Orion StarBright XLT 8" Schmidt-Cassegrain

Focal Length: 2032mm   F/10

with 2xBarlow: F/20

(412Kb) JPG

Camera: Orion StarShoot Solar System Color Imager II

Sensor: CMOS Progressive Scan 1/2"

FPS: Max-15fps @ 1280x1024 and

30fps @ 640x480

Pixels: 1.3Mp 1280x1024 layout.

IR Filter

Digitally recorded to hard drive with laptop, 3Ghz dual core processor,

1Gb of memory using Maxim DL Essentials software.

Movie files created with Roxio DVD Creator VideoWave 7 software.

   Important Note on Conversions:

The Maxim software records digital video in the AVI format from 21 to

27Mbs per second, depending on lighting and rendering.

At 640x480, a 30 second clip ranges from 600 to 680Mbs. At 1280x1024 it's almost double that.

So all conversions to the WMV format doesn't reduce it's resolution but

does reduce the bit-rate or data information, down to 1.5 to 3Mbs per second.

That's quite a bit from the original but necessary for web use.

Any 1280x1024 clips I made are reduced to 640x480 for web use.

This produces the result of lower quality video and smaller file size, although the quality is still very good.

On some videos, I kept the file in the first generation AVI format but shortened the clip for size.

And on others that are longer, I used an AVI to AVI conversion @ 5Mbs per second for file size.

The "Scanning The Moon" section are large files up to 90Mbs.

Videos are embedded in the pages for viewing, however, if you save

 any of the Moon videos, your connection speed will determine time of download.

Only one video I recommend viewing in full screen is "Tsiolkovsky's Secret".

Note on large files:

If AVI's over 40Mb's "stalls" in Windows Media Player, press pause

for a few seconds so the media loads faster than it's played.

The WMV's load themselves before they start and don't have that problem.

Saving Files:

On all pages for files over 5Mbs, I recommend to right click and "save as" on the download links.

You'll see a dark speck near the bottom right corner in most videos.

That's a scratch on the sensor from careless cleaning and the only remedy is to replace the sensor.

Update: Sensor replaced.