When Choosing A Thermal Imaging Camera For Outdoor Hunting, You Must Know These Things
Friends who like to play outdoors know that choosing a good thermal imaging product should not only consider its practicality and comfort, but also its product safety and quality assurance. Excellent products can greatly enhance the outdoor play experience.
Outdoor hunting, we not only need to observe animals, environment, and terrain, but also need to predict danger in time, or be able to search and rescue teammates accurately and quickly when we are separated from teammates.
Therefore, more and more outdoor hunting enthusiasts have begun to have strict requirements on the quality of outdoor equipment, especially thermal imaging products, which are not cheap in themselves. So, how to choose high-quality thermal imaging products?
Onick Optics recommends that when purchasing thermal imaging products, you must pay attention to the following parameters:
1. Detector
The heart of the computer is the CPU, and the heart of the thermal imager is the infrared detector. This is enough to prove the weight of the detector in the thermal imager. The detector is divided into cooled and uncooled. The uncooled one is small in size and low in power consumption. At present, the mainstream of the civilian market uses uncooled infrared focal plane detectors.
2. Thermal sensitivity NETD
Thermal sensitivity NETD is the core indicator of thermal imagers. Thermal sensitivity NETD means noise equivalent temperature difference, which is a key parameter for evaluating medium wave (MWIR) and long wave (LWIR) infrared thermal imagers.
It is a value representing the temperature difference signal-to-noise ratio. This temperature difference signal is equivalent to the instantaneous noise of the thermal imager. Therefore, it approximately represents the minimum temperature difference that the thermal imager can distinguish, which is also directly related to the clarity of the thermal imager measurement, that is, the smaller the thermal sensitivity value, the higher its sensitivity and the clearer the image.
On the contrary, the larger and worse the thermal sensitivity value, the observed point will be submerged by noise, and "invisibility" will also lead to the failure to ensure the most basic safety in the wild.
3. Detector pixels
It must be noted that detector pixels and eyepiece pixels are two different things. The detector pixels of infrared thermal imaging directly affect the imaging effect. The higher the detector pixels, the clearer the imaging effect.
For example, the current mainstream detector pixels in the market are 384×288, and have gradually developed towards the trend of 640×480 pixels.
4. Frame rate
The frame rate refers to the number of images processed by the thermal imager within 1 second. The faster the sensor, the higher the internal circuit processing rate, and the higher the frame rate. The frame rate directly indicates the performance and response speed of the infrared thermal imager.
Thermal imagers with high frame rates can accurately capture high-speed moving objects. The general film frame rate is 24 frames per second, while equipment used in outdoor observation, site monitoring, car assisted driving, medical and other fields requires the use of thermal imagers with high frame rates.
5. Pixel spacing
Pixel spacing refers to the minimum distance between adjacent pixels, in microns. The common pixel spacing on the market is generally 8μm, 12μm, 17μm, and 25μm. The most mainstream ones are 12μm and 17μm.
6. Waterproof, dustproof and shockproof performance
Outdoor sports often require trekking through mountains and rivers, so it is inevitable to suffer from some bumps and rain. Therefore, thermal imaging products need to have certain waterproof and dustproof performance (the current detection level of the industry's higher quality products is IP67), and even need excellent shockproof performance to calmly deal with the impact of the recoil of the shotgun.
7. Lens, field of view, identification distance and other indicators
The field of view and identification distance are determined by the detector resolution and lens focal length. In a sense, these values are not fixed and can change with the replacement of the lens. In fact, as long as the detector resolution and lens focal length of the infrared thermal imager are fixed, these indicators are fixed.
8. Brand
Infrared thermal imaging is a high-end precision instrument. If you want to obtain effective protection of big brands, professional infrared manufacturers have a sound infrared industry chain and quality control capabilities. In recent years, with the improvement of my country's scientific and technological level and national defense security strength, the infrared thermal imaging industry has become a key focus of my country's scientific and technological innovation planning and strategic emerging industries. Therefore, you can pay more attention to high-quality domestic brands in the industry and support domestic products.
For example, the Onick Optical brand is a leader in the field of night vision devices and thermal imaging in the world. Its products are sold at home and abroad. The products they produce must be high-quality and are deeply loved and recognized by consumers. In particular, the G series handheld infrared thermal search instrument has good light transmission performance and clearer image quality. Once it was launched, it was highly sought after.
9. After-sales service
After-sales service is a product of brand economy, and most brands have their corresponding after-sales service. Under the premise of ensuring after-sales service, we have greater trust in the products. Especially for products with higher unit prices, after-sales service becomes part of their extended value.
Taking Onick Optics as an example, night vision products enjoy a one-year free warranty, and thermal imaging products enjoy 18 free warranty services.
