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This video presentation examines multiple factors affecting Astrophotography System sensitivity (i.e. the Limiting Magnitude), and see how much they individually contribute to overall system degradation (actual data in magnitudes). The presentation quantifies the dependence on Aperture, OTA type, Optics Coatings, Camera QE (with imager comparisons), Seeing, Light pollution, Extinction… https://nlobs.com/acad-intro/ https://youtu.be/8RN_uc2f6NM This is a must see for all astrophotographers, beginners and experienced alike. PDF of this presentation and other goodies are available from: https://nlobs.com/resources/ ~Chris K. -
Vibrations from ZWO ASI cameras effecting star shape?
Corpze posted a topic in Discussions - Cameras
Stumbeled upon a forum thread saying the some of the ZWO ASI Cameras has issues with vibrations from the fan. I don't know if i had any issues with my fan (having a ASI 2600MM) but I am to corious not to test this out. I made a video of how I (try to) analyse my vibrations with my phone as it has a accelerometer, which indicated a bit better values after the mod. You can find my video on my youtube channel: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q0K_7oEQbEg&ab_channel=ExoPhotography Have you noticed anything like this? Have you made the mod? Have you changed the fan for another, better one? Regards, Daniel -
From the album: CCD venture
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From the album: CCD venture
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From the album: CCD venture
A h-alpha and OIII shot of the Wall section of NGC7000 aka north america nebula. Processed to resemble the hubble palette colour scheme. ED80 - ATK16HR - Ha clip filter - EQ6 - finderguider 9x50mm PhD2 - photoshop - DSS. -
From the album: 2015 Various
recently found a cheap 16ic mono - a little old and kernakkered but does the job :) A stack of 7 or 8 subs of 300s 400s and 500s (kept increasing exposure length once good tracking had been established) -
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From the album: 2013/2014 planetary
Lumenera lu070m - jupiter, 3x barlow in 200p/eq5 30+ fps© Aenima
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Hi all, Not sure which section to put this in? getting started or cameras, (Mods please move if necessary) Need a little help/advice/recommendations, I have been away from my telescope/astrophotography for about 2 maybe 3 years, i kind of lost the mojo for it, but now looking to get back to it, So i'm looking for camera advice/help, Previously i only ever used a DSLR for astrophotography, however i am thinking do i stick with that or do i get something different? I know there will be a learning curve with new camera setup, My area of interest is/would be Nebulae and Galaxies,i know there is no one camera fits all kind of thing, so Nebulae would be my main interest with Galaxies coming 2nd. My current scope is the (Older Blue Model) Sky-Watcher Evostar 80 DS-PRO ED, so with that in mind what would be a good camera to pair that with, colour or mono i'm not fussed really, My budget for new/2nd hand camera is £700 but could maybe stretch to £800. Any help/advice (good or bad) will be greatly appreciated. Regards JemC
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Hello, I recently purchased my first telescope and camera, and now I want to make sure I have the correct Barlow or reducer to couple them together to achieve Nyquist sampling on the camera (or slight over-sampling). In case it’s important, I’m interested in planetary imaging—in theory that shouldn’t matter for this sampling question, but maybe there are other considerations to take into account. I used this calculator (https://astronomy.tools/calculators/ccd_suitability) and plugged in my info: Telescope: Celestron 8 SE Camera: ZWO ASI462MC Seeing: experimented with this one, but would like to get optics that allow for poor or very poor Binning: prefer 1x1 to preserve spatial resolution, but could consider higher if SNR is a problem I’ve seen on several forum posts that people often use a 2x Barlow to couple the two. However, according to this calculator, that will always lead to over-sampling. If anything, it says I should use no intermediate optics or even a reducer. So my questions are: Binning: Will I be able to see anything with 1x1 binning, or should I expect to need to bin to collect enough light? Is there some other consideration that’s more important here than achieving correct sampling? It seems like most others are over-sampling, and perhaps there’s a good reason for this. If so, is there another formula that would let me determine the appropriate optics to buy? Thanks in advance for any help! -
Hi, I just published a video of how I am cleaning my filters - I thought I might do this while my telescope is back at service due to some kind of astigmatism. How do you guys clean your filters? it seems that every dust particle finds it way to the filters just as you are done cleaning them, and to sit in a damp bathroom seems kind of a mess... Anyway, here is the video / Daniel
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Hi - I just wanna share my latest build - based on Starlight Express optical rig in which they align their camerachip / housings before the ship them out - And i was inspired to build my own. I am very keen to be able to do so much adjustments and tuning to my gear during the day as possible - and this is another method of doing just that, and in this case the aligning of camera tilt which can be a royal PITA during the dark and -20 degree C. So, here is the SX article on what i was going to build: SX Article Note: I haven't reciieved my new camera yet so the video does not contain the actual adjustment, but as soon as i get my new camera - I will show just how it works! /Daniel
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Thought this might be interesting for anyone who might consider a ASA mount, or anyone else who just wan't to follow my adventures trying my best in the obsy Anyway - here is the video of me polar aligning and making a new sky model /Daniel
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Hi, I have been getting a lot of questions regarding what components my "optical test rig" has, and how to clamp the camera/laser with. I found some new bits and pieces which makes it very simple to build your own rig
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Greetings everyone. I recently scored a great deal on facebook marketplace and bought Skywatcher Skymax 180 mm Maksutov-Cassegrain Telescope (f/15) with EQ6R-pro mount. I understand that long focal length telescopes are more suitable for planetary imaging. However, as I am tight on budget, I would like to use the same scope for deep-sky astrophotography. I have Canon Rebel T5 DSLR camera that I am using for taking images. Without autoguiding and a decent polar alignment, I can get ~30 seconds long shots without any star trailing, but that's not sufficient for imaging objects like M51. I would like to be able to integrate longer, say few minutes, thus would like to purchase an autoguider. Here are some specific questions I have. 1). The telescope comes with an 8 x 50 straight-through finder. If I were to use it as a guidescope, what type of image integration time can I expect? Has anyone done autoguiding for f/15 scope with an 8x50 or other finderscopes? 2). If the integration time will be an issue with the 8x50 finder scope, I am open to purchasing an off-axis-guider. However, considering the narrow field-of-view of Mak-180 telescope, I am concerned about not having enough photons from guidestar for autoguiding. For instance, with my DSLR camera, I need to integrate 20-30 seconds to see the nearby stars in M51. What type of OAG and camera would I need to autoguide with my scope? Are there affordable cameras (~$200) that would do the job for me? Would ASI120MM Mini Monochrome (~$150) do the job? What about OAG? I plan to use phd2 software for autoguiding rather than relying on the build-in guide port on the mount. Instead of integrating for hours, I am planning to do DSS stacking of few mintues long multiple shots, hopefully this will put less strict requirements on the autoguider. In case this information is relevant: with my current setup, I have no issue pointing my scope to a desired deep-sky object, track the object within the field-of-view of my DSLR camera for hours using the mechnical tracking of the EQ6 mount. For instance following is a single raw image of Ring nebula taken with 30 seconds shot. But it is not enough for generating high-quality images. Thank you in advance for your help. Regards, Jay
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From the album: Badgers - Astrophotos
First test of my Atik 460ex LRGB (50mins L, 15mins each RGB, 1x1 binned)© Anton Enright 2012
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Hello I'm new to this forum, greetings from rainy Luxembourg. I see this subject has been well covered already but I have a specific situation I need help with. I have a f/3.67 20" (508mm) Newtonian,coupled with a TS-Optics Coma Corrector 0.73x Reducer, and an Apogee U4000 CCD (chip size 15.2mm x 15.2mm). I understand I need an over sized secondary to take full advantage of this f/2.7 super fast setup, but exactly what size secondary should I order? This setup has disadvantages that I cannot change like unforgiving collimation and focus (and some coma), but this is the one thing I can change for optimum performance. Can anyone tell me how to calculate this or, better still, calculate it for me? Cheers, Matt Dawson, Luxembourg -
I have no idea how this stacks up to other cameras, but I figured I’d post this new camera from Meade for those imagers out there. https://www.meade.com/accessories/cameras/deep-sky-imager-dsi-iv/deep-sky-imager-iv-dsi-iv-color.html
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I have an old StarlightXpress Frame store that hasn't been used for years. After the order from "on-high" to de-clutter I was going to take it to the skip along with other old astro stuff, but thought I'd just check to see if it was working. It appears to work fine so if any use can be found for it I would rather donate it to someone than take it to the skip. For those not familiar with the SX original Framestore it is self contained and only needed a PC to save images. To do that there was rudimentary software and a card to insert into the PC. Of course, being the late 1990's it was designed for use with Windows 98. To save images would require an old desktop with Windowa 98 or maybe Windows 2000 on it. However, for taking short or long exposure images and displaying them on a screen no PC is needed. I did use it at a star party to do just that. Showing a group of people objects they couldn't see well, if at all, through the scope directly collected quite a crowd. In the spirit of reducing landfill, if it can be of any use to anyone who is prepared to collect it from Maidenhead I will happily give it away. I attach images of the setup taken last week. Ian B
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Hi Everyone, I have been trying to connect my QHY FW2 to APT and even though it establishes connection, I am unable to rotate the wheel with the software. No clue whats happening. The wheel is powered, connected to CCD and APT. But nothing after that. Someone please help
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I was looking to get into astrophotography with my 10 inch dobson and for start would like to buy something affordable. Cameras can be used or new. Thanks in advance!
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Hello, I have a question about filterwheels; SBIG filter wheels specifically. As far as I know they are the only ones that really use the 8 position filter wheels. So I have it loaded with L, R, G, B, Ha, OIII, and SII. So that is seven filters, what goes in the 8th slot??? Thank you for your insight, Christopher
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I have decided to buy an OSC CCD and have narrowed it down to a choice between AS129MC Pro and the ASI183MC pro. I would welcome some advice and comments on my reasoning. First, I know there is a good argument for going mono, but that’s for the future. I want to take it one step at a time. I am just about getting my head round guiding. My kit is a HEQ5-Pro Rowan Belt modified with mainly Explore Scientific ED APO 102mm f/7 focal length 712mm permanently mounted on a pier.. I also have a Celestron C8 but that’s for later. Until now I have been imaging with a Canon450D moded and a Canon 2000D. I have an ASI178MC (not cooled) that I bought to experiment with last year. I also have travel gear consisting of an AZ Gti WiFi on which I sit my DSLR with a Cannon 300mm lens, which is great for big targets like M31, Rosette Nebula etc After extensive reading on Forums etc I am leaning towards the ASI294MC-Pro. (but tomorrow I might change my mind) My reasoning is that the ASI1294 has a larger sensor size, 14 bit ADC vs 12 on the183; and larger pixels, and a greater full well capacity. So this means that the FOV will be only just a bit tighter than the my DLSR so with my ES102 I can still get good images of larger targets like M42 especially if I add an FR. Without the FR I can get smaller targets. I should also be able to use it with my Canon 300mm lens when traveling. It should also work well with my C8 when I start using that. I have also read that the larger pixels at 4.63um are more forgiving than the ASI183 that has 2.4um pixels especially when focussing. The ASI294 also has a much greater full well capacity, in theory providing greater dynamic range and less chance of blowing out stars. But I have a nagging doubt, because the ASI183MC pro although it has a smaller sensor size, is still quite decent and the tiny pixels mean that it has a resolution of 20mp compared with the 11mp of the ASI1294. So am I turning my back on greater resolution for my shorter focal length scopes? In the world of DLSR 20mp beats 11mp any day. Plus the ASI183 has an 84% QE! What brought it home was a test exposure I did with the old ASI178MC that also has 2.4um pixels, but a much smaller sensor. Using the ES102 I took 50 x 30 sec exposures of M27 (dumbbell) and compared them with results from the 450D on the C8. The FOV is the same, but the 178MC results were so much better. Any views most welcome.
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After a fair bit of thinking and inner turmoil, have decided that the best track for me in my imaging at present is to put my CCD and associated gubbins away in the box and move back to imaging with my D7100. Don't get me wrong, am not in any way upset with my purchase or the quality of the CCD, it is just that it is taking too much tinkering to get to what I want, that with the very short amount of time I get to image with the pump weather and other commitments, I feel that my efforts will be best spent in getting my data with the D7100. I know I can get the spacing for it spot and get pin point sharp images. Getting this will help keep my interest alive and stop me heading into a downward spiral of CBA as the results from the CCD will be inconsistent. Will still keep the CCD going and set up on my SA, so can get some widefield imaging done with that. Now all I need is a clear night to get meslef back into it (Not really an informative post, sorry, just a 'getting things off my chest and clearing my head' type of post)
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Hey guys it is getting really cold and this is the first time I'm using laptop in the field for imaging, so I have no idea how to use the laptop in subzero temperatures. Last year when i was checking something in Stellarium, my screen just froze and did not work until i had it warmed. I get that it is Liquid Crystal, and will freeze in subzero temps. So how can i use it in the filed, all night long, without freezing it to death? Sorry for bad English Regards
