- CUT filter which would kick-in, in Colour mode. In this PD version of the camera, this filter has been disabled to make the camera suitable for deep sky imaging.

11 11 Image Adjust Menu Gamma should be set to 0.45 to 1.00 for bright objects. Special Menu DPC For Deep sky, set Gamma to USER, then set to a lower value, like 0.30 or Here you can set the level of Defective Pixel Correction, for Bright Pixels and Dead Pixels. Increasing the value of WHITE THR will turn bright pixels off. But use sparingly, since high values may result in star images being turned off. Special Menu FACTORY SETTINGS To return the camera to its factory settings, change FACTORT SET to YES, then press ENTER button. AUTO WHITE BALANCE AWB AWB MODE - PUSH The camera is supplied without an IR Cut filter. This means that images will have a predominately red cast, with terrestrial infra red sources (such as foliage in sunlight) showing bright. The AWB feature can be used to correct this colour cast. It's not very scientific, but it does produce most interesting results, both terrestrially and astronomically. SAVING YOUR CHANGES EXIT - SAVE&EXIT To save any changes made, go to the EXIT menu, and select SAVE&EXIT.

12 Specifications The PD Colour Camera (modified Huviron). Imaging chip: Sony SuperHAD CCD II, ICX639BKA Chip size: Diagonal 6mm (Type 1/3"); 4.89mm (H) x 3.64mm (V) Number of effective pixels: 752 (H) x 582 (V); Total number of pixels: 795 (H) x 596 (V); Pixel size: 6.5 microns (H) x 6.25 microns (V) Resolution: 600 TV lines The camera features on-board controls for full control of gain, shutter speed, sensitivity, gamma, pixel correction, digital noise reduction, etc. For details, see the technical Manual sheet PDF As with any CCD camera, you should bear in mind that the field of view with telescopes can be quite small. The Camera's chip size is 6.1mm diagonal and the field of view with various focal lengths is as follows:- Focal Length Field of View (diagonal) Focal Length Field of View (diagonal) 2000 mm 10 minutes of arc 75 mm 4.7 degrees 1000 mm 21 minutes of arc 50 mm 7.0 degrees 500 mm 42 minutes of arc 25 mm 14 degrees 200 mm 1.8 degrees 16mm 22 degrees 100 mm 3.5 degrees 12.5m 28 degrees The following is a guide to the limiting magnitudes (stars) which can be seen live on TV screen when the PD Camera is fitted to telescopes/lenses of various apertures. Some users claim to have bettered these figures. In practice, the limiting magnitude will depend largely on local conditions. The figures below assume dark, clear skies. In town conditions the figures might be reduced by up to 2 magnitudes or more. The figures will also be reduced if the optics are of poor quality, or if they are poorly focused. Telescope/Lens Aperture Limiting Magnitude (stars) Telescope/Lens Aperture Limiting Magnitude (stars) 200mm (8") 17 mag 50mm (135mm f2.8) 14 mag 125 mm (1000mm f8) 16 mag 36 mm (135mm f4) 13.3 mag 100 mm (1000mm f10) 15.5 mag 18 mm (25mm f1.4) 11.8 mag 75 mm (300mm f4 ) 15 mag 10mm (16mm f1.6) 10.5 mag 12