New Ltl Acorn 5310 series cameras - Standard and wide angle lenses compared

Fig 1: Ltl Acorn 5310A with standard lense

My apologies for the lack of technical posts and reviews over the last few months but I'm just emerging from what I think of as the lost winter. Late last year a nine year old hernia suddenly became much worse and prevented me from doing any more than essential tasks. Restricted walking and no heavy carrying meant I couldn't do winter camera surveying which was a great disappointment and sitting at a computer or workbench for any length of time was not possible.

I eventually had an operation in early February following which I am only now becoming properly active; and still catching up on camera repairs.

Anyway, enough of all that and on to the subject of this post which is a comparison of the standard and wide angle lenses in the new Acorn 5310 trail cameras.

The 5310 also has a larger 940nm IR LED array which doubles the night range to over 60 feet (20 metres) when compared to the 5210 and 6210 cameras at 30 feet.

Figure 1 shows the 5310A with the standard lense and Figure 2 shows the 5310WA with the wide angle lense. Apart from the
lense window both cameras are identical. Apologies for the quality of the images.

Fig 2: Ltl Acorn 5310WA with wide angle lense

In later posts I'll also be comparing the 5310 models with the 5210 and 6210 series cameras to illustrate the differences in field of view (FOV) and night IR light range.

Factory specifications list the FOV for each camera as follows:
5210 and 6210 series cameras - 52 degrees
5310A standard lense - 55 degrees
5310WA wide angle lense - 100 degrees

There is also a 6310 series camera on the way which Acorn are hoping to release for user testing next month (June 2014).

The new 6310 will also have the larger LED array, standard and wide angle lense versions and a control panel/screen moved to the back of the camera similar to the 5210 and 5310 series cameras. This will mean a larger screen than the 6210 and that it will be away from possible water and battery corrosion damage (more about this later).

Figures 3, 4 and 5 illustrate the different results from the standard and wide angle lenses used in the 5310 series.

Figure 3:  The central area with the yellow border is the FOV of the 5310A with the 55 degree standard lense.
The larger image area is the FOV of the 5310WA with the 100 degree lense.
Note the darkening of the corners similar to vignetting which is actually slight underexposure

I will be carrying out bench tests using a test card, hopefully next week to see just how much the wide angle lense distorts the final image, some evidence of which can be seen in the leaning appearance of the polytunnel which is in reality perfectly upright.

Figure 4:  5310A with standard 55 degree lense. Firmware version V1.0.023TA - see note below
Aperture F2.8 - Exposure time 1/88 sec  - ISO speed ISO50

Figure 5:  5310WA with 100 degree lense. Firmware version V1.0.026TA - see note below
Aperture F2.8 - Exposure time 1/99 sec - ISO speed ISO50 

Important: Please note that the firmware is not interchangeable between these two camera models.