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Antarctic Undersea ROV 08

Hello Cameo and "The Team," My students and I would like to know exactly what types of pictures you will be taking with the "Scini?" We are also interested in knowing why you have designed this camera. Thank you... Jillian, Uriel, Ricky, Jesus, Ivan, Kris, Zach, Giavanna, Ryan...

Fri, 08/29/2008 - 14:38

Cameo Slaybaugh

Hi Jillian, Uriel, Ricky, Jesus, Ivan, Kris, Zach, Giavanna, Ryan...I should start by explaining that I am a beginner when it comes to SCINI but I'm learning quickly.
The camera on the SCINI will take pictures of anything. Last year the camera took some really cool pictures that you can see by looking at the Antarctica Undersea ROV 2007 Photo Gallery.
They designed the camera to have a record of what SCINI sees when it goes deeper than the scuba diver. There are regulations in Antarctica that scuba divers cannot go down more than about 130 feet. However, the seafloor is much deeper. I have attached a photo of a possibly new species of nudibranch that SCINI observed last year. Hopefully, this year the team will see other new species in the waters around Antarctica and you all might be some of the first to see the pictures that are taken by SCINI.

 
Thanks for the questions.
 
Cameo :)

Mon, 09/22/2008 - 14:58

Stacy Kim

Hi All,I'll just add a bit of techie talk to what Cameo said.  The camera is made by Elphel, and can transmit 5 megapixel images 17 times per second!  You know how when you take a picture with your regular digital camera, it takes it a few seconds before you can take a second picture?  That slowness is because of the time it takes for the camera to write the image to memory.  The Ephel camera uses a special microchip, called a Field Programmable Gate Array  that rapidly compresses images so that they can be stored faster.  An FPGA can compress images 100 times faster than a regular microprocessor!