June 26, 2015

High Altitude Picture of KD4STH-4 Over St. Louis, Missouri


This rare high-altitude picture of a weather balloon (KD4STH-8) taken at 52,300 feet on June 20th, 2015. The location is St. Paul, MO - near St. Louis, Missouri. The image was taken by a Canon A1100 point-and-shot camera on Thelma Lou II. The balloon in the image has expanded to about 19' in diameter - estimated by the known length of parachute. Notice how the top of the balloon is thinning to a point of being clear -  the balloon is about 10 to 15 minutes from bursting.

June 15, 2015

Links to Mayberry Galactic Flight #1 Videos on YouTube



It is so fun to realize that our little 11"x10"x7" payload - "Thelma Lou" - made it to 109,000 feet above sea level with our two cameras capturing the ride.  The first camera -- a Canon A1100 point-and-shoot - was loaded with Canon Hacker Development Kit firmware so it would automatically take a picture once every 4 seconds. Our two hour flight had some 2,600 multi-megapixal images on a 64GB SD card.  They have been stitched together into a jumping video with some up-beat music that is fun to watch: Mayberry Galactic Flight #1 Time-Lapse Video from Canon A1100 Camera.

Our second camera was a GoPro recording in High Definition.  This shows the flight in real-time - but edited to fit into a 4 minute video and some appropriate music. Unfortunately, the GoPro did not capture any of the descent - as the memory card became full.  But the you can see nearly the entire ascent to 109,000 feet.  Enjoy by clicking on this link: Mayberry Galactic Flight #1 GoPro High Definition Video




Jeff in Workshop

Jeff in Workshop
Working on Payload Called "Aunt Bea"