Junk catalog Hammacher Schlemmer occasionally gets a winner—this new “Digital Video Rocket” by Estes may be one. While the capability isn’t as good as one would hope—only 12 seconds of video or three VGA-quality pictures—it sounds like a lot of fun for a sunny afternoon.
It’s $60 plus shipping from the Hammaschlem, plus rocket cost. ($10 for three.) I’d bet you could find this at your local hobby stores soon, too. They’d appreciate the business. And human contact.
Catalog Page [Hammacher.com via Coolest Gadgets via GetUSB.info]
12 seconds is all you need to get video of the rocket flight. Since it is in the nosecone, it probably won’t trigger until the parachute deploys, so no video of it screaming into the sky.
Chances are H-S is way overcharging. Like Joel says, contact your local hobby shop.
I have, or had depending on how you look at it, one of the older “Oracle” Estes movie cameras. More expensive and larger. 30 second capture time, with a time trigger (press button, run away, launch rocket within 10 seconds). Lousy frame rate. No sound. But pretty remarkable for a consumer tech-item.
For its fourth flight, I put the Oracle camera on a two-stage model. The second stage didn’t light. Came in hard. To really rub it in, the batteries popped out, so I lost the crash footage. I think I could put it back together, by splicing in a generic plastic cone over the splintered remains of the old one.
Make magazine had a great feature on how to build it yourself if you are so inclined.
http://makezine.com/07/camerarocket/
With 60 dollars, you can definitely come up with a better solution on your own, and it’ll be more fun.
Has anyone tried this with multi-stages or high power (E or more)? It would be tough to lose it. I have one and it’s a nice, cost-effetive design.
I used to fly the Astrocam with the camera/nosecone reversed. Use the right delay motors, and you get photos looking downward and not obscured by the fuselage and fins. The net effect was like the late 1960s Estes CAMROC. I’m going to do that with this model.
–Mike
Michael A. Banks
http://www.michaelabanks.com