I have a new project that has been in my head for several months and I think the time has come to try to turn it in reality. The catchtheiridium project has confirmed to me that with the right dose of enthusiasm and passion even the ideas that appear initially complex and difficult can materialize in positive experiences especially when they play the right chords of shared passions with other people. What is it about? Well about a year ago I felt in love with the idea of being able to build an “all-sky camera” for 360 ° night sky monitoring (hence the name “all sky”). And here comes the name: The All-Sky Camera Project.
AN ALL-SKY WHAT?
An all-sky camera is nothing more than an astronomical camera which, properly programmed, spends its nights taking pictures of the sky hoping to being able to capture meteors or satellites flares and so on and which each morning makes available on the net a series of videos and characteristic photos of the night just passed (e.g. startrail and video of the rotation of the constellations around the polar. Have a look herebelow!). A large number of professional solutions (which unfortunately require a huge amount of money) are already available on the market used by public and private observatories.
Fortunately and thanks to the generosity of part of the world community of amateur astronomers, it is possible to find on the net some technical solutions and “do it yourself” projects that allow, by investing time, enthusiasm and energies, to realize at a lower of costs, a fully customizable all-sky camera. After spending the last few months investigating which type of product was most suitable for my case, I am now ready to build, program and install an all-sky camera here in the roof of my house of Serramanna (it would be the first of this type to be installed in Sardinia and one of the few already installed in Italy) and make freely accessible the contents that will be created with it.
The economic investment necessary for the purchase of all the materials of this project is estimated at around 500,00 €, that I hope to recover in part by selling some lens and tools already in my possession to be sacrificed for the cause. Needless to say, the more the recovered budget will approach this estimate, the more performing the components that will make up the all-sky camera will be.
Anyone wishing to help me even with a small donation through the fundraiser open on Paypal will obviously be welcome. Every euro received will be of fundamental importance! It will obviously be my job to constantly update whoever wants it on the development phases of the project and on where and how any euro collected in this sort of strange “crowdfunding” will be invested. Regardless, however, the project and the all-sky camera will continue (perhaps more slowly than expected).
Fingers crossed and clear skies at all: let’s do it!
DO YOU WANT TO CONTRIBUTE TO THE PROJECT WITH A SMALL DONATION?
