Can you use it in the day?
Yes. We have a day mode switch which turns on the IR cut filter and the colours comes out natural.
Why use a small sensor?
Small sensor has several benefits.
Smaller system size. A smaller sensor allows you to use a smaller lens and get more zoomed in.
Better technology. New technologies are proven on small sensors first. That’s why each new generation of small sensor cameras improve more than each new generation of large sensor cameras.
Why only 4MP?
TLDR: Pixel level perfection, crisp and sharp photos.
General consumer cameras advertise their cameras by their pixel count. It is easy to understand by customers and easy to market. However, the resolution only tells a small part of the story on how good a camera is.
More megapixels mean bigger enlargements. However, if you zoom into the photo captured by your 16MP smartphone, you will realize that you are just zooming into noise. There is no real information and it is a waste of storage.
You will get poorer performance in low light, as the gaps between pixels are not light sensitive. The losses means that the high megapixel sensors collects less light.
Can it shoot things other than astronomy stuff?
Yes. Tiny1 is designed for travel. Just switch off the astronomy mode, it will switch on the IR cut filter and plants stay green and humans stop glowing.
Can I do time lapse?
Yes. The original concept was a time lapse camera only; it will have a well featured time lapse mode built in.
Will it work in winter?
Depends on where you are. It’s designed for temperatures of -10 to 55 degree Celsius.
Can it shoot videos?
Yes. It even has audio in for external microphone and audio out for live monitoring. Do remember that space has no sound. We keep forgetting ;)
Are your photos edited?
Yes, but the enhancements are built into the camera. You can disable them if you like.
Isn’t the point to star system already on the Play Store on Android?
Yes, and no. The software is a derivative of Google’s API. We want to avoid reinventing the wheel. However, the implementation on a camera is novel. The sensors we use are higher specification than the even flagship phones. Further software enhancements will improve accuracy even further.
The lens has coma
Yes, the camera’s kit lens has coma. The lens is optimised for large aperture and coma is unfortunately, a common trade-off.
We are looking into aspherical optics to solve that, they will be released after the crowdfunding campaign has been delivered.
Does it shoot RAW?
Yes, it shoots a variety of RAW. .DNG and .RAW. We recommend DNG as it is lossless but compressed. .RAW is very troublesome to retrieve for minimal benefits. We may support .FITS in the future as an update.