I'll show you how to build your own high quality allsky dome unit
for a fraction of the retail price and get excellent results.
Discussion
With the recent non activity in my skies except for satellites, birds, meteors etc, I've been advised by someone on youtube to build a strobing infrared torch to maybe help attract unusual objects with a spectrum of light that humans can't see. Normally I wouldn't use IR with my night vision equipment because it attracts bugs etc. and can burn out my gen 3 night vision tube if aimed the wrong way. So I decided to try and build a torch with a straight beam, straight up into the night sky. An IR laser would be better, but they cost way too much and are kind of illegal here if over 1mw in power. 1mw probably wouldn't even reach the clouds. So instead I bought an IR illuminating device for a cctv camera. I got the round shaped one so I could mount it inside a pvc pipe of similar diameter. To create a sort of pipe shaped beam of light. Not exactly a laser, but still not spread out everywhere to create havock with my gen 3 nv tube. I also bought a cheap strobing module to wire to it and a power supply kit to build and also wire to it. Buying kits are the cheapest way to go, plus I enjoy the soldering assembly :) I haven't had much time to assemble and build this project so far, but I will in the coming days. But here is a video of testing the torch while attached to the pvc pipe. The video has been sped up to save time and upload space. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jN7BEFezrjQ
Yay : o )
I'll first show the original version I made that consisted of a Samsung scb2000 cctv camera mounted in a home made box with a 6" acrylic dome on top. The lens was a tv f:1.4 180 degrees fisheye.
The scb2000 cameras were good in their day. They were popular for skywatchers because of the very low lux. Stars could be easily seen but the recording suffered a slow frame rate.
I thought it would work well as an allsky camera because it meant objects passing over would leave a slow frame rate streak. And could be easily seen.
And I did in fact record a very slow object that seemed to enter the atmosphere and cruise across the night sky so slowly that the fading streak left behind disappeared while the object was still in view on the screen.
As you can see the quality is quite bad.
So began a mission to build something better since cameras and ccd chips had improved so much over the years.
This video shows how I made a flag pole type pull up hoist for the allsky camera module.
I kind of live in a gully and I have to hoist the camera up high to get over the houses etc.
I'm still to do a video which will show how and which materials to use as a housing and the specs on the camera etc.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tjoiJtUiH2M
Sorry for the long pause between.
I got Chris (horsefarmer1000 yt channel) in New Zealand to build mine because he could do a much better job than me :)
The following pics are of the housing, camera, lens, dew heater and cables. A Sony alpha 5100 is ideal to use.
The abs housing had a 40mm quick release camera mount bolted and glued to it to hold the camera steady.
There is also a dew heater that runs on a separate 12v power supply.
The camera has a constant power supply to it also. Normally sony cameras only have a 1hr battery. But I can run this until the flash mem card is full.
I run the dew heater through a dew heater controller but find it's always on "full" or number 10 anyhow.
So by taking exposure shots and compiling into a timelapse video you can achieve much better quality. Here is an example video :
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R80YpyWm-m8
Also if you have any questions regarding the build, just ask and I'll answer when I can.
Cheers :O) BP.