Camera hints?

[ab0032]

Is there anything special I should watch out for? Can I just stick a normal video cam on the viewing port?
Thanks in advance for any advice.

[Jim Kovalchick]

Some of Mike's best pictures were taken by him with his Samsung galaxy S2 cell phone. My Canon SX100 which normally takes great pictures did a terrible job because it kept trying to focus on the plasma. Both cameras added blue because of IR. The best video was taken with my Canon Xvidea HFS10 hi def. it did a nice job with getting true color.

For just normal plasma monitoring Mike used an old camcorder with a cable to a monitor set up near the variac and gas control.

At higher voltages you should be careful not to use an expensive camera because you will get radiation damage.

[bthoma]

Use a mirror. I roasted my first camera shooting directly through a window into the chamber.

[ab0032]

Thank you both for the recommandations. Will I also get radiation damage if I use a mirror? Is it caused by the x-rays or by the neutrons? Is that permanent damage to the ccd sensors?

[Jim Kovalchick]

The mirror idea eliminates any damage.

[Richard Hull]

I have spoken to all of this many times in the past.

A mirror is a great idea and was first used by Farnsworth's team in 1964. You will discover that unless your view port is really large, even a mirror will cut your field of view and you will need to process the image digitally or you will present only a view of the porthole and a small grid in the center.

I personally have used a $49.00 high res, little single board color camera since 2003 looking into the face of the "Gorgon" and attached directly to the view port with no real damge beyond 2 blown pixels. This camera has an extremely wide angle lens that can be readily focused on the grid. I view on a remotely connected NTSC monitor. From about 1998 until 2003 I used a similar B&W single board camera. Also still surviving with no blown pixels. Old technology tends to survive. New stuff loves to buckle under the rads and EMP. I typically photograph the monitor screen for my images.

Images follow. The last image shows the camera that is mounted in a black plastic cylinder jammed into the viewport to keep out ambient light.

Richard Hull

[Dan Tibbets]

To see a wider field of view through a small view port or mirror, a divergent lens setting on the view port may help. These can be found in old slide projectors, and possibly disassembled camera lenses.

Dan Tibbets

[ab0032]

Yes, after these remarks about a mirror I thought, that that would move the camera even further away, so I thought of using one of these amplifying shaving mirrors, but a think I must have some lens from a projector I once took apart still flying around somewhere. I even thought about putting a convex mirror into the chamber, so I could see things from a second different perspective.

Thanks for all the helpfull hints and remarks to all of you.

[Dennis P Brown]

Either a small telescope with adapter for your camera can be used or you can buy a telephoto adapter. That way, you can be ten feet away.

[Dan Tibbets]

If you lack the focal length in a distant camera to fill the frame with the window dimensions a magnifying lens, or telescope, or mafnifying make up mirror can help. But if it is a question of narrow field of view due to exit pupil issues, a diverging lens as close to the window as possible is the answer. I don't know if a diverging lens that doesn't form an image when viewed with the eye or a camera with an integral lens would work, except if it was used with a DSLR camera with the lens removed. This would not be very friendly for the camera and most probably wouldn't operate without a lens attached in any case.

Dan Tibbets