Player One Apollo-C USB3.0 Color Camera (IMX174)

Focus on Solar imaging!

Apollo series is the world’s first camera line designed specifically for solar photography, named after Apollo.

The Apollo series features Sony sensors with global shutters and a focus on monochrome sensors.

Now, we lanuch 4 models of Apollo cameras:

Apollo-M MAX (IMX432), 1.1 inch sensor, monochrome.

Apollo-M MINI (IMX429), 2/3 inch sensor, monochrome.

Apollo-M (IMX174) , 1/1.2 inch sensor, monochrome.

Apollo-C (IMX174) , 1/1.2 inch sensor, color.

* Notice: Solar camera requires energy rejection and light reducer, such like Baader film or Herschel wedge. Please DO NOT use it directly imaging the Sun.  

Product Description

Apollo-C is a solar camera developed by Player One Astronomy, which adopts the Sony IMX174 1/1.2” format color sensor. The 5.86um pixel size accommodates a well depth of 32Ke with a total of 2.3MP  (the resolution is 1944*1216), and the diagonal is 13.3mm.

Pregius Technology

Apollo-C (IMX174) and Apollo-M (IMX174)  based on Pregius 1st Gen, it was a gaint leap in CMOS sensor development.

Format

Apollo-C (IMX174) has 1/1.2″ format, this size is between Apollo-M MAX (IMX432) and Apollo-M MINI (IMX429).

 

Features:

The naming of Player One Astronomy cameras is unique. Solar camera line, named after Apollo, the god of the sun. The suffix of the name describes the camera’s biggest feature.

Drivers and softwares download: http://player-one-astronomy.com/service/software/

Manuals download: http://player-one-astronomy.com/service/manuals/

Cutting-edge Design

The planetary cameras developed by Player One Astronomy uses a scientific and technological regular hexagon to construct the main body line, supplemented by round chamfers to achieve both rigidity and flexibility. The positive orange, which is imply solar, is matched with the low-key and steady black, and the super-fine frosting process on the entire surface makes the camera look luxurious and cool, highlighting the style of high-end players, can’t take my eyes off 😀

2nd Gen – Sensor Tilt Plate

When taking solar photograph with prominence telescope, the Newton ring is annoying. Smoother solar image without Newton ring could be taken by adjusting the focal plate. Get a much smaller field curvature of the telescope.

The built-in high-density sponge shading pad can block the light from the side slits without any side leakage.

 

Passive Cooling System

Solar cameras working in daylight, temperature could be much higher than night. Heat of global shutter sensors will be a problem, especially some big format like IMX432. Player One add a new feature called Passive Cooling System to conduct the heat from the sensor out.

256M DDR3 Cache

Player One Astronomy cameras are the first one who adpots the DDR3 cache in all planetary cameras in the world! It helps stabilize and secure data transmission, it effectively avoids frame dropping and greatly reduces readnoise.

With the DDR3 cache, the camera does not have high demands on computing needs any longer, it will still has excellent performance even if it is connected to a USB 2.0 port.

DPS technology

The planetary cameras from Player One Astronomy have DPS (Dead Pixel Suppression) technology. The DPS is anaylse many dark frames to find out thoes fixed abnormal pixel and record the map in camera memory. In imaging, each exposure frames, thoes position of dead pixels will be given a median value according to the active pixels around that abnormal pixel.

​

Overvoltage and overcurrent protection mechanism

Player One cameras produced by the number one player ensures the safety of your camera and other equipment through overvoltage and overcurrent protection mechanisms.

Data Port

When the camera is connected to the USB3.0 interface and full-resolution preview is used, it can reach 164 FPS in RAW8 mode (10bit ADC). When recording images, since the actual writing speed will be affected by the writing speed of the hard disk itself, when the hard disk writing speed is slow, the recording may not reach the theoretical speed. It is recommended that you use a high-quality solid state drive to record data to give full play to the performance of the camera.

Use the ST4 guide cable to connect the camera and the AUTO GUIDE port of the equatorial mount to do guiding.

Performance

Readout Noise

Regarding readout noise, we solemnly promise that all values are obtained from actual tests.  And for users, you could use Sharpcap 4 for testing. SC4 has a function called Sensor Analysis, provide a very simple way to test readout noise.

If you are interested in readout noise testing, you may try it yourself, which is very simple.

QE Curve

 

Mechanical Drawing

Highlight

 

Specifications

Sensor	SONY IMX174 1/1.2″ CMOS (color)
Diagonal	13.3mm
Total Pixels	2.3 Mega Pixels
Max Resolution	1936×1216
Pixel Size	5.86μm
lmage Size	11.3mm×7.1mm
Frame Rate	164FPS（10bit）
Bayer Matrix	RGGB
Shutter	Global shutter
Exposure Range	32μs-2000s
Readout Noise	6.3-3.5e
QE Peak	≈77%
Full Well	24.8k e
ADC	12 bit
Data Port	USB3.0/USB2.0
Adapter	1.25″ / M42X0.75
Back Focal Length	12.5mm
Protective Window	D32*2MM High Quality AR Plus (Anti Reflection) Multi-Layer Coating
Diameter	66mm
Weight	160g
Resolution and FPS	Under USB3.0 mode Resolution Raw8 Raw16 1936×1216 164FPS 82.5FPS 1920×1080 184.5FPS 93.5FPS 1280×720 272FPS 210FPS 800×600 323FPS 252.5FPS 640×480 398FPS 311FPS More resolution options could be setup in capture softewares!

 

Software & Manual

Before the first usage of this product read Manuals and install correct Drivers and Softwares.