Camera car

[Anonymous]

I just put together an N scale camera car to have a look at my layout from the perspective of an engineer. Way cool!



Here's a short test drive (1.7MB): http://nscalers.com/clips/train_cam.wmv

The only thing that bothers me is that the 9V battery is just too big and heavy
and that it's making the car wobble around too much, because of the high center
of gravity.
Are there smaller 9V battery solutions out there?
Or do I have to pull power of the tracks (DCC) to feed the camera?

If anyone has done this before, I'd sure appreciate the help.

[MisterBeasley]

I have a similar camera from WirelessMicroColorCam.com (SJT Enterprises.) They do make a DCC pickup. Since I'm planning to go to DCC, I bought the power source when I bought the camera, but for now I'm running with the "DCB" (for DuraCell Battery) option. My layout is HO, though, so I've got a bit more tolerance.

The DCC power is about the same width and thickness as the 9-volt battery. It's actually about a quarter-inch longer, too. The big component is a large capacitor, which it needs to smooth out momentary power dropouts caused by dirty tracks, frogs, etc. The good news is that it's a lot lighter than the battery. The capacitor is mounted on the side of the board, so you could arrange it with the capacitor at the bottom of the car and greatly help your center-of-gravity problem.

I agree that these things are cool. Try it in the middle of a train with a couple of flat cars ahead of it. Nice perspective.

[Anonymous]

Okay that is just WAY cool! Since I model HO, I could probably find a dummy loco (old stock Athearn BB stuff maybe) and install one just like you've got yours inside the loco. Does the camera save the movies and then you d/l them onto your computer or how does that work? I'd love to find a camera that I could hook up like that, but have a reciever that could pick up the live signal feed and watch stuff real time while you're running your trains.

[jacon12]

Just too cool! I've done something similar with a digital still camera that also shoots little 60 second Quicktime moves. I sat the camera in an open gondola car and ran the train backwards. I've been wanting to get a setup like you have though.
NICE!
Jarrell

[Seamonster]

Neat video, Kyle!

[bikerraypa]

QUOTE: Originally posted by kaysievert

I just put together an N scale camera car to have a look at my layout from the perspective of an engineer. Way cool!

Way cool indeed. What model camera do you have and where did you get it? I've seen various ones on eBay but I don't really know what to look for as far as features or price. I'd love to try this.


Ray

[Anonymous]

QUOTE: Originally posted by MisterBeasley

I have a similar camera from WirelessMicroColorCam.com (SJT Enterprises.) They do make a DCC pickup.

Perfect. That's exactly what I was looking for!
Thanks for the tip.

[Anonymous]

QUOTE: Originally posted by jshrade

Okay that is just WAY cool! Since I model HO, I could probably find a dummy loco (old stock Athearn BB stuff maybe) and install one just like you've got yours inside the loco. Does the camera save the movies and then you d/l them onto your computer or how does that work?

I'm glad everyone likes this little project. It really is a lot of fun.

It is a wireless camera system, similar to this: http://WirelessMicroColorCam.com
I bought the same system for about $30 on eBay. All you have to do, after you placed the camera in a car, is to plug the receiver into a TV or VCR and you're set. Video and audio!
Since I have a video capture card in my computer, I just captured the movie
right onto the computer and compressed it a little, so it downloads faster.
I'll get a small cheapo color monitor, that I can place near my layout.

As you can clearly tell by the movie - my layout still needs a lot of work.. [;)]

[Anonymous]

Your layout may need alot of work... but talk about getting 'up close and personal' with what you're working on. Any little dips or bumps in the track could be viewed first hand. That's just cool man! That's DEFINITELY on my 'to buy' list. And the price isn't bad either, I expected it to be upwards of $250 for wireless and the quality I saw on the video. Not bad at all!

[Anonymous]

QUOTE: Originally posted by jshrade

Your layout may need alot of work... but talk about getting 'up close and personal' with what you're working on. Any little dips or bumps in the track could be viewed first hand. That's just cool man! That's DEFINITELY on my 'to buy' list. And the price isn't bad either, I expected it to be upwards of $250 for wireless and the quality I saw on the video. Not bad at all!

Yeah, the quality of these cameras is pretty good.
The more light you have, the better the picture.
The live picture looks even better, but I had to compress my little movie so it
wasn't too big a file to download.
And since you model in HO, all you have to do is to drop one into one
of your cars, use the battery and you're read to roll for about 30 bucks.
You can't beat that. It's almost like the "real thing" when you drive around on your
layout, watching it from that point of view. Amazing.

[Anonymous]

$30 bucks? The ones on http://WirelessMicroColorCam.com were $79 with no sound... where'd you find yours? (did I miss where you said you got it?)

[Anonymous]

QUOTE: Originally posted by jshrade

$30 bucks? The ones on http://WirelessMicroColorCam.com were $79 with no sound... where'd you find yours? (did I miss where you said you got it?)

I bought in on eBay.
Look for something like this:
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=48632&item=5774992413

[bikerraypa]

QUOTE: Originally posted by kaysievert

QUOTE: Originally posted by jshrade

$30 bucks? The ones on http://WirelessMicroColorCam.com were $79 with no sound... where'd you find yours? (did I miss where you said you got it?)

I bought in on eBay.
Look for something like this:
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=48632&item=5774992413

Sweeet. Thanks man. I think I'll get one for the trains and one to stick on an airplane, if I can find one that has some range to it.

[:D]

Ray out

[Anonymous]

QUOTE: Sweeet. Thanks man. I think I'll get one for the trains and one to stick on an airplane, if I can find one that has some range to it.

[:D]

Ray out

Those cameras are cool, aren't they?
I also got one that has night vision. I'm planning on placing that one in a tunnel
and watch my trains go by. [:)]

[MisterBeasley]

The receiver that comes with this particular model puts out video, so you need to plug it into the video input of something. It does NOT produce a Channel 3/4 RF output like most VCR's, but most of today's TV units have a video jack. That's the one you would plug a video game into, so a lot of them are conveniently located on the front. You should be able to plug it into the video input of a camcorder, too.

Kaysievert, is that site where you posted your video a public site where others could put their train-cam shots?

[Anonymous]

QUOTE: Kaysievert, is that site where you posted your video a public site where others could put their train-cam shots?

That site is not public, sorry.
But I think that there are public forums that will let you upload a movie clip, if
it's not too big.

[lonewoof]

Kaysievert -- You can probably get 3 3-volt lithium cells and stack them in series, to power your camera. I'm not sure what kind of battery life you'd get, since I don't know how much current it draws. Might be worth a try, though...

[Anonymous]

QUOTE: Originally posted by lonewoof

Kaysievert -- You can probably get 3 3-volt lithium cells and stack them in series, to power your camera. I'm not sure what kind of battery life you'd get, since I don't know how much current it draws. Might be worth a try, though...

Here's the catch with that: Three 3V cells together are as big as a 9V battery..
Same with using 6 AAAA cells. I couldn't find any kind of battery combination
that would produce the 9V and is smaller and lighter then a single 9V battery.
Go figure..
But I ordered a DCC module that will pull power of the tracks and is lighter then
a 9V battery. Let's see what that does.

[jkeaton]

Three, 3V Lithium calculator batteries (the thin disc ones) are smaller than a 9V "Brick" - but the battery life might very short.

Jim

[Anonymous]

Update:

Well, here it is: My cam car without the pesky battery..
I installed a DCC/DC converter and axle wipers, which makes for a much smoother ride.



Installing the axle wipers was probably the biggest pain..

Here are 2 new clips taken with the updated car. I added some sound FX
for good measure. Why not?

http://nscalers.com/clips/roundhouse.wmv (900KB)
http://nscalers.com/clips/tunnel.wmv (1.6 MB)

If I stop getting sidetracked by projects like this, I might even find the time to
add scenery to my layout..? [:)]

[bikerraypa]

those videos are great! Inspiring, actually (so I can blame you for making me spend the money on a camera [:D] ) But I have a question for you, if you don't mind....

I got the cam and it's great. I can get my video onto my computer, etc, but how do you compress it to make it uploadable. I noticed that your clips are right around 1MB. I have a ten second video that goes 67MB. Waaay too big. What software do you use on videos?

thanks!


Ray out

[MisterBeasley]

Cool. I don't have DCC yet, so I'm still running off the battery. Is the DCC source just a power supply, or does it have any DCC programmability? The power seemed very steady, anyway. Is it always that good, or do you have occasional dropouts?

I noticed the bright light in the roundhouse. How many watts was that bulb? It seemed to provide ample lighting for the camera. I'm working on my subway tunnel walls now, and I'm wondering how I will be lighting them. One trick will be to put the lights on the inside wall of each curve, where the camera will never point directly at it.

[Pennsy58]

For DCC you can do both. I have mine on DCC just as the power source for now. Power pick ups through the trucks. But, you can wire the camera through a decoder as a function output to turn it on and off if you wish.
Depending on track cleaning there are power drop offs and this has resulted in poor video for me at times. I see some people are now offering a DCC convertor for the cameras. These have a capacitor built onto a board to eliminate power fluctuations or a small rechargable battery that provides power only when power from the track is low or off.
I am probably going to switch mine back to 9volt battery power as this worked better for me and I dont want to spend the money on the DCC board thingie.
As far as lighting, on mine I placed an LED on each side of the camera to light things up. Still under development to prevent wash out by having the lamps to close to the lens. Thats been my biggest issue with the camera. What seemed to be good lighting in my train room proved way to low for the camera.
I keep checking this topic for potential solutions to my lighting problems.

[Anonymous]

QUOTE: Originally posted by bikerraypa

those videos are great! Inspiring, actually (so I can blame you for making me spend the money on a camera [:D] ) But I have a question for you, if you don't mind....

I got the cam and it's great. I can get my video onto my computer, etc, but how do you compress it to make it uploadable. I noticed that your clips are right around 1MB. I have a ten second video that goes 67MB. Waaay too big. What software do you use on videos?

thanks!


Ray out

Hi Ray,

I've been doing video editing for some time now. I use Adobe Premiere to edit
my videos and then spit them out compressed right out of Premiere.
Video compression is a science by itself though. Quality vs size of the clips.
Uncompressed video is brutal, as far as the size goes, but I think that you can
get an encoder for free from Microsoft:

http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windowsmedia/9series/encoder/default.aspx

I hope this helps. Just ask if you have more questions. Editing hours of HI8
video of the kids and burning it onto DVD sure helped me figuring this out..

[Anonymous]

QUOTE: Originally posted by MisterBeasley

Cool. I don't have DCC yet, so I'm still running off the battery. Is the DCC source just a power supply, or does it have any DCC programmability? The power seemed very steady, anyway. Is it always that good, or do you have occasional dropouts?

I noticed the bright light in the roundhouse. How many watts was that bulb? It seemed to provide ample lighting for the camera. I'm working on my subway tunnel walls now, and I'm wondering how I will be lighting them. One trick will be to put the lights on the inside wall of each curve, where the camera will never point directly at it.

When you model in anything bigger than N scale, I'd use the battery if I'd be you.
In N scale, the battery is just to heavy and makes the car shake around too much.
I do get occasional dropouts, but not that often. I guess I should clean those
tracks again..?

I use grain of wheat bulbs in the roundhouse. That's a cool shot though, isn't it?
I just wi***hat I could get the car smaller to fit through the stall doors all the way.

[Anonymous]

QUOTE: Originally posted by Pennsy58

What seemed to be good lighting in my train room proved way to low for the camera.

I agree. These CMOS cameras need a lot of light. The only other alternative would
be to go with a night vision camera, but those are usually only black & white.
And I don't know if you can get a more light sensitive CCD camera that small?
Sure would be a lot more expensive.

I like the idea of adding lights to the camera car, but this will give you only a small
illuminated area around the camera, right? What do you use, bright white LEDs?

[Anonymous]

I use a wireless colour camera with sound on our OO scale layout. It runs on a 9v PP3 size battery but I find it needs a new battery to perform well. After a little use the performance drops off.
I have obtained a battery pack that takes 6 x AA batteries with a PP3 connector on the top. The batteries fit in 3 x long by 2 x wide. This should give best performance for longer, although it would probably be too big for N scale.

[Pennsy58]

Yes, I used two Bright White LED's. They do provide a decent amount of illumination down the track and a little off to the side. Remember, LED's are directional and do not fan out the beam from the lamp very well. Still, it an improvement over the dark images I was getting before. My camera claims to only need 1 lux of illumination but the better the lighting the better the picture from my experiments.
I tend to think that if I wanted a really great video capture of my layout, when its done someday, I would set up lights on stands that I have in my garage to daylight things better. As is, its still a cool little toy.

[mcouvillion]

Pennsy58,

I've got two pinhole color cameras, one mounted inside an engine powered by DCC, the other still loose, powered by two 9V batteries in series. I usually mount this one temporarily in gondolas. I noticed your camera has a lens, which explains why your focal point is down the track a ways. The pinhole lens brings everything into focus right up to the camera, and it has decent peripheral vision, too. I have tried white LEDs to no avail. My engine's headlight is a white LED that is as bright as a flashlight, and I can;t see a thing in tunnels with it. However, I can see with infrared LEDs! You and I can't see the light from these, but the pinhole camera does. Try one of these with one of the white LEDs and see if your vision improves in the darker areas.

I'll try to get a video together soon of an actual layout, and then post a clip.

Mark C.

[Pennsy58]

Never thought of that. Gonna have to give it a try.