Latest capture

[Carl Reade]

Had a late one last night with the Samsung and captured a few shots of the Dumbell. No filters used, run through DSS and a bit of contrast to bring the colour out.

Still learning......

[shirva]

Like it Carl.Davy

[johnno]

Nice one Carl. what settings are you using, I just can't seem to get it right

[Carl Reade]

Nice one Carl. what settings are you using, I just can't seem to get it right

Hi Johnno, the only settings on the camera I adjust are,

Shutter Manual

AGC Low

Brightness 1

SSDR On

SSNR3 On

White Balance set to R Gain 420, B Gain 513 (colour settings)

Once the mount does its thing I centre the object with a 10mm eyepiece (X75 with my scope) That is enough to center the object on the camera. Then pop the Sammy in.

To focus I set the shutter to 32 or 64 so the stars are live more or less and you can see the focus being adjusted any higher then your waiting on the intergration times (if my focus is well out no stars even appear on screen) but Im used to where it roughly is.

Once I have focused its just a case of changing the shutter up to x128, then up to x512 (if the AGC is switched to off then you can use the sens up function to do the same thing in the exposure settings).

Sometimes I have noticed that if you jump up the shutter speeds too quickly the camera freezes for a while so give it a few seconds to adjust.

If you are going to process the video later then I would recommend having the camera on for about 10 mins at x512 and take about a minute of dark with the cap on (for amp glow later).

To process I followed Doctor D and extract the frames in VOB (both picture and darks) then let DSS do its thing. Final touches in Photoshop C2. To be honest I'm no expert in processing. I have added a live shot so you can see what appears on my laptop compared to the stacked. The dumbell is definatey dimmer than the Ring Neb I took a few weeks ago.

I'm sure there are other ways of doing it still learning. Hopefully its useful.

image00000187.bmp

[johnno]

Thanks Carl, i'm must have one of the gains turned up to high, think i'll start from scratch and set everything low next time out. I've been trying it without tracking , so I don't think that's going to help , by the time I've stopped playing with the settings its vanished. The screen just gets washed out. I'm ok for planets just DSO's I'm having problems with

[DoctorD]

Hi Carl

Nice image - I notice that you seem to have black circles around some of your brighter stars - I've seen this on other images with the Samsung but have not experienced it myself.

Next time, try with SSNR Off - let DSS do the processing and see if it makes a difference.

I'm not sure what mount you have and what the tracking's like - however I found that the SSNR can effectively increase the exposure to 30 seconds or more as it seems to average a number of frames with some motion detection. I figured this by testing on a distant terrestrial object at night, setting the camera to x512 and max SSNR then moving the mount, watching how long it look the picture to stabilise.

Might have nothing to do with your black circles, but possibly worth a try.

Clear skies

Paul

P.s. no telescope time for me - I'm in Hong Kong on a business trip!

[DoctorD]

Hi Johnno

What scope are you using and are you using a focal reducer?

The camera on its own is similar to a 6mm eye piece - pop one in your scope and see how quickly things move across the field of view. If you have a x0.5 reducer then use a 12mm eyepiece - no need to be exact, use e nearest you have to get an idea of what to expect.

This will give an indication of the max exposure you can get away with.

The guys on the Internet who use mounts without tracking usually use non integrating cameras, so the stars do not get trails - try setting the exposure to x32 which is just over 1 second and see what you get.

If you have a lot of light pollution, then at longer exposures the camera can get over exposed and all you see is a white picture. A light pollution filter such as the Baader Moon and Sky glow will significantly reduce this.

Hope this helps

Paul

[Carl Reade]

Hi Carl

Nice image - I notice that you seem to have black circles around some of your brighter stars - I've seen this on other images with the Samsung but have not experienced it myself.

Next time, try with SSNR Off - let DSS do the processing and see if it makes a difference.

I'm not sure what mount you have and what the tracking's like - however I found that the SSNR can effectively increase the exposure to 30 seconds or more as it seems to average a number of frames with some motion detection. I figured this by testing on a distant terrestrial object at night, setting the camera to x512 and max SSNR then moving the mount, watching how long it look the picture to stabilise.

Might have nothing to do with your black circles, but possibly worth a try.

Clear skies

Paul

P.s. no telescope time for me - I'm in Hong Kong on a business trip!

Hi Paul, Will have a go at that. I'm using the Eq3/2 synscan goto. The tracking is very good but you do get the odd error. I have other video I havn't processed yet and from memory the recordings were over 2 mins without movement. I think I have noticed the 30 second effect as well.

Cheers Carl

[midnight_sky_watcher]

Hi carl, great image.

[Carl Reade]

Hi carl, great image.

Cheers Midnight

[johnno]

Thanks for the replies on ''what settings ''. I think I've sorted it out. I've been using Gstar and Mallincam software and never bothered about adjusting the brightness and other settings [what a numpty] all I have to do now is find them DSO's. lol.

I've been trying out the Sw ed80pro without a focul reducer,do you think I should use one? Tried a 0.5 one what I've used on my 127 mak but cant get a sharp focus with it.

[Carl Reade]

Thanks for the replies on ''what settings ''. I think I've sorted it out. I've been using Gstar and Mallincam software and never bothered about adjusting the brightness and other settings [what a numpty] all I have to do now is find them DSO's. lol.

I've been trying out the Sw ed80pro without a focul reducer,do you think I should use one? Tried a 0.5 one what I've used on my 127 mak but cant get a sharp focus with it.

Thanks for the replies on ''what settings ''. I think I've sorted it out. I've been using Gstar and Mallincam software and never bothered about adjusting the brightness and other settings [what a numpty] all I have to do now is find them DSO's. lol.

I've been trying out the Sw ed80pro without a focul reducer,do you think I should use one? Tried a 0.5 one what I've used on my 127 mak but cant get a sharp focus with it.

Glad to hear your on track Johnno. Should mention I use WXastrocapture very easy to use. I could'nt comment on the reducer side with a refractor, hopefully someone can.

Cheers Carl

[johnno]

last night I thought I would give sharpcap a go which I use with my Philips webcam and when I saw the exposure controls on the right that's when I realised I hadn't adjusted them in Gstar, for the exposure contols you have to open another window and I forgot all about it. . that was a nice 2 hrs waisted trying to get rid of the washout on screen before hand

[Carl Reade]

The Sammy wont be affected by computer software settings but a webcam will as its USB software controlled. The sammy is just Pal video into the computer frame grabber or video card. The camera menu controls the camera.

Can you post any of the washout frames your getting? Are you getting stars focused?

You could try on Vega it is a great bright target and focus then try settings from there, at 32 first for focus.

Onwards and upwards!

[johnno]

Hi Carl, what I was trying to explain was the software settings were set at default and in Gstar you have to open another window to see them settings and I forgot all about them being there. It wasn't till I tried sharpcap that I realized this and this what was giving me the washout.. first pic is how it was looking on the screen...the second is after I adjusted the software settings.., I cant remember what this is because I was having trouble with the tracking was drifting, these are just snapshots of what was on the screen. taken with SW ED80 pro ..no reducer/flattener...john

[DoctorD]

Hi Johnno

I have used sharpcap - the video settings will depend upon the drivers for your capture device.

Try using the histogram and adjusting the brightness and contrast (may be called gain) until you fill the histogram - black to white.

Looks like you have both set a little too high.

HTH

Paul

[Carl Reade]

Hi Carl, what I was trying to explain was the software settings were set at default and in Gstar you have to open another window to see them settings and I forgot all about them being there. It wasn't till I tried sharpcap that I realized this and this what was giving me the washout.. first pic is how it was looking on the screen...the second is after I adjusted the software settings.., I cant remember what this is because I was having trouble with the tracking was drifting, these are just snapshots of what was on the screen. taken with SW ED80 pro ..no reducer/flattener...john

Hi Carl, what I was trying to explain was the software settings were set at default and in Gstar you have to open another window to see them settings and I forgot all about them being there. It wasn't till I tried sharpcap that I realized this and this what was giving me the washout.. first pic is how it was looking on the screen...the second is after I adjusted the software settings.., I cant remember what this is because I was having trouble with the tracking was drifting, these are just snapshots of what was on the screen. taken with SW ED80 pro ..no reducer/flattener...john

Ahh see what you mean but it looks like your nearly there. I must have another look at Sharpcap, the last I tried it, it would'nt let me adjust the gain on my NX Ultra webcam.