Wednesday, November 22, 2017

tested web cam

Did some testing with the LogiTech 5700 web cam to see it might work as a polar scope camera.

Cut the bottom out of an old (translucent) plastic film container. Quickly attached it to the camera body (with tape) trying to keep it fairly well aligned.

Attached the USB connector to John Repeat Dance. Launched Paint and chose the capture command.

webcam view down film tube

We have a picture! All right. But could not control the camera.

Installed the assembly onto the Celestron/Vixen polar axis scope. Could see the reticule pattern. Yes! Tested focusing. It worked.

webcam view of polar scope

The shaft was clearly too long. Cut down the film tube, removing about 1 cm. This put the camera very near the ocular. Shaft length is about 3.3 cm.

Tried Microsoft AMcap version 8.x and it worked nicely. Was able to control the output video frame size. 640x480. Manually focused the camera.

web cam view of polar scope reticule

Much better.

I suspect the oblong shape is due to the misalignment.

This is looking very promising.

Strapped the polar scope to a tripod. Ready for a star test...

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