Shevill Mathers
Shevill uses a Takahashi FS-102 (4") f/8 Apo for lunar/planetary/solar work and 35mm format camera lenses for deep sky imaging with an ASTROVID 2000 B&W Video Camera.  Recording is to a full size S-VHS tape.  Single video frames are digitized with a Miro DC30Plus capture card and , saved as a .bmp image, converted to .jpg.


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Reading the recent list mail, I notice there are quite a few discussions about Progressive Scan cameras. This jogged my memory and I searched
through some video footage that I shot last year just as M42 was sinking from the southern hemisphere skies. It was on the last night that I saw it, I was testing a Sony 3-CCD 1/2" Colour camera (DXC 9100) just the camera head,
A$16,000.00 worth, so not an amateur bit of gear!

This camera has amongst other features, a range of slow speeds down to 8 seconds.  I had machined a Pentax to Sony bayonet adaptor to take a Pentax 105mm 2.8 Super Takumar Lens and fitted this to the Sony camera. I managed to take a few 8 second shots onto S-VHS tape before M42 disappeared from view. I may  not fit in with peoples idea of video at 8 seconds, however, it is video!

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Large solar prominence Friday 3/NOV/00
Selected video frames over a 45 minute period between 11am & 12 noon.
Technical details: 82mm refractor at f/15 with Lumicon 1.5 Angstrom H alpha
filter.Watec 202 1/3" CCD video camera on to S-VHS videotape. Single frames
digitised and edited in Photoshop.

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PC-23C B&W video camera. Seiko F/ 0.8 fast aspheric lens.
Recorded to S-VHS tape and a single frame digitised and processed in Adobe Photo Deluxe Business Edition. Saved as BMP files but compressed to verysmall JPEG's to save space.
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2x telenegative, f/16
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Prime focus, f/8
2x telenegative, f/16
The white light solar images above were made with a Takahashi 4 inch refractor, Sony Exwave HAD 1/2 inch CCD surveillance colour video camera and Baader Planetarium solar filter.  Video was recorded to S-VHS tape via S-Video mini Din connector.  A Miro DC 30 Plus capture card was used to digitize images which were than minimally processed in Adobe PhotoShop 5.5

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First effort with the FlashBus MV Lite capture card and Astro VCR V 2.0 software for capture straight to hard drive. A single frame with no processing, taken at twilight on 14 Feb. 2000 under good seeing conditions with the Takahashi 4" apo and a Sony 1/2" Exwave HAD SSC-DC50AP colour video camera(surveillance type). Output was from the S-VHS connector on the camera( this camera has Y/C and composite outputs). 
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 Tamron 200-400 Zoom at 400, Thousand Oaks Solar Filter, Sony Exwave 1/2" CCTV colour camera, Single video frame as BMP.
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Takahashi  4" refractor, Thousand Oaks Solar Filter, Sony Exwave 1/2" CCTV colour camera, Single video frame as BMP. Takahashi  4" refractor, Thousand Oaks Solar Filter, Sony Exwave 1/2" CCTV colour camera with 3x telenegative lens, single video frame as BMP. 
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Lunar Crater Gassendi. 55 miles dia.on the northern border of Mare Humorum.  Eastern walls 9,000 feet with a central mountain group, 4,000 feet. A system of clefts, craterlets and the remains of an inner ring can be seen with small telescopes.
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Transit of Mercury 16/11/99
Details: 82mm f/15 home built refractor with Lumicon 1.5 Angstrom Prominence Filter. A PCB colour camera (inexpensive variety) used at prime focus, recording on to a Sony Video 8 VCR Monitor/Recorder. Single video frame digitized with a Miro DC30 Plus capture card as a .bmp
file then converted to .jpg.  Of interest with this shot is that the image in H-alpha was still visible through light cloud when the white light image on the main scope was not visible at all.
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