Its known for its "cheap yet cool B&W look". It used to record to audio cassete, surely you remember this gem..
I sold one on ebay for almost $80 as is!
Disposable Video Camera
Moderator: Andreas Wideroe
Can pixel vison be made as a cheap toy today? With compression I think a new pixel vision would be quite good, even if a cassette tape is still used. I wonder how much compressed digital data an analog tape can hold today? If it could record 5 minutes of analog fotage per side in the 80's I am sure it would be quite interesting to see.
-
discs of tron
- Posts: 87
- Joined: Thu Dec 11, 2003 4:50 am
- Location: western mass
it's funny i just checked out this thread and i'd been fantasizing about this digital back thing myself. i guess great minds think alike. what got me started on this line of thought was that i've been really eagerly following progress on the kinetta. as we get closer to shipping time, it seems like they're gonna be >$50K. so i made a postt asking jekk (the kinetta developer) if there would ever be a "kinetta bolex" type of thing, and he says that that will be happening. he said it will probably take c-mount and might have a leatherette covering. now this is a couple years down the road but it got me thinking about the "digital back" idea. in my mind, this is what it would look like:
you'd send in your beaulieu 4008 to the developer. (i know this part isn't great for everyone, but i think enough has to be done with the camera that there has to be just one camera that it's done for, and the 4008 is the most readily available s8 out there with removable lens.)
the shutter and claw are totally removed. the take up motor will dictate the speed, and some kind of digital processing will translate any motion within 2 fps into the exact, digital framerate. in other words, voltage variations, etc, mike make a camera set to "24" run at more like 22.5, but the circuitry would figure out that this speed meant to capture at 24. all of the original 4008 speeds would be available. this isn't really science fiction either. the kinetta is available with a hand-crank for under and over-cranked and manual speed-ramps. so jeff has clearly already figured out how to translate mechanical motion into cmos capture rate.
i'm pretty sure current cmos sensors capable of 720p hi-def res can fit into a s8 gate, so obviously the chip is in the gate, as had been suggested.
the film loading door is replaced with a new one with a cool lcd display to display important camera status stuff, (remaining recording time, audio levels, etc.) also, this new door has the now-necessary ports, including two xlr inputs, switchable mic/line, with phantom and limiting. headphone jack too. the cartridge-sized "digital back" contains an ipod-sized hard drive, possibly 2, though i don't know if they could be "stacked" like that. toshiba is now making those drives in 80 GB capacity. with panasonic's dvc hd codec, that 80 GB gives you 80 minutes at 60 fps 720p, about 3 hrs at 24p i believe. oh, the door no longer opens, unless by factory tech. (i don't think it would be healthy to have the imaging chip exposed like that, although i guess it gets exposed when you change lenses. hmm.) there's a firewire port on the door that lets you download your footage to external hard-drives, if you want, with an optional removable-media drive that can be mounted on the camera.
AND... there would be some sort of screw-in adapter along the lines of the Guerilla35, the micro35, etc, but obviously smaller, that projects the lenses image onto an area the size of a 16mm gate. it would look like a little screw-in donut thing that goes between the body and lens. this would give us 16mm depth of field. (i think 35mm depth of field might be too shallow for the stuff we'd be doing with this camera.) also, we could use any of the readily available c-mount lenses in 16mm appropriate focal lengths. (it's a lot easier to find 16, 25, 50, and 75 mm lenses than 8mm, etc, and there are plenty of zooms out there too. if you wanted, you could adapt to a nikon f-mount or any other reasonable mount. m42 could be cool.)
cost would be $1500 if you supply the beaulieu, $2250 if you don't. we just need someone to make it. roger, are you busy?
you'd send in your beaulieu 4008 to the developer. (i know this part isn't great for everyone, but i think enough has to be done with the camera that there has to be just one camera that it's done for, and the 4008 is the most readily available s8 out there with removable lens.)
the shutter and claw are totally removed. the take up motor will dictate the speed, and some kind of digital processing will translate any motion within 2 fps into the exact, digital framerate. in other words, voltage variations, etc, mike make a camera set to "24" run at more like 22.5, but the circuitry would figure out that this speed meant to capture at 24. all of the original 4008 speeds would be available. this isn't really science fiction either. the kinetta is available with a hand-crank for under and over-cranked and manual speed-ramps. so jeff has clearly already figured out how to translate mechanical motion into cmos capture rate.
i'm pretty sure current cmos sensors capable of 720p hi-def res can fit into a s8 gate, so obviously the chip is in the gate, as had been suggested.
the film loading door is replaced with a new one with a cool lcd display to display important camera status stuff, (remaining recording time, audio levels, etc.) also, this new door has the now-necessary ports, including two xlr inputs, switchable mic/line, with phantom and limiting. headphone jack too. the cartridge-sized "digital back" contains an ipod-sized hard drive, possibly 2, though i don't know if they could be "stacked" like that. toshiba is now making those drives in 80 GB capacity. with panasonic's dvc hd codec, that 80 GB gives you 80 minutes at 60 fps 720p, about 3 hrs at 24p i believe. oh, the door no longer opens, unless by factory tech. (i don't think it would be healthy to have the imaging chip exposed like that, although i guess it gets exposed when you change lenses. hmm.) there's a firewire port on the door that lets you download your footage to external hard-drives, if you want, with an optional removable-media drive that can be mounted on the camera.
AND... there would be some sort of screw-in adapter along the lines of the Guerilla35, the micro35, etc, but obviously smaller, that projects the lenses image onto an area the size of a 16mm gate. it would look like a little screw-in donut thing that goes between the body and lens. this would give us 16mm depth of field. (i think 35mm depth of field might be too shallow for the stuff we'd be doing with this camera.) also, we could use any of the readily available c-mount lenses in 16mm appropriate focal lengths. (it's a lot easier to find 16, 25, 50, and 75 mm lenses than 8mm, etc, and there are plenty of zooms out there too. if you wanted, you could adapt to a nikon f-mount or any other reasonable mount. m42 could be cool.)
cost would be $1500 if you supply the beaulieu, $2250 if you don't. we just need someone to make it. roger, are you busy?
-
discs of tron
- Posts: 87
- Joined: Thu Dec 11, 2003 4:50 am
- Location: western mass
it's funny i just checked out this thread and i'd been fantasizing about this digital back thing myself. i guess great minds think alike. what got me started on this line of thought was that i've been really eagerly following progress on the kinetta. as we get closer to shipping time, it seems like they're gonna be >$50K. so i made a postt asking jekk (the kinetta developer) if there would ever be a "kinetta bolex" type of thing, and he says that that will be happening. he said it will probably take c-mount and might have a leatherette covering. now this is a couple years down the road but it got me thinking about the "digital back" idea. in my mind, this is what it would look like:
you'd send in your beaulieu 4008 to the developer. (i know this part isn't great for everyone, but i think enough has to be done with the camera that there has to be just one camera that it's done for, and the 4008 is the most readily available s8 out there with removable lens.)
the shutter and claw are totally removed. the take up motor will dictate the speed, and some kind of digital processing will translate any motion within 2 fps into the exact, digital framerate. in other words, voltage variations, etc, mike make a camera set to "24" run at more like 22.5, but the circuitry would figure out that this speed meant to capture at 24. all of the original 4008 speeds would be available. this isn't really science fiction either. the kinetta is available with a hand-crank for under and over-cranked and manual speed-ramps. so jeff has clearly already figured out how to translate mechanical motion into cmos capture rate.
i'm pretty sure current cmos sensors capable of 720p hi-def res can fit into a s8 gate, so obviously the chip is in the gate, as had been suggested.
the film loading door is replaced with a new one with a cool lcd display to display important camera status stuff, (remaining recording time, audio levels, etc.) also, this new door has the now-necessary ports, including two xlr inputs, switchable mic/line, with phantom and limiting. headphone jack too. the cartridge-sized "digital back" contains an ipod-sized hard drive, possibly 2, though i don't know if they could be "stacked" like that. toshiba is now making those drives in 80 GB capacity. with panasonic's dvc hd codec, that 80 GB gives you 80 minutes at 60 fps 720p, about 3 hrs at 24p i believe. oh, the door no longer opens, unless by factory tech. (i don't think it would be healthy to have the imaging chip exposed like that, although i guess it gets exposed when you change lenses. hmm.) there's a firewire port on the door that lets you download your footage to external hard-drives, if you want, with an optional removable-media drive that can be mounted on the camera.
AND... there would be some sort of screw-in adapter along the lines of the Guerilla35, the micro35, etc, but obviously smaller, that projects the lenses image onto an area the size of a 16mm gate. it would look like a little screw-in donut thing that goes between the body and lens. this would give us 16mm depth of field. (i think 35mm depth of field might be too shallow for the stuff we'd be doing with this camera.) also, we could use any of the readily available c-mount lenses in 16mm appropriate focal lengths. (it's a lot easier to find 16, 25, 50, and 75 mm lenses than 8mm, etc, and there are plenty of zooms out there too. if you wanted, you could adapt to a nikon f-mount or any other reasonable mount. m42 could be cool.)
cost would be $1500 if you supply the beaulieu, $2250 if you don't. we just need someone to make it. roger, are you busy?
you'd send in your beaulieu 4008 to the developer. (i know this part isn't great for everyone, but i think enough has to be done with the camera that there has to be just one camera that it's done for, and the 4008 is the most readily available s8 out there with removable lens.)
the shutter and claw are totally removed. the take up motor will dictate the speed, and some kind of digital processing will translate any motion within 2 fps into the exact, digital framerate. in other words, voltage variations, etc, mike make a camera set to "24" run at more like 22.5, but the circuitry would figure out that this speed meant to capture at 24. all of the original 4008 speeds would be available. this isn't really science fiction either. the kinetta is available with a hand-crank for under and over-cranked and manual speed-ramps. so jeff has clearly already figured out how to translate mechanical motion into cmos capture rate.
i'm pretty sure current cmos sensors capable of 720p hi-def res can fit into a s8 gate, so obviously the chip is in the gate, as had been suggested.
the film loading door is replaced with a new one with a cool lcd display to display important camera status stuff, (remaining recording time, audio levels, etc.) also, this new door has the now-necessary ports, including two xlr inputs, switchable mic/line, with phantom and limiting. headphone jack too. the cartridge-sized "digital back" contains an ipod-sized hard drive, possibly 2, though i don't know if they could be "stacked" like that. toshiba is now making those drives in 80 GB capacity. with panasonic's dvc hd codec, that 80 GB gives you 80 minutes at 60 fps 720p, about 3 hrs at 24p i believe. oh, the door no longer opens, unless by factory tech. (i don't think it would be healthy to have the imaging chip exposed like that, although i guess it gets exposed when you change lenses. hmm.) there's a firewire port on the door that lets you download your footage to external hard-drives, if you want, with an optional removable-media drive that can be mounted on the camera.
AND... there would be some sort of screw-in adapter along the lines of the Guerilla35, the micro35, etc, but obviously smaller, that projects the lenses image onto an area the size of a 16mm gate. it would look like a little screw-in donut thing that goes between the body and lens. this would give us 16mm depth of field. (i think 35mm depth of field might be too shallow for the stuff we'd be doing with this camera.) also, we could use any of the readily available c-mount lenses in 16mm appropriate focal lengths. (it's a lot easier to find 16, 25, 50, and 75 mm lenses than 8mm, etc, and there are plenty of zooms out there too. if you wanted, you could adapt to a nikon f-mount or any other reasonable mount. m42 could be cool.)
cost would be $1500 if you supply the beaulieu, $2250 if you don't. we just need someone to make it. roger, are you busy?