canon eos 300d question for astrography

[bottletopburly]

Quick question is a canon 300d worth getting for astro photography or do i stick it out and wait for a canon 350d your thoughts please.

[Guest]

Hi,

Depends how much it is, i would go for a 1000D as it has the live view, 10,1 mega-pixel and the sensor is far superior to the 300D or the 350D, and they can be got for around £170 body only, it's all down to what you want to pay.

That's my thoughts anyway, i dare say someone will disagree.

Olly

[Welrod50]

I don't use Canon but am well aware that the 1000D is, as has been pointed out already, a superior sensor. If however, you are set on either 300D or 350D then the extra resolution offered by the 350 is not to be sniffed at. In real world terms, as an everyday camera you would not see much difference, however as an astro camera the extra pixels used to capture DSO's will afford a little better overall resolution.

You will find a lot of folks still use 300D for imaging on here and the photographs it captures are very good. Depends what price you're willing to pay and if you think the extra outlay for the 2 megapixel difference is worth it. Jump from 6mp 300D to 10 meg 1000D though, and you will certainly notice it.

Good luck whatever you decide

[bottletopburly]

​

thanks for your replies

[gkec]

I started with a Canon 300D

This was one of my first images

I now have a 1000D which has a larger sensor, liveview and is lighter .

Also whilst the 300D and 1000D use the same s/w package I had a few niggles with the 300D interface which were not present in the 1000D interface. Why Canon don't backport the changes I have no idea.

The s/w can be downloaded from Canon and activated using a simple registry hack.

There is also a firmware hack (known as the Russian hack I think) for the 300D that can unlock a few advanced features. e.g Mirror lockup.

[badgerchap]

An 1100D isn't much more either - a lot of people get excellent results with those. You have to be patient, but they come up on ABS fairly regularly, often ready-modded too

[bottletopburly]

thanks guys for your input

[nephilim]

've got the 350D (havnt had chance to use it yet thanks to the weather) and altho it hasnt got liveview if ur going to be using it with capture/camera control software such as APT or BYEOS, liveview isnt that much of a bonus as u can use the software for more or less the same thing (series of short exposures that u can see on the laptop so ur getting your framing & focus spot on). I also found out today that the 300D wont work with the above so i'd wait till u can get the 350D, I've read a lot of opinions of the 350 been a very capable AP camera, yes of course there are better, less 'noisy' ones but for the money IMO u cant go wrong & I think for the price u can buy them 4 now they are well worth it.

Steve

[wayland]

On 3/3/2013 at 22:59, gkec said:

I started with a Canon 300D

This was one of my first images

I now have a 1000D which has a larger sensor, liveview and is lighter .

Also whilst the 300D and 1000D use the same s/w package I had a few niggles with the 300D interface which were not present in the 1000D interface. Why Canon don't backport the changes I have no idea.

The s/w can be downloaded from Canon and activated using a simple registry hack.

There is also a firmware hack (known as the Russian hack I think) for the 300D that can unlock a few advanced features. e.g Mirror lockup.

While trying to upgrade the firmware of my old Canon DSLR both MS and my AV software went nuts! Something about "Malicious Content". The old download " Canon 300d firmware Russian hack" has been popular for years with many references and recommendations to it throughout the web. I am no expert on such things. Just a word of caution

[michael8554]

I too started with a 300D.

As Steve says, the 300D doesn't have shutter control through the usb like later cameras do. So if you're tethering it to a computer you will have to make yourself a usb shutter cable that plugs into the round shutter port on the camera, and use Stark Labs shutter control to automat a series of long exposures. Canon's "Canon Utilities" software will download the images via the usb. It also doesn't have LiveView so focusing will be tedious.

The 1000D has the same size sensor as the 300D, but smaller pixels, which ups the resolution. You should ideally match the pixel size to your telescope before blindly rushing down the "more pixels is better" route.

In practical terms the 350D is the cheapest one you should consider, as it has usb shutter control, then the 450D as it has LiveView which makes focusing so much easier.

Michael

[bottletopburly]

Thanks for the posts but bit of an old thread now chaps @ 4yr old now using the 1000D