ISS to have video cameras mounted outside to film space

A couple of weeks ago, (Friday, April 18) SpaceX Dragon aunched to visit the ISS and amongst its paylpoad was a set of 4 video cameras which will supposedly show their footage to the public.

Do you think we will get to see space once again as it really is or do you think the images they capture will boringly be of Earth? I suspect online viewers will have to register themselves with NASA too.

SpaceX-3 Launches Science Cargo to Station

The Dragon also carries four commercially available high-definition video cameras that will be mounted to the outside of the station to see how they handle the conditions of space. Although they will be inside temperature-controlled enclosures the cameras will experience the radiation of orbit. Online viewers will be able to watch the footage from the cameras.

Oh dear, I see here that these WILL be Earth pointed. See the section External Payloads.

MOre on this mission

a reply to: qmantoo

In addition to the cameras for UrtheCast, there's gonna be quite a few of them there!

I'm glad they will be pointed at Earth; those cameras wouldn't see much out in space except for blackness. There's also a chance that the Sun might get into the lenses and ruin the electronics.

Looking forward to watching the footage!

So they stop the live feed to the ISS (unless that changed), just to mount more cameras? Am I missing something? Must be...

originally posted by: Yusomad
So they stop the live feed to the ISS (unless that changed), just to mount more cameras? Am I missing something? Must be...

No, just more cameras with live feed. The good old NASA TV stream from ISS is alive and well.

By the way, here's the new cameras' live stream: www.ustream.tv...

a reply to: qmantoo

Why would you want the cameras to be pointing at space? The ISS is only a couple of hundred miles up. You're not going to see anything looking out that you couldn't see from earth, certainly not using a normal video camera! On the other hand, views of earth from 200 miles up are pretty nice to have!

PS Just installed Ustream on my phone. The new HD feed doesn't seem to be on at the moment, just a grey screen.

The nice thing about cameras mounted on the "outside", is that if anything 'anomalous' is seen, at least we'll know it's not just a reflection off the window glass...

originally posted by: qmantoo
Do you think we will get to see space once again as it really is or do you think the images they capture will boringly be of Earth? [/url]

How dare you? Go outside hug a tree and apologize, ts,ts,ts.
Besides, what else should it show, the vast nothingness? Better to have an eye on home, isn't it?

originally posted by: Ninipe

originally posted by: qmantoo
Do you think we will get to see space once again as it really is or do you think the images they capture will boringly be of Earth? [/url]

How dare you? Go outside hug a tree and apologize, ts,ts,ts.
Besides, what else should it show, the vast nothingness? Better to have an eye on home, isn't it?

Haha, I hugged a tree already today, dont want to overdo it.
you'd be surprised if an incoming fleet of UFO's caught you napping. Do you honestly think NASA would tell us if there was going to be an extinction event, or even a possible one. Better to die in ignorance rather than be waiting for it to happen.

Earth is so boring these days, there are far more interesting things to see looking outwards towards where they will come from... they=the interesting things I mean.

We actually might get to see some spaceships going to and from the Moon or Mars perhaps? Who knows?

This certainly opens the doors for more beautiful photography of this planet. It seems plausible that it will mainly focus on Earth but they could use them for more direct things like what Chris Hadfield did except show space walking missions but vlog style? First vlog in space! I dunno, would be cool for them to create a sort of program/web show from the crew on ISS.