Comparison of three green lasers' IR output

[Bionic-Badger]

I modified an old Canon G2 camera to remove the IR cut filter from the body (along with some other modifications to allow it to focus).  This makes the camera much more sensitive to Infrared (IR) light.  I also bought a B+W #093 Infrared pass filter, which blocks all light in the visible spectrum, passing IR.  

As an experiment, I thought about showing, visually, how much IR actually exits these laser pointers/modules relative to each other.  I have three green lasers to test with:  a < 5mW Newwish laser pointer I got off eBay for $30 back when that was a good deal; a Deal Extreme "True" Green 30mW laser; and a PGL-III 80mW laser I got from a group-buy long ago.  The test setup was the IR camera mounted on a tripod with the filter in front at about 3ft from a white wall.  The camera was set to have manual exposure and aperture of f/2.0 and 1/20" exposure time.

Attached is the photo comparing the three.

 

[Switch]

This is a pretty informative post.There has been a lot (and I mean A LOT) of discussion about IR leakage , especially about DX lasers, still this chapter is still a little fuzzy.
I would like to see someone with a meter and high OD goggles testing the IR of different lasers :

 

[Curiously_Coherent]

Nice shot there, BB! Thanks for sharing your findings.

That's one expensive IR Pass filter you've got there. Do you do IR photography as well?

Cheers, CC

 

[thejunkmonger]

Nice shot there, BB!  Thanks for sharing your findings.

That's one expensive IR Pass filter you've got there.  Do you do IR photography as well?  

Cheers, CC

damn puts my home modded Fuji to shame but then again I paid nothing for my filter made from exposed film if anyone is interested you can check out my NIR photos here http://www.thejunkmonger.org I hope to get some laser related pics up soon also.

 

[Bionic-Badger]

Nice shot there, BB!  Thanks for sharing your findings.

That's one expensive IR Pass filter you've got there.  Do you do IR photography as well?

I was able to get it for a pretty good deal on Amazon though, like $80, which I thought was worth it. I kind of like the less expensive Hoya R72 more though, since it lets some visible light through, which changes the colors.

As for IR photography, I really liked the look of IR photos I saw on the web. So I got that R72 filter some time ago to try it out. Unfortunately, it would take really long exposures to have the digital camera produce a nice picture, which kind of put me off. Later I found some guides on the net to modify old digital cameras (or new ones) to have increased IR sensitivity. Since I had a camera that nobody used anymore I thought I'd try it and it worked--beautifully. Now that I have an IR sensitive camera I've gotten into the IR photography a lot more, and bought that #093 filter to attain different effects.

 

[Bionic-Badger]

damn puts my home modded Fuji to shame but then again I paid nothing for my filter made from exposed film if anyone is interested you can check out my NIR photos here http://www.thejunkmonger.org I hope to get some laser related pics up soon also.

Oh I tried doing that too, but with negatives, which didn't work so well for me. Also, taping it over the end of the tube didn't work so well.

All these filter costs ($40 + $80), and even the money I spent to get some microscope mounting medium ($50 + $30 shipping = $80) and microscope slides ($10) to do the mod, are nothing compared to having the camera professionally modded ($300) by companies like Lifepixel (http://www.lifepixel.com), or even buying their glass and doing it yourself ($140 for the glass). A worthwhile investment and good experience too.

I'll be modding another camera I got off eBay soon. It's addicting like buying lasers.