deskthority

Continuing with the "Big Beautiful Keyboard (BBK) series... here is the Chyron Duet keyboard that would have been used with a graphics station. It has a proprietary connection so it is not easily connected to a PC but it is a good looking keyboard. The black bottom case is metal and top " blue wave" portion is plastic. Because of the curves, the PCB is broken into two sections and the controller is mounted on the bottom case portion. This keyboard has Cherry MX clears with diodes for most keys except for the Cherry MX Grey space bar and the Cherry MX clear with LED for the Caps Lock key. If I read the components correctly, it looks like the keyboard was made in 2004.

Here are some pics:

That's one hell of a "blue wave".

I was wondering what's inside this monster when I saw it at eBay... Given the big space inside it's a good candidate for future projects. Thanks for the pictures.

I never even noticed the massive black box thing at the back =o . Nice, what a board huh? And named so closely to me 8) .

What a beautiful beast. To bad it isn't ANSI. Also is this straight out of the box usable or does it need work?

Yeah, a space saving design would just get lost here!

Super cool. I'm sure with that much case space, you could build a mini itx computer inside!

Beautiful!

If I may ask : How do you light your photos? They are superb.

photekq wrote: If I may ask : How do you light your photos? They are superb.

I would be interested too, thinking about investing in some better lighting.

I have experimented with lighting and the best lighting is... no artificial lighting at all. I only use natural light and let the camera do the work. I take the pictures in a room that is has sunlight in the afternoon. If it's cloudy, it doesn't really matter. I adjust the brightness through the Windows 10 picture viewer for almost all of my pictures. I also use that to straighten the pictures and use MS Paint (that comes with Windows 10) to crop and resize. That's pretty much it.

Here's a photo before and after simply adjusting the brightness. The room had decent light at the time but I still have to adjust the brightness and play with the contrast on rare occasions.

The background looks really white though. I can't imagine you'd have a giant featureless white mat you take the pictures on Oo .

snuci wrote: I have experimented with lighting and the best lighting is... no artificial lighting at all.

The professional photographer who told me a few things about product photography, recommended the opposite: start with a completely dark room. Add lights to achieve the desired effect. This gives consistency and control.

Chyros wrote: The background looks really white though. I can't imagine you'd have a giant featureless white mat you take the pictures on Oo .

I have a white plastic corrugated sheet that folds in half. I would guess it's 4 feet by 5 feet or so. I also have more pieces to make sides in case the computer is too big. You can see the sides in the picture below

XMIT wrote: The professional photographer who told me a few things about product photography, recommended the opposite: start with a completely dark room. Add lights to achieve the desired effect. This gives consistency and control.

I'm just an amateur that couldn't figure out lighting because I didn't want to spend money on good lighting equipment. I just wait for the sun and it's free and good enough for me. I don't doubt that proper lighting is best but I get decent results my way.

With your vintagecomputer.ca work you need a setup like that, your shots are pretty evenly balanced, I tend to have a problem with lighting. I don't like to use flash if I don't have to.

seebart wrote: With your vintagecomputer.ca work you need a setup like that...

Exactly. At one point I was looking into "light boxes" but they are too restrictive for big items and I would have to turn them around often which is difficult at times because my stuff is heavy. The "lightbox" might be a decent set up specifically for keyboards though.

Sure, you could spend a fortune on lighting equipment, do us all a favor and spend it on vintage keyboards instead. Your photography is more than good enough.

Thank you. And I will take your advise I have purchased what I believe is my earliest keyboard yet. Let's see if/when it comes Pics to follow.

Great, very much looking foreward to it. Pre 1970?

seebart wrote: Great, very much looking foreward to it. Pre 1970?

No. 1972ish. Actually my Univac was from 1971 so that blows that possibility but it's still early.

snuci wrote:

seebart wrote: Great, very much looking foreward to it. Pre 1970?

No. 1972ish. Actually my Univac was from 1971 so that blows that possibility but it's still early.

True, I'm sure you remember my oldest, still one of my more interesting finds to this date:

photos-videos-f64/honeywell-micro-switc ... hilit=reed

seebart wrote: True, I'm sure you remember my oldest, still one of my more interesting finds to this date:

photos-videos-f64/honeywell-micro-switc ... hilit=reed

Absolutely! That is an awesome keyboard.

I almost want one of these purely for the blue wave style!

There was one on eBay not too long ago.

ohaimark wrote: There was one on eBay not too long ago.

There's one on eBay right now! :p

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Chyron-Duet-L ... Swu4BVu~G-

These keyboards are on eBay pretty regularly. The key is finding one when they are not so expensive. I did watch the last auction. Hope it was someone here who bought it.

Good to know!