Celestron Neximage 5

[neonblade]

Just bought one on eBay, first try with it last night.

The "Icap" software that comes with it (Registax is on the installation disc too) is pretty good.

I have been using a 3mp telescope webcam, this new one has 3 advantages over it:

1) Higher resolution (the obvious one)

2) No "lag". My 3mp one had about a 2 second delay between moving the camera and the movement showing up on the laptop screen, whereas the Neximage is pretty much instant.

                   the lag was very frustrating when moving the scope trying to get an object centered on screen!

3) Icap software allows me to alter the Gain while filming.

The attached image is a composite of 2 cropped frames from a video at 1280x720 resolution.

1st frame had gain turned up to capture Jovian moons, 2nd frame had gain turned down so banding on Jupiter was visible. No stacking, but I'm going to try that later today.

Might try Saturn tonight, looking forward to getting some good 5mp lunar pics when the Moon is rising at a more respectable hour too.

Using a hand-cranked 8" Dobsonian

[jambouk]

Nice. Look forward to seeing the stacked image!

James

[Astrosurf]

Good job! Have a go with SharpCap to capture the vids. It's very flexible.

Looking forward to the stacked image.

Alexxx

[toilandtrouble123]

That's looking great. I see you mentioned using a dob

I'm wondering how useful my 90mm refractor would be with a ccd. All these great astrophotos being uploaded atm is really giving me the itch to have a go myself. Well done, love seeing the nelts and detailing, all I've seen of Jupiter and 3 moons was a bright shining globe and 3 smaller dots of light.