The DFN observatories use consumer still photographic cameras (specifically DSLRs) with 8mm stereographic fish-eye lenses covering nearly the entire sky from each station.
The cameras are controlled via an embedded Linux PC using gPhoto2 and images are archived to multiple hard disk drives for storage until the observatories are visited for maintenance (every 8–18 months depending on the storage capacity).

The observatories take one long exposure image every 30 seconds for the entire night.
After capture, automated event detection searches the images for fireballs, and events are corroborated on the central server using images from multiple stations.

A GNSS synchronised time code is embedded in the long exposure images by the operation of a liquid crystal (LC) shutter to provide absolute timing data for fireball trajectories after triangulation with temporal precision better than one millisecond.
Absolute timing is used for the calculation of meteoroid orbits and the relative timing also embedded by the timecode is required for trajectory analysis (specifically to calculate the mass from the deceleration of the meteoroid).
The DFN observatories use consumer still photographic cameras (specifically DSLRs) with 8mm stereographic fish-eye lenses covering nearly the entire sky from each station. The cameras are controlled via an embedded Linux PC using gPhoto2 and images are archived to multiple hard disk drives for storage until the observatories are visited for maintenance (every 8–18 months depending on the storage capacity).
The observatories take one long exposure image every 30 seconds for the entire night. After capture, automated event detection searches the images for fireballs, and events are corroborated on the central server using images from multiple stations.
A GNSS synchronised time code is embedded in the long exposure images by the operation of a liquid crystal (LC) shutter to provide absolute timing data for fireball trajectories after triangulation with temporal precision better than one millisecond. Absolute timing is used for the calculation of meteoroid orbits and the relative timing also embedded by the timecode is required for trajectory analysis (specifically to calculate the mass from the deceleration of the meteoroid).
Desert Fireball Network