High-speed and DV video

Digital video cameras

Many digital cameras do not apply to the "DV" standard. Some of them follow the "DCAM" standard, others do not.
Generally speaking you cannot use standard video capture software to save the images to your hard disk. A special piece of software is needed to do so.

These cameras come in all flavours: Resolutions up to 1024x1024 or even 1280x1024 are available as well as frame rates from 5 to 100 Hz. Interlacing (odd and even fields) is usually not used.
As far as I know all these cameras can cooperate on the same Firewire bus. But there is another limitation: Band width:
Due to the fact that these cameras do not compress the images their data rate is immense:
1024x1024 pixel (8 Bit monochrome) = 1 MB per frame. For RGB color this amount is three times as much.
Some cameras use the "Bayer" algorithm to encode color information. In this case the color image has the same size as the monochrome image.

Further information:
www.1394imaging.com,
www.unibrain.com/home

We used BASLER A601 cameras which are highly suitable for biomechanical usage (100 Hz, 640x480):
www.baslerweb.com/produkte/produkte_en_1455.php

Although these cameras transfer up to 30 MB/s (240 Mbit/s) we managed to configure a computer setup which is able to collect data from 4 cameras.
Prices vary: About US$ 2500 per camera and US$ 2500 for a high-end computer.