Planetary & Lunar advice needed

[GazofCorra]

I am looking into starting a bit of astrophotography planetary and lunar. I have a SW 80ED pro and a SW 127mm mak and i am looking into purchasing a HEQ5 SynTrek mount, what i would appreciate is some guidance on what to use as the capture device as i was thinking a good quality webcam based camera like these, i doubt i will need guide camera's etc.

What else would i need to get up and running?

Cheers

Gaz

[Cornelius Varley]

Your link to the Opticstar website didn't point to a specific camera so I can't comment on your choice. Most people start with a webcam such as the Philips SPC900 or 880 flashed with the 900 firmware available from Morgan Computers and then progress to a camera such as the Imaging Source DMk21, 31 or 41.

If you are planning to purchase a Syntrek HEQ5 then also consider an EQDIR module to interface your mount to the computer. You can then use the EQMosaic application to control your mount.

Peter

[riklaunim]

If you want something better then look at:

- DMK21 ICX618 latest version

- iNova, QHY IMG0H, PGR Flea 3 - those with ICX618 sensor

- PGR Chameleon (ICX445) - more in lunary, but can also do for planetary

Second hand at low prices:

- DMK21

- Lumenera Skynyx

Webcams, other than SPC:

- MS Lifecam HD-5000/6000, Cinema (or even maybe Studio): more sensitive than SPC880/900 and has ROI for planetary; a lot of IR sensitive pixels for lunary.

[GazofCorra]

Your link to the Opticstar website didn't point to a specific camera so I can't comment on your choice. Most people start with a webcam such as the Philips SPC900 or 880 flashed with the 900 firmware available from Morgan Computers and then progress to a camera such as the Imaging Source DMk21, 31 or 41.

If you are planning to purchase a Syntrek HEQ5 then also consider an EQDIR module to interface your mount to the computer. You can then use the EQMosaic application to control your mount.

Peter

Many thanks for your reply, i decided not to link to a particular camera as i do not know which one to consider and i had no idea about the controlling the mount via a PC, i thought i just got the mount to track the object and got the PC connected to the camera taking pics or movies, seems there is a lot more to this than i expected, i thought Lunar/Planetary would be the easy place to start into astrophotography

Gaz

If you want something better then look at:

- DMK21 ICX618 latest version

- iNova, QHY IMG0H, PGR Flea 3 - those with ICX618 sensor

- PGR Chameleon (ICX445) - more in lunary, but can also do for planetary

Second hand at low prices:

- DMK21

- Lumenera Skynyx

Webcams, other than SPC:

- MS Lifecam HD-5000/6000, Cinema (or even maybe Studio): more sensitive than SPC880/900 and has ROI for planetary; a lot of IR sensitive pixels for lunary.

Thanks for your reply and i like the sound of the DMK camera's but i will need to do a lot more research and asking questions before i buy.

Gaz