Cosmos 1—The Planetary Society Camera

The Planetary Society camera flight unit, just prior to delivery to The Planetary Society.     The Planetary Society Cosmos 1 camera test image (viewing a test target on the ceiling of a lab)

MSSS fabricated and delivered to The Planetary Society (TPS) a low mass, space-qualified camera to observe the details of solar sail deployment at a high frame rate. The camera system was based on a VGA format (640 x 480 pixel) color CMOS sensor. The TPS camera was designed to provide a series of images at selectable resolutions and frame rates, and to acquire short bursts of images and store them in an internal buffer for subsequent readout at a lower data rate.

The Planetary Society's Solar Sail spacecraft, Cosmos 1, was lost during launch on 21 June 2005.

Specification Value
Detector CMOS, 640 x 480 pixels
Electronics Mass 120 g (including radiation shielding)
Power 0.5 W
Color Panchromatic or video-quality color (Bayer pattern filter) or narrowband filter (custom color filter)
Frame rate Up to 10 frames per second
Interface RS-422 or LVDS

 

The Planetary Society's Cosmos 1 Home Page MSSS Press Release About the TPS Camera