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Posted: 6/30/2008 3:14:40 PM EDT
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I am getting into shooting my new Varmint Ar15 at longer ranges and thought I would take it a bit more seriously. I have been using my astroscan as a spotting scope for some time now, but decided I wanted to keep better records and record videos. Digital scopes cost quite a bit, so I decided to mount a webcam on my astroscan. So now I can take pictures before and after shots, take videos of stuff exploding on impact, and also record how the wind is behaving banners and streamers during shots. I did some testing at my girlfriends today and got these images of the setup.  The square is about the area the bottle is in when viewed with the naked eye  Here is an image of what I see on the computer. I can put an assortment of lenses in the setup for a range of 50x-500x  |
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I had several requests to post images of the telescope adapter so here it is. Here is the final product, that I slip into my telescope eyepiece tube.  The webcamera was easy to disassemble and mount. I had to cut a slot in the pvc tube for the quick picture button to fit. The hose clamp holds the segments together.  I had a flat and a rounded pvc endcap, I see no reason why one could not use 2 flat endcaps, but I only had one of each and did not want to take a trip to town.  You can see how the slot had to be cut to fit around the webcam instants button. The insterted pvc pipe was cut so that the webcamera lense would butt up agaisnt the eyepiece. This is important for the eyepiece to remain aligned with the camera. Since the endcap is thin the eyepiece can wiggle otherwise and mess up the sight picture. As for the inserted pvc pipe Lower magnification lenses are usually longer, so you may need a longer tube. I plan on cutting more if my selected magnification does not work out. It is easy to insert different length pipes.  I couldn't mount the camera flat because of the cable plug, so some erector set screws and spacers gave me the clearance I needed. I had to slightly enlarge the holes in the chip to get the screws to fit. A black rubber O-ring holds and keeps the cord from pulling out.  I used an older Creative webcam instant, because I never used it and it was just setting around the house. I am sure there are some better quality cameras out there that would provide more resolution. Here is what my camera looked like before I disassembled it. It looks like they sell new for about $27 
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That is impressive. I looked into a remote (802.11) wireless camera that I could place downrange right next to the target and transmit the video back to my laptop, but I feared other shooters might hit the camera. I have been thinking of getting a MAK (Celestron C90 or equiv) in leiu of a spotting scpoe. Does your reflector allow for better terrestrial images than a conventional spotting scope? |
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The light gathering ability should be far greater on mine than typical spotting scopes, so the picture quality should be a great deal better. The C90 looks like a great little scope. I am not sure how the C90 will stack up to the astroscan, but the astroscans primary mirror is .75" larger, not a lot of difference for the added bulk. It also looks like the C90 comes with an image inverter, and celestron products are great. I have an 8"Celestron schmidt-cassegrain that is very nice, and has seen a lot of astronomy use over the years. To large to use as a spotting scope though. I do recall someone using one as a long range spotting scope for a sniper in a Stephen Hunter book lol, I believe it was Point of Impact. |
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