Free mod Toucam - Page 5

asimov (John) · #81 05-10-2005, 10:55 PM

Wheres Port Lincoln?? Where all the great white sharks eat surfers for lunch....that's where!

davidpretorius · #82 05-10-2005, 10:59 PM

sorry ken, just reread yours, yes my toucam has the mod as well.

i might give saturn another crack tonight now that the focus is better

ballaratdragons (Ken) · #83 05-10-2005, 11:03 PM

I've got the telescope
I've got the TouCam
I've got the programs
I've got the time

BUT

I've got the rain!

RAJAH235 · #84 06-10-2005, 12:01 AM

What can one say to that??????

L.
ps. Hope it clears soon Ken.

L.

ballaratdragons (Ken) · #85 06-10-2005, 07:07 PM

David,

I found a question a page back where you asked the size of memory in my old pooter. - I don't know!

shall I tell the pooter man just to leave my pooter as is and just make sure it has 2 available USB ports?

davidpretorius · #86 06-10-2005, 07:11 PM

mainly hard disk space, not memory. You will be taking some fairly big videos, so unless you want to keep having to delete them, i would try and make sure the disk space is 40 or 60 gigabyte.

yes two usb ports would be good, one for toucam, one for memory stick

ballaratdragons (Ken) · #87 06-10-2005, 08:41 PM

I really don't know how much space it has. I don't even know the size of the hard disk.

I do remember something about it being only a small hard disk.
I will just delete everything after I use Registax.

EDIT: What is the minimum size of space I would need for it to be practical. As I have to ring him tomorrow (Friday) and tell him what I want done to my pooter I can ask him if he can upgrade the size. (to a limit depending on dollars) He is going to hunt me down a new motherboard anyway! Apparently the current problem is in the motherboard.
Also, will I ask him to put Winzip on it or can winzip be downloaded. (if I need winzip)

davidpretorius · #88 07-10-2005, 02:53 AM

one pass of the moon at 200 x at the 600 x 400 video size was nearly 1 gigabyte. So i would want 80 gigabyte, 60 or 40 if money permits. Even if you end up with 20 that would be fine. It just means you will have to delete older ones more frequently over time.

yes winzip on the old one would be good as at times you will want to compress the video of the planets for storage maybe and also so that you can transfer to new poota for emailing to us so we can have a play with your video as well. ie registax, to see if we can help you with your processing!

avandonk · #89 07-10-2005, 02:54 AM

[QUOTE=ballaratdragons

I will be snapping away ASAP. I have it working and the quality of images in the kitchen is astounding.

Thanks Bert

[/QUOTE]

Try turning off the lights progressively,you will then see the low light capabilities of this wonderful webcam.I did not realize I would start such a storm of activity.The people here are great.The practical help you have been offered is amazing.Especially DavePretorius.The real fun is the learning and the help in learning.I am watching all this from afar but it seems so close.
Regards Bert

davidpretorius · #90 07-10-2005, 03:00 AM

hey bert, thanks,

ken helped me when i first joined with tips, so I am returning the favour. he is also part of the team organising star camp

i am about to image saturn and mars, beautiful night, the scope is cooling. how is it your way?

by the way, the afocal setups were no good at all with the eyepiece projection, i have now sent back to the supplier with the feedback that toucams and this setup does not work

have the digi-t for a camera 20d, 300d etc down the track.

I have the williams optic digiscoper platform for taking an image with the modded toucam thru the lens as my eye sees it, and it works pretty well. I just wanted that totally encapsulted setup, only one focus to worry about etc

avandonk · #91 07-10-2005, 03:06 AM

Up waiting for a hole in the clouds.But this is Melbourne if you don't like the weather wait five minutes.Not good though!

Bert

ballaratdragons (Ken) · #92 07-10-2005, 12:37 PM

Win 98, 20 - 80 gig, winzip, 2 free USB ports and an almost empty memory (no, Office, Word, games etc).

I shall ring him now and see how I go, unless you can think of anything else it will need.

ballaratdragons (Ken) · #93 07-10-2005, 01:46 PM

Dave, following our phone Conversation I have rang Mr. computerman and he is going to see how cheap he can bump the whole system up to 80 - 120 Gigabytes. He is also loading XP Pro instead of Win98.

After I explained the system of using the Toucam, registax and winzipping it and putting it on memory stick he then saw what I was trying to achieve.

He is going to ring me Monday with the answer to what he has done to it.

This thread seems to ramble on a lot but I believe other people will get a good idea of all the steps I am going through to set up a Toucam: computer to computer. In that way they will learn how to do it too.
You know the ones: "always wanted to know, but too afraid to ask"

Well, I am on my way and almost ready to Rock'n'Roll. As long as the weather clears next week I should be able to post my first proper pic!

Thanks all for your help.

davidpretorius · #94 07-10-2005, 01:57 PM

now like any noobie to astronomy.

ken, you will not be getting this first night out:
http://www.iceinspace.com.au/forum/a...&stc=1&thumb=1

The journey has just started and you must enjoy this journey. Take time to smell the flowers.

or take asimov's approach "if the b@@@@@@@d don't work threaten it with the angle grinder!!!"

ballaratdragons (Ken) · #95 07-10-2005, 02:13 PM

Hehehe! I don't expect pics like that for quite a while. I see this as another of lifes adventures.

My boys are already waiting to learn! At least they are keen. And that makes it all worth it.

ballaratdragons (Ken) · #96 16-10-2005, 11:49 PM

Well, I finally got hold of my pooter fix-it man and I think I need a change of pooter fix-it man.

He said because he couldn't find any of the bits I need to upgrade my pooter at a good enough price he didn't get any parts for it!!!!!!!!!!!!

He is leaving it as is and re-loading Win98 and bringing it back one day! (he doesn't travel out this way very often). He said it still freezes occasionally. That's why I gave it to him to fix

It will still be a 700mhz Celeron with 8mb Ram that still crashes.

Not impressed.

asimov (John) · #97 17-10-2005, 12:01 AM

I've tried running registax on a pentium II with 16 ram....no way. Although you only intend to use it as a capture device for the toucam & then trasnsfer to the sooper-dooper-pooter don't ya Ken??

ballaratdragons (Ken) · #98 17-10-2005, 12:12 AM

Yeah. but I gotta load the Philips program, registax & Winzip into it. The idea is to capture, stack, zip-up, and transfer to memory stick. Then put memory stick in the biggun. Then either send it on to be played with or play with it using NeatImage, Astra & Photoshop myself.

As I said "not impressed".

davidpretorius · #99 17-10-2005, 06:46 AM

asimov taught me one thing

bink and smacker video editing software really does compress up the movies.

I would suggest you get bink and smacker, winizip and just the toucam video software on the old one.

We have aprox 128 mbyte on the memory stick. So take the movie, compress it with bink and smacker or winzip, whatever is the best compressor, load onto memory stick and take to the big computer.

Every planet video i have done will compress easily and fit onto the memoy stick.

The only one i will test is a 1 gigabyte movie of the moon at 250x, lots of detail and the screen is full. I will compress that and see if it fits on the 128m memory stick.

If it does, then there is nothing really you will miss out on imaging.

Remeber, as you don't have tracking, then there is only a finite length you can video an object as it will have moved out of the screen.

As long as the old one can run toucam video, winzip and optionally bink / smacker and has a usb port (hopefully 2), then we should be right.

What size disk drive is it?

ballaratdragons (Ken) · #**100** 17-10-2005, 01:01 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by davidpretorius

What size disk drive is it?

I don't know, it's not here. He still has it.

I will do a google and try find the Bink & Smacker!! Thanks Dave.