Camera scope

[sputnick]

Hey everyone, today after coming home from school and browsing youtube for a bit, I found a large bunch of POV pellet gun shoot videos,
Wanting something similar, I decided to try and make my own camera scope for super accurate computer viewable aiming and pictures, so I could aim by setting up my laptop and watching the screen, instead of straining my eyes.

What I came up with is this monstrosity of a web cam taped to some bristol board taped to a scope,



the results were, how do we say, somewhat less than spectacular...
Here's at about 20 feet lowest zoom at this month's popular science,


Here's same distance max zoom, same target


the images were too small! and I do not know how to adjust them, oh well, some tinkering might yield the answer.

But all its shortcomings aside, What do you guys think? is it a project worthy of pursuing? and do you know of any way I might be able to control the size of the image or the zoom?

Any comments or harsh criticism welcome!

[jimmy101]

I suspect you have the camera too far from the scope. What happens if you cut the cardboard tube length in half?

[sputnick]

With a smaller cardboard tube, I get a much smaller visible space, forget the technical term, but its like when you turn it to an angle and it goes black, that gets much smaller and harder to adjust. So this space is what I deemed acceptable, and also, the tube is adjustable, I would just have to take off the tape and slide it further over the scope.

[jackssmirkingrevenge]

You're mostly limited by the webcam quality here, especially indoors, and I'm guessing your scope doesn't have a particularly wide lens either.

To avoid all the ghetto tape you can get a universal camera adapter fairly cheaply, actually what the hell, go for night vision

[rp181]

Haha. I have the same camera and popular science =p 15$ for 2 camera's aint bad.

Anyway... I took one apart. Inside, there is a little square PCB. You can unclip the snapshot button, and the lens screws directly onto the PCB. It works much better without the case and if the cross hairs are before the lins, right above the CCD.

[dudeman508]

Last year my uncle got me an infered ammiter for X-mas and i made a night vision camera ill get some pics up soon.

[starman]

I think the idea is worth pursuing and this was a gallant effort. Get it perfected then mount an LCD display on your gun. It would be great for accurate shooting from the hip shots.

[rp181]

The hard part is getting it all into a small independent system (laptops don't count) =p
I did it so It was inline with the barrel, there is a Tee and the camera, chamber down.

[starman]

OR....find a way to interface the cam to an iPhone and just build a dock for your iPhone to display the cam...I'm not sure that would work or not, but it would be very cool. Might be able to get a WiFi cam to work with it....

Hummmmmm..... 8)

[jackssmirkingrevenge]

With a good enough camera, you don't even need a scope, just tape crosshairs onto your screen.



The corner shotprovides some "real world" inspiration