Lodestar Live compared to video

[nytecam]

Is this because of the reduced sensitivity of the colour chip, or are there other factors at play?

Not to my my knowledge - the Lodestar-C with pale CYMG subtractive on-chip pixel filters has under my tests about 60-70% sensitivity of the mono Lodestar-M . TEC cooling is a separate technique to minimise thermal noise including hot pixels but if the exposures are brief it's not really an issue for the Lodestar cameras :-)

Is this because of the reduced sensitivity of the colour chip, or are there other factors at play?

[HiloDon]

Fabulous deepsky results HiloDon via your 4"frac+Lodestarx2+LL - much darksky envy

As you say LL copes very well with Lodestar hot pixels via its darks subtraction in the brief exposures we use.  TEC [Peltier coolers] seem more necessary with videocam which, according to some forum posts, seem to get warm or hot and some reference to an added cardboard 'insulator' behind sensor of the uncooled entry MC Micro videocam.  By comparison the Lodestar is 'cool' to the touch.  Maybe it's a climate thing - what night temps do you get in Hawaii?

I've spoken to Ian King [of I K Imaging - SX dealer] in the past and he thinks the Lodestar-C a great little camera but would be better for long exposure imagers with TEC but no movement from SX on this - news of Lodestar-Cx2 should appear soon is good !

Thanks for your comments Rob and Nytecam.

Great to hear that SX is planning on the X2C. Not sure the TEC is necessary. As you say our exposures are relatively short. Anything over a minute seems like imaging and not near real time viewing. Tracking also starts to be critical. Our evening temps here in Hawaii are consistently between 65 and 70 degrees F.

Will the stacking feature Paul is working on improve the noise and hot pixels as well? I was also wondering if it registers the frames, will that allow for longer exposesure without improving tracking?

Don

[nytecam]

Paul's work on LL stacking uniquely includes registration and rejection of poor images:-)

[Live_Steam_Mad]

Anyone know if the LodeStar X2 color has a gain control or not for the on-chip amplifier inside the ICX829 sensor?

Like the manual gain control on some cameras / camcorders.

And if so, what software has access to it?

Regards,

Alistair G.