Thread: Diy cheap night vision scope?

how much would you want for that ATN X sight? @gonetropo or @223nut

sold it

Pm incoming

I have a ir iluminated digiscope as new that I would pass on for a song foy a diy project. Works as is but would be interesting to have a play with it.

Something of a necrothread, but back to what to what chippychow was asking - it's entirely possible to make a DIY NV system using most digital cameras. Most digital cameras can see short wave IR as well as the visible light spectrum, but the good ones have an IR filter inside them, and the cheap ones just get a purple smear or tint in strong IR light. That purple is the camera "seeing" the IR light. Whether or not it ends up cheap is pretty dependent on how you do it. The better the components the better the end product, but more expensive

A fiddly but straight forward way to make a NV system is to open up a smart phone, remove the IR filter from the camera in the phone, then put it back together. Mount the phone in a VR headset (or on to a helmet, whatever works) with the camera lens peeking through the front of the VR headset, run the phone on video and no time-out on the screen, and get an IR light source to illuminate for the camera to see (this' an active system). You can get an auxiliary battery for the phone so it doesn't run through the battery as quickly. It'll also probably overheat relatively quickly, so a heat sink on the back of the phone helps. Mounting a small IR light source on the headset helps avoid having to point your rifle at things to see them clearly. The main light source can be mounted to the gun. The camera can see through a scope, but it will probably have trouble focusing, and correct head placement is difficult at best - alternate systems use the camera mounted to the scope, but they usually can't take much recoil. A pistol scope and scout setup might make this easier. That or limit your your shots to close/known range and use an IR laser on the gun and just point and shoot.

I built a setup like this to test the idea and it worked well. Biggest problem is disassembling and reassembling the camera without damaging any of the lenses or the focusing mechanism. A strong IR light source is really helpful as it helps make up for grainy image a bit. An IR laser or focused beam light is great on a firearm, but you really need a good power floodlight mounted around the camera to find your target first. A modern smart phone will give less delay in image than an older cheap phone, and the camera will probably be better. I built mine using a old cheap android so camera quality was poor to begin with, the screen was low-res, and the phone itself was never that fast, but it was good enough to move around in the dark and spot animals. It would probably be quite a nice setup with a more modern phone, and the cameras can be plugged in and out and are cheap on amazon, so you aren't making any permanent modifications unless you break something in assembly/disassembly. Your camera will see see shortwave IR in daytime though, so any photos taken with IR light present will be purple tinged.

Also you'll look like an idiot with what looks like an inside-out radio strapped to your head in the middle of the night

Originally Posted by canross

Something of a necrothread, but back to what to what chippychow was asking - it's entirely possible to make a DIY NV system using most digital cameras. Most digital cameras can see short wave IR as well as the visible light spectrum, but the good ones have an IR filter inside them, and the cheap ones just get a purple smear or tint in strong IR light. That purple is the camera "seeing" the IR light. Whether or not it ends up cheap is pretty dependent on how you do it. The better the components the better the end product, but more expensive

A fiddly but straight forward way to make a NV system is to open up a smart phone, remove the IR filter from the camera in the phone, then put it back together. Mount the phone in a VR headset (or on to a helmet, whatever works) with the camera lens peeking through the front of the VR headset, run the phone on video and no time-out on the screen, and get an IR light source to illuminate for the camera to see (this' an active system). You can get an auxiliary battery for the phone so it doesn't run through the battery as quickly. It'll also probably overheat relatively quickly, so a heat sink on the back of the phone helps. Mounting a small IR light source on the headset helps avoid having to point your rifle at things to see them clearly. The main light source can be mounted to the gun. The camera can see through a scope, but it will probably have trouble focusing, and correct head placement is difficult at best - alternate systems use the camera mounted to the scope, but they usually can't take much recoil. A pistol scope and scout setup might make this easier. That or limit your your shots to close/known range and use an IR laser on the gun and just point and shoot.

I built a setup like this to test the idea and it worked well. Biggest problem is disassembling and reassembling the camera without damaging any of the lenses or the focusing mechanism. A strong IR light source is really helpful as it helps make up for grainy image a bit. An IR laser or focused beam light is great on a firearm, but you really need a good power floodlight mounted around the camera to find your target first. A modern smart phone will give less delay in image than an older cheap phone, and the camera will probably be better. I built mine using a old cheap android so camera quality was poor to begin with, the screen was low-res, and the phone itself was never that fast, but it was good enough to move around in the dark and spot animals. It would probably be quite a nice setup with a more modern phone, and the cameras can be plugged in and out and are cheap on amazon, so you aren't making any permanent modifications unless you break something in assembly/disassembly. Your camera will see see shortwave IR in daytime though, so any photos taken with IR light present will be purple tinged.

Also you'll look like an idiot with what looks like an inside-out radio strapped to your head in the middle of the night

Or you can start with a CCTV camera remove the IR filter and use a reversing camera screen, some of the cameras also have privacy regions in the firmware/on board menus that can be used to make a cross so no additional scope is needed

Originally Posted by Chilli_Dog

Or you can start with a CCTV camera remove the IR filter and use a reversing camera screen, some of the cameras also have privacy regions in the firmware/on board menus that can be used to make a cross so no additional scope is needed

Now that sounds better. Only downside to me is it's less compact.

Originally Posted by canross

Now that sounds better. Only downside to me is it's less compact.

Possibly a bit less compact, mine is 115mm *55mm * 40mm excluding the screen and doesnt use a scope, that is including the mounts with a 50mm lens. The biggest problem with it is the amount of light given off by the screen which I haven't managed to sort out yet

I have been watching a few vids on the ATN x sight II lately - Is anyone using one?

How did you find your old one @gonetropo? Did they come in for repair often?

only time i had to repair them was they had been dropped/ leaky batteries and one with a stuck sim card.
they work well but are on the heavy side and very power hungry. 6-8 hours on a set of lithium batteries is the most you will get