Original Comment posted at NYTimes Pogue’s Posts
For the record, I used to work for ZERO-G for a number of years, but was no longer employed with them when Matt’s flight took place.
I had known for a while that hard drive cameras and DVD cameras failed in microgravity. For the hard drive cameras, I suspected it was the HD accelerometers as we had prior experience with Apple iPhone screens not flipping in microgravity. For DVD cameras, we figured there was some rebound effect with the vibration dampening system that caused write errors. Normally it was up to me to approve specific hardware that would fly on the plane, but since I did not work there anymore….As it turned out, weeks after his flight, we were pleasantly surprised that some other flyers–people who actually read their camera manual–had learned that these HD cameras have a setting that allows the accelerometers to get shut off for rollercoasters and high-action shots.
A friend at ZERO-G ended up telling Matt this fact, and knowing that I would have at least steered him the in right direction for his first flight had I been around, we lobbied the sales team that he get a discount on a 2nd flight, which he did get.
Matt used a Sony HDR-SR1 on the first flight, and I don’t know what he used on the 2nd, but my understanding is that it was a solid-state device.Here are the photos from his first flight:
http://www.gozerog.com/photos/thumbnails.php?album=77
and his second:
http://www.gozerog.com/photos/thumbnails.php?album=109