Listening to the Voices in My Head

And I did manage to bag a few.  My old Kodak 3200...well the door catch for the battery compartment was gone (design flaw as _meegan's has the same problem) and th Kodak company wanted to charge me $45 just to send it in. Huh?  Yeah right, so, I used a piece of grey ducttape and a very strong hair tie to keep the door closed.  *shrug* Works well enough, I guess.

Back to the bargain hunt.

Headed into my fave tech/nerd store (would love to have unlimited credit and 10 minutes in there.. maybe 20) to get a new DSL line filter (turns out you can daisy chain em if one doesn't filter well enough) and as I got to discussing my McGuyvering of one of their webcams into a ccd. Told em it was a success, but I wanted larger image, so I would be getting the 640x480 resolution webcam.  While checking out, I was asked if I knew about Kodak 3200, and I said yes, and mentioned the above story about the battery door, and I was offered it for the horrible price of..(wait for it)... $10. SOLD. 

Got a flash card for it too, as all three of the laptops here don't have serial ports, but can use the card reader I got at same geek/nerd store. (aka, MY home away from Home!)

This image was made by using IRIS to capture the AVI file, and RegiStax to align/optimise/stack it.  I did this with the CCD camera I made from that inexpensive webcam. If images this good can be done with it, I can only imaging how much better it will be with a more sensitive and precise webcam.

( Jupiter and Three Moons )

I won't be able to do anymore photography until my new mount gets here, as the stock mount had a manufacture flaw, and the latitude adjustment doesn't hold.

I won't be able to do anymore photography until my new mount gets here, as the stock mount had a manufacture flaw, and the latitude adjustment doesn't hold.

EDIT: I managed to get some frames from the avi with the clouds. This is what I managed to do:

( Jupiter no moons visible due to clouds )

Really I am, but underappreciated.

I got a new internet webcam today, and modified it.  It is now a CCD camera. (go Any, Go Any, Go Any!) should be much simpler to use than the Acuter but the Acuter has its purposes still.

I will have to wait for a stint of clear weather, but I am patient (and if you believe that, I have this long red bridge for sale in San Fran for sale). 

Still looking into getting a more robust EQ mount. Found a great price on an EQ5, Dual Axis motor drive capable.  Just have to save up a bit longer to get it.