Estes Astrovision

In an effort to fill some spare time I decided to revive an old hobby of launching model rockets. I stumbled across this rocket from Estes that includes a digital camera in the nose cone, called the "Astrovision". Now, the included instructions and box say that getting this camera to work is really easy. I've found that this is not entirely the case.

Not USB 2.0 Compatible

The camera in the rocket is not compatible with USB 2.0 ports. Your PC will detect it just fine, but the software will report a "Communication Error". My solution was to use a USB 1.1 hub in between the rocket and my laptop. Geeks.com has USB 1.1 hubs for $2.99, but I haven't tested those specific ones.

Downloading Videos

Getting videos off the rocket isn't as intuitive as it probably could be. Here's the step by step...

  1. Put the rocket's switch onto video
  2. When ready, push the start button
  3. 15 seconds after you push start, the rocket will start recording video
  4. Recover the rocket and plug it into your computer without shutting off the rocket
  5. Click Start -> Programs -> MyDSC2 -> MyDSC2
  6. Click the "Download Photos" button. (The one with the pink camera icon.)
  7. Click your video
  8. Click the disk icon
  9. It will prompt you to save JPEG files... name the file something, and it will actually save an AVI.

If you shut off the rocket before plugging it in to the computer, you will lose your video.

Drivers

I've found it impossible to find drivers for this on the internet, so I am republishing the only file on the driver CD here in a zip file.

estesastrovision.zip (4,023kB)

Batteries

I received a friendly e-mail from Susanne B., with information on batteries for the camera in the rocket. She says that they are of type 357. EastCoastPhoto.com has them for $0.31/ea.

Sample Videos

This is my first attempt at launching. I didn't wait long enough after triggering the camera, so all you get is a video of the parachute.

This is my second attempt. It worked a bit better this time around.