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ZEISS DTI thermal imaging cameras. For more discoveries at night, and during the day.

Night vision equipment for mortals (2 Viewers)

Any strong recommendations for thermal imaging?

Hi all

As a keen birder I've always wondered whether I'd see more night birds or roosting owls if I carried thermal imaging capability. I was also in Western Sahara earlier this year and regretted not having with me either thermal imaging or low light capability when looking for Sand Cat (which I dipped though they are really tricky). I'm going to Thailand in 6 months and wonder whether such equipment might enable me to locate day-roosting White-faced Scops-owls?

Having done some research, we seem to be getting to the point where for £500 or so you can get basic thermal imaging capability, that might just about be effective enough for the night birder, and for £1000 you get stuff that (I think) would work well.

As others have identified on this thread, this is nascent technology in some ways for birders and finding good reliable reviews is hard to come by. I did find this generic review quite useful:

https://cheapestthermalcamera.com/best-cheap-monocular-thermal-imaging/

and there is a recent Birdguides' article about night vision (not thermal imaging) here: https://www.birdguides.com/reviews/bushnell-equinox-z2-6x50-night-vision-monocular/ showing the growing interest in this area.

Given the spec I set out at the beginning of this message, would any birders like to offer suggestions / recommendations for thermal imaging products:

1. At budget / market entry level for say up to £500 or so (the FLIR Scout TK seems to be the best I can see but would it do the job?);

2. The next level between say £500 and £1,000;

3. Anything that should be considered up to £1,500.

I've always been impressed by the level of expertise and help that BF members offer so I'm really hoping for some good insights this time too.

Many thanks.

Mike
 
Thanks to Torchepot and Newzzler for replies.

Relatively little interest does suggest these are not for birders yet. Or at least not at the prices for a decent model. Yet.

The ones highlighted are more at the top end. I think what I'd conclude is that the technology is there, but at the moment it remains specialist, therefore expensive. The price will probably only start dropping for us mere mortals in line with demand when the manufacturers can make profits via economies of scale.

I'll keep an eye open for the breakthrough product!

Mike
 
My impression so far is that the night vision field is still waiting for its Ford T moment. That is a model which would be both affordable and practically useful for an average person.

Please, keep writing, I will read this thread with interest.
 
Winter should be the time of peak utilization for NV gear, the long cold nights show off the IR sensor to best advantage, plus no leaves to interfere.
Maybe a night walk to complement the Christmas Bird Count would help raise the awareness of the technology among birders.
As is, NV is poorly understood and not marketed very effectively, especially given the still high prices. Unless that changes soon, it may be that cell phone sensors with extra high sensitivity will allow effective near NV at a fraction of the cost of current IR based offerings
 
Thermal is the only area we will see improvements, which will come as soon as someone can make high quality mid-infrared optics cheaply (ie not germanium). Then we could have zoom capability and larger lenses cheaper. The pixels aren’t going to get smaller, so the same number but cheaper or larger sensors for a higher resolutuon view, but currently these are extra costly.
Intensifier night vision is as good as it will get and it’ll stay very costly, though in the EU we now have more options that we used to. Camera based night vision is lead by sionyx with their large pixel “black silicon” sensor, which you can buy https://www.nhbs.com/sionyx-sport-night-vision-monocular? though not with more than unity magnification. It has been shown to work well in urban situations where there are areas of bright and dark, but when you get really dark out in the countryside with no moon or under trees it will just give noise.
The other camera based units need some light to help them, using 940nm LED will minimise the visibility of the light.

For spotting warm creatures I would back thermal, unless you are in a warm country where the environment is the same temperature as the creatures!
I’d hope pulsar to announce new thermal units at the ShotShow in a few weeks, maybe at the higher end though. The axion look good but I understand there is a long shipping wait. Personally I’d avoid the <£1000 units at the moment.

Peter
 
Binoculars are really expensive, so the popularity of Night Vision Monocular is not without reason. I used Solomark Night Vision Binoculars to shoot video of animal activities at night. It is very cheap and suitable for newcomers like me.

You can get a lot of the night vision stuff on Amazon for pretty cheap these days...it's not like it was 10 years ago.

Prices have dropped a TON over the years.
 
Sionyx units seem to be the best digital sensitivity systems available, good for when there is some light available, but loses it when it gets really dark and the “proper stuff” keeps on giving a picture.

Peter
 
I am currently looking at the ATN BinoX 4k and the forthcoming (end of November is being mooted) Luna Optics LN-G3_B50.


The ATN has all sorts of bells and whistles, but emailing with Luna Optics recently I think for those who do not need to spot a sniper the Luna Optics device will be the way forward, especially as image quality goes.
 
I am currently looking at the ATN BinoX 4k and the forthcoming (end of November is being mooted) Luna Optics LN-G3_B50.


The ATN has all sorts of bells and whistles, but emailing with Luna Optics recently I think for those who do not need to spot a sniper the Luna Optics device will be the way forward, especially as image quality goes.

These two night vision glasses use an IR illuminator, which does give vision, but it is as if one shone a flashlight at the scenery, so a very different effect.
The attraction of the pure IR sensor glasses is that living objects such as birds stand out from their colder surrounds.
Sadly the pure IR systems are still expensive as well as giving fairly coarse images.
 
I have several IR night vision systems, a standard IR Yukon scope and a Yukon digital ranger IR scope both quite old now but still of use and are fairly cheap. I have another IR source as well that has a longer range than the illuminators included in the units.

But I recently bought a Nightfox digital night vision just over £100 from Amazon (there are several models) and for the price is a very nice bit of kit, you can take photos with it as well.

I have also the pulsar Axion thermal imager XM30s which is brilliant for finding wildlife and I use it in conjunction with IR night vision.


I would be interested to hear what people think of the Sionyx aurora pro, ATN BinoX 4k and Luna Optics LN-G3_B50 if any body has used one. And I think these units would not fall foul of travel restrictions so may be a good option for taking on holidays abroad if we ever get the chance again.

Mark
 
I would really love to meet someone with the Axion to see whether there is any difference from the Helion and to find out whether I have thrown away the extra money needlessly or not :) This stuff is still so rare that I do not know personally anyone else with a thermal scope.

In any case, I think my Helion XQ38F, which retails for around 2400 EUR, is still perfectly suitable "for mortals". Hell on this very forum there is a huge section dedicated to people buying binoculars at a similar price point, even though the difference in what you see between a 150 EUR binocular and a 2k EUR one is much smaller than between having and not having a thermal scope.

Since there is interest in these things, I will probably write more about my experiences with it. It's definitely not a silver bullet for finding mammals at night, especially because it's hard to ID small things in it and it's hard to locate them in white light afterwards. The idea of the active near-IR night vision to complement it sounds interesting! Do such night vision devices take pictures? Would be pretty interesting to see how it looks like and how good for ID of various things it is...

In the last week, we finally found several good sites with Harvest Mice and this is pretty awesome, because you have basically zero chance of finding one without an IR scope. Other than that, it just really shows you how many Roe Deer and Rabbits are there in the fields and that almost any habitat in Poland is biblically infested with Apodemus mice. You can also find some birds in the night - in the last two evenings, we found several Tawny Owls, some Yellowhammers, Fieldfares and Treecreepers, a Pheasant roosting high on a tree and a Woodcock running in the middle of a huge field.
 
I have used a Pulsar Helion 2 XP50 more than 3x the cost of my Axion but it is excellent.
However for what i am doing the axion is perfect and I could not justify the extra expense, the Axion is tiny easy to put in a pocket.

Mark
 
Mark, Jan and others,

How would you rate quality of the image and pleasure of watching an animal? Is it 'OK, species can be IDed, not so bad' or more like 'in BBC wildlife films'?
How would you rate durability of your equipment? Would you take them freely in the rain and to the tropics? On my trips always some guy seem to lose his camera or telephoto lenses due to tear and wear. Are they more or less sensitive to abuse, rain, humidity, dust, vibrations, etc.?

I still did not choose a type. IR binoculars have advantage that they feel the same as familiar binoculars. But they only extent the existing light, so animals may be less visible. On the other hand, colors can possibly be seen. They are also relatively cheap.

There are IR googles, which are said to be better than bins for soldiers, but I never heard about anybody using them for wildlife. Why?

There are also thermal monoculars. Apparently wildlife glows from heat, which makes them more visible, and the flming can be integrated. On the other hand, natural colors are apparently invisible and they are extremely expensive. I am also worried about the stability of electronics, and how resistant it can be outdoors and in the tropics.

Opinions about different types, and brands within types?
I wonder if there is some consensus being formed about wildlife watching?
Any experience from field biologists or safari rangers in Africa?
 
I have the thermal monoculars, as I mentioned - quite expensive indeed around 2400 EUR. It just shows you the thermal light, so there is no color and no "familiar" detail - you see which parts of the animal are warmer, not their color. You can ID big things based on shape - foxes, deer, rabbits and you can watch how things move around, but you want to see the animal also in white light very often (or maybe with another night vision as I learned now). But you find basically anything with a pulse.

The Pulsar is supposed to be waterpoof and really looks like, I would take it anywhere no problem.
 
I attach a photo taken from my £100 Night Fox IR digital binoculars, hand held at full zoom, in pitch black. You get better photos with less zoom.

The more expensive ones produce better photos, but I can ID the species using this bit of kit at a reasonable distance. The BBC have more expensive kit than that we are discussing on this thread.

I have a thermal monocular as mentioned previously I have only used in in the UK so cannot discuss about how robust it is abroad. I can ID some species but the resolution and colours make it difficult to ID except on shape as opisska has already mentioned, but they are fantastic at finding the animal in the first place.



Mark


Mark, Jan and others,

How would you rate quality of the image and pleasure of watching an animal? Is it 'OK, species can be IDed, not so bad' or more like 'in BBC wildlife films'?
How would you rate durability of your equipment? Would you take them freely in the rain and to the tropics? On my trips always some guy seem to lose his camera or telephoto lenses due to tear and wear. Are they more or less sensitive to abuse, rain, humidity, dust, vibrations, etc.?

I still did not choose a type. IR binoculars have advantage that they feel the same as familiar binoculars. But they only extent the existing light, so animals may be less visible. On the other hand, colors can possibly be seen. They are also relatively cheap.

There are IR googles, which are said to be better than bins for soldiers, but I never heard about anybody using them for wildlife. Why?

There are also thermal monoculars. Apparently wildlife glows from heat, which makes them more visible, and the flming can be integrated. On the other hand, natural colors are apparently invisible and they are extremely expensive. I am also worried about the stability of electronics, and how resistant it can be outdoors and in the tropics.

Opinions about different types, and brands within types?
I wonder if there is some consensus being formed about wildlife watching?
Any experience from field biologists or safari rangers in Africa?
 

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I attach a photo taken from my £100 Night Fox IR digital binoculars, hand held at full zoom, in pitch black. You get better photos with less zoom.

The more expensive ones produce better photos, but I can ID the species using this bit of kit at a reasonable distance. The BBC have more expensive kit than that we are discussing on this thread.

I have a thermal monocular as mentioned previously I have only used in in the UK so cannot discuss about how robust it is abroad. I can ID some species but the resolution and colours make it difficult to ID except on shape as opisska has already mentioned, but they are fantastic at finding the animal in the first place.



Mark

Wow, I think I am sold on the night vision, especially if it's this affordable. I would even give more money and don't insist on necessarily binocular vision. What do I buy? :)
 

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