G-Star Ex camera question

[PCH]

Hi,

those of you who have a G-Star Ex camera, how do you feed the video into your laptops. I've asked Steve at MyAstroShop and he's said either a Video to USB converter into any spare USB slot on your laptop will do fine. But Steve says it's preferable to use a PCMCIA video capture device.

Anyone who own a G-Star Ex care to share how they get the signal into their lappy?

Any advice appreciated :thumbsup:

[renormalised]

Exactly as Steve described there. If you can get an external PCMCIA capture device, then do so, but having an Video to USB device is OK. Steve also sells a wireless device for sending pics to you computer via a remote and a wireless station...they're $110 at his site. You can also control the camera via the remote as well.

[Karls48]

I use AverTV Cardbus plus PCMCIA card. Works well with Toshiba Satellite and IBM R52 laptops. Although, it gives you only 720x 576 resolution. I also got from eBay USB EasyCap video capture thing and it also works OK with same resolution, But images taken with it appears to be more noisy.

[jjjnettie]

I connect my Gstar to the lappy using a USB 2 hub and a Belkin Video Capture device.
Works a treat.

[PCH]

Hi,

Karl, Carl and Jeanette, - thank you so much for your helpful replies. I would think I'll be able to make up my mind from this info. The wireless option seems like a great idea - no messy cables to trip up over :thumbsup:

Quick question though. Hope it doesn't sound too stoopid...

Does the software that comes with the Gstar collect the data from the USB or PCMCIA ready for you to process it with DSS etc? How does this part of it happen?

Thanks guys

[lacad01]

Hi Paul, I don't have a G-Star but a similar security video cam which is good in low light. I use a USB-stick style video capture device and then some software called VirtualDub to capture onto my laptop. RegiStax is used to stack the avi file. But there is some software specifically for the G-Star:
http://www.myastroshop.com.au/guides/gstar/index.htm#DOWNLOADS
Hope that helps :)
cheers

[Karls48]

Many of video capture applications support GStar when used with analogue Video capture card. I capture images only in FITS format and I use Maxim DL (mostly for processing) but mainly AstroVideo. It is only video capture program I know that will capture video frames of with exposure time you can specify, subtract dark frame, align the image with previous one and stack it on fly. So if you want to take 150 exposures with other capture programs you would end up with 150 images or video clip with 150 frames. Then you would have to subtract darks, align images and stack them. With AstroVideo you can specify to take 3 subs of 50 images and you finish with 3 images that are align and have darks subtracted.
I have not used Video capture program that comes with GStar so I cannot comment on it.

[PCH]

Aha !

Thanks Adam and Karl for those replies. I see there is a little bit more to it. OK, well as with most people when they try something new, the terminology used can be a little daunting. But I do basically understand, and the rest will come once I get into using these things.

Thanks to you guys and all who have helped so far. :thumbsup:

[Blue Skies]

Hi Paul,

Jaycar sell a "DVD maker" device for around $80. It has three plugs at one end and the USB connection at the other. Just connect the video feed from the gstar into the yellow plug and then the USB to the computer BUT you do need a capture program at the other end. Virtualdub, which is free, will get you started but there might something else around that I'm not aware of.

[tonybarry]

Hello Paul,

I use a Canopus ADVC55 firewire frame grabber, which at AUD350 ain't cheap, but it is good for the job. It digitises at 784 x 576 rather than 640 x 480 so I get a few extra pixels for the effort. It's bus powered so there is no need for another power cable. It also does not consume much in the way of processor cycles, as firewire is arbitrated on chip rather than by the processor.

Regards,
Tony Barry

[garin]

Paul,
I use a Kworld DVD maker USB 2.0
http://global.kworld-global.com/main/prod_in.aspx?mnuid=1248&modid=6&pcid=47&ifid=17&prodid=104

I have also used a AverMedia PCMCIA capture card, either capture system works fine but I suggest that if you go USB (as I did) mark the USB port you install the camera on and make sure you plug into the same port each session, if I don't do this I've had problems detecting the video correctly.

The Gstar software will create avi files for direct import to registax (although I have had some issues if the avi files are too large).
FYI the G-Star software works with any video capture/webcam camera.

Cheers
Garin

[PCH]

Hi Garin, Jacqui and Tony,

thanks so much for that helpful informaion. Tony, I'm not sure I want to start off with a $350 option, but I take your point about the better resolution. Jacqui and Garin, these options look good. I'll keep these in mind when it comes to make your mind up time.

Thanks again guys :thumbsup: