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A new member of the imaging club...


Byz1453

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Well the bug bit and I ordered up a new CCD for solar imaging. I had planned on putting it off for a while but the observing was so good I had to give it a go.

I went straight in at the deep end and ordered up a PG Grasshopper 3 ICX687 to go with the LS 60.

Will spend next weekend setting up the laptop and software, I'm a mac user so will have to go the bootcamp route.

If any of you have any handy guidance on the best of the tutorials or what not to do in terms of imaging or processing it would be greatly appreciated.

I have found the odd one or two already and caught up on things like handy tricks with plastic bags but if there are any 'tips for idiots' out there it would be a great help.

After that it's wait for the good weather to come again.

Here's to a glorious summer...

Kieran

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Nice set up Kieran.

The best advice I can think off is Practise, Practise and more Practise. Oh and of course post your images on here for us all to see. I have no doubt you will soon be getting some terrific shots.

I used to take full disc images in one go using a focal reducer and a DMK41, but the loss of detail and the difficulty of getting an even field (especially true with a double stack) made me switch to a 1.5x Barlow and 12 exposures, using Autostitch to assemble the 12 panes. I take 600 frames per pane, using 3 columns of 4 rows, giving me about 30% overlap. Process them in AS!2 and then sharpen and crop in Paint.net. Then it is over to Autostitch to assemble the panes and finally back in Paint.net for post processing.

Exchange Paint.net for your favourite image processing software.

Robin

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Congrats on the purchase, Kieran :smiley:

Grasshopper 3, very nice, though I would say that, having the same one as you :grin:

My main tip for setup with this camera would be to make sure you are using the Point Grey USB 3 driver. My computer was very, very unstable using the standard driver. As soon as I started using the Point Grey one, all was well :laugh:

I can't remember how I installed it. I switch the PG USB3 driver on just before using the camera, then switch back to the original driver afterwards. This is because as far as I know, the PG driver knocks out the USB port for other uses while it is in control.

To control the driver, I use PG's "DriverControlGUI" utility. I head to the USB tab, select the USB controller in the left list, and to the right, I select "Point Grey Drivers" and chose "USB Pro (Signed)" from the dropdown. Then later of course switch it back to whatever it was on originally (for me the original driver is in the "Third Party Drivers" section).

That's what I do anyway, I've no idea what everyone else is doing, but that's what worked for me as I fumbled around. I have to say, I was all worried about how demanding the camera might be, but I have run it on a cheap laptop reasonably well, getting full frame rate in 8 bit and a still usable 16FPS in 16 bit mode.

As Robin says, practice, practice practice, you'll soon get used to the controls.

The Point Grey FlyCap software (not sure if they still use the same) that I used first was a bit intimidating initially, but I soon got the hang of it. I later switched to using a different capture software, FireCapture. At first I thought the PG FlyCap software was fine, but I much prefer FireCapture now. I thnk there were some special notes somewhere on the FireCapture site about special steps to take if you are using the Grasshopper 3, but I can't remember, so please keep an eye out for any notes there if you go this route.

For tutorials, check out the tutorial section on Mark Townley's site:

http://brierleyhillsolar.blogspot.co.uk/p/imaging-tutorials.html

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Robin & Luke,

That's brilliant, exactly the kind of thing I was looking for.

Much appreciated.

That's the thing about SGL, it's nice to know you're not alone...

At least if nothing else I will provide some comedy moments as I fumble along with the software.

Thanks guys.

Kieran

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I started in solar just less than 2 years ago and in Ha about 18 months ago, with a PST. It was through the help of the folk on here that I improved and couldn't have done it without.

I get lots of practice, about once or twice a week, wish I could say the same about night time, where it is once every one to two weeks, even though I have an obs now and that practice really helps. Ultimately, you have to find what works for your set up, your scope is the same as mine, so I would imagine that the settings I use will work for you as well, but they might not and you might find something better, in which case I will be the first in the queue to nab it.

I have just had four days holidays in the Scottish highlands, it was forecast to be clear skies on two days, so took my Lunt and managed two imaging sessions from the car park in front of the hotel. A few people asked what I was doing, when I showed them the images on the screen they couldn't believe it and neither can I, it still looks as amazing as when I first looked through a PST. There isn't many things that can still generate that kind of interest after lots of sessions, but our local star in Ha certainly can.

So just give it a go, have fun and keep trying, it will get easier very quickly, unlike planetary and DSOs which I have been trying for longer, with less success.

Robin

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Nice Kit - look forward to seeing your results... The PGC3 is on my potential camera purchase list for solar as well but had a moment of weakness  and bought another daytime camera instead this time around as I am "enjoying" doing the 30+ pane mosaics with the 618...

Peter...

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A very warm and sunny welcome :) :) :)

Yes, the library section on the above site has all the tutorials you will ever need.

I worry that you have a Mac though, the Point Grey Flycapture is rubbish to say the least, and I think the only good capture and stack program for the Mac was ASTRO IIDC and that is no longer sold. I'd be interested to know how you get on.

Kind regards

Alexandra

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Just arrived back in Edinburgh myself though no time for astro this trip unfortunately.

I fully intend to share my pain as much as possible with you all :-)))

I think, as Alexandra points out, it will mostly be in the IT and software areas.

Whatever happened to the dream of plug and play????

I plan to run windows on the Mac so hopefully, once I get that all sorted, I will be reliving the pain that you have all gone through at some point in the not too distant past.

Thanks again for the support and links.

K

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