A little Q history for ya'll.

 

I don't remember the exact year but approximately twenty years ago Paul Fisher and I were messing with video cameras on our Q's.  These were the latest and greatest "spy cams" that were super small, wired, and had amazing resolution - 240x160, if memory serves. I made a custom vertical fin "cap" that contained the camera and was aerodynamic. The cable ran from the tail all the way to the cockpit and was taped to the outside skin. It was connected to a camcorder inside the cockpit for recording.  The results were AMAZING!!!  Oh… wait… I WANTED them to be amazing - they were actually quite horrible. Awful resolution that lacked color, were like looking thru a straw, and had no image stabilization...  But we celebrated anyway - it was all we had! 

In an effort to achieve better results, I flew with a small camcorder attached to the tail a few times.  That wasn't any better.  It had to be powered on and recording started while on the ground.  I can't remember how I attached it or exactly what the results were but it was unworkable so abandoned that idea.
 

Our current ability to bolt on a relatively small camera and achieve pretty great results is not lost on me!  

As an aside, I'm now recording at 5k (5120 x 2880) and it still isn't good enough!!   

And... yes... I find myself giving more and more of these 'back in the old days' speeches.  I'm not exactly sure why that is happening... ☹
  
Jon Finley
Somewhere in the Southwest flying an RV-4