Advice on setup please?

[Concretedan]

Hello,

After being in the hobby for some time I have decided that I would like to get into EEVA rather than continue with the astrophotography side of things.  To be honest I've never really had the patience for it and I really like showing friends the laptop screen and the reaction I get!

I have quite a bit of equipment already but I'd like to know if it is better to sell all/part to get something more aligned to EEVA.  I have the following;

EQ6R, Starwave 102 FPL53, Hypercam 183C, Sharpsky focuser/dew controller.

I know it's a great setup for astrophotography (I purchased most of it from a friend who upgrades every couple of years and sells me his gear!! He is very talented and is very serious about it!) but how does it sit for EEVA?  Should I get a reflector for the mount?  Should I sell and get a GOTO dob?  I'm really after some advice and guidance please if possible.

Thanks very much

Dan

[cfpendock]

What does EEVA mean?  According to Google it is something to do with embryo viability.  Are you sure you have the right forum?

Chris

[gilesco]

8 minutes ago, cfpendock said:

What does EEVA mean?  According to Google it is something to do with embryo viability.  Are you sure you have the right forum?

Chris

Electronically Enhanced Visual Astronomy

[Highburymark]

It’s a Stargazers‘ Lounge acronym for electronically enhanced astronomy.
Embryonic, and viability not yet proven 🙈

[shirva]

Lol,, think video astronomy,, this is where it stemmed from,, and some of still regard it as that,,, but we're not dinosaurs we move with the times and technology,, 

EEVA,, what is it,, it's a very easy going part of astronomy,, combining most elements,, visual EEVA, to view the dark skies using a camera and monitor in live or near live time,,  

It's also short exposure live imaging,, whether you stack it or not,, 

How long is too long and would it then be classified as astrophotography,,, thing is,, who cares,, it's a hobby,, can I use my astrophotography kit,, of course you can,, most of us probably have pretty much similar equipment,, 

Think of video astronomy as easy going, no rules,, no pressure in doing thing's by the book,,,,,,  it got ripped up and burnt years ago,,  😂

One thing,, that doesn't change,,,  no one scope does it all 

[gilesco]

3 minutes ago, shirva said:

Lol,, think video astronomy,, this is where it stemmed from,, and some of still regard it as that,,, but we're not dinosaurs we move with the times and technology,, 

EEVA,, what is it,, it's a very easy going part of astronomy,, combining most elements,, visual EEVA, to view the dark skies using a camera and monitor in live or near live time,,  

It's also short exposure live imaging,, whether you stack it or not,, 

How long is too long and would it then be classified as astrophotography,,, thing is,, who cares,, it's a hobby,, can I use my astrophotography kit,, of course you can,, most of us probably have pretty much similar equipment,, 

Think of video astronomy as easy going, no rules,, no pressure in doing thing's by the book,,,,,,  it got ripped up and burnt years ago,,  😂

One thing,, that doesn't change,,,  no one scope does it all 

You have some coma in your reply

[shirva]

Yip,, anything goes

[gilesco]

22 minutes ago, Highburymark said:

It’s a Stargazers‘ Lounge acronym for electronically enhanced astronomy.
Embryonic, and viability not yet proven 🙈

It's somewhat supposed to be a bridge between visual astronomy and astrophotography.

Visual astronomy says look through this eyepiece and see what you see.

Astrophotography is more - look what I can see if my pupil had an exposure time of x hours.

EEVA tries to bridge that gap, look what I could have seen if my pupil could have seen all that data over the last 30s, or another arbitrary value.

[Martin Meredith]

1 hour ago, Concretedan said:

Hello,

After being in the hobby for some time I have decided that I would like to get into EEVA rather than continue with the astrophotography side of things.  To be honest I've never really had the patience for it and I really like showing friends the laptop screen and the reaction I get!

I have quite a bit of equipment already but I'd like to know if it is better to sell all/part to get something more aligned to EEVA.  I have the following;

EQ6R, Starwave 102 FPL53, Hypercam 183C, Sharpsky focuser/dew controller.

I know it's a great setup for astrophotography (I purchased most of it from a friend who upgrades every couple of years and sells me his gear!! He is very talented and is very serious about it!) but how does it sit for EEVA?  Should I get a reflector for the mount?  Should I sell and get a GOTO dob?  I'm really after some advice and guidance please if possible.

Thanks very much

Dan

Hi Dan

I'm not too familiar with your scope and camera (perhaps you could provide focal ratio for the scope and some details like pixel size for the camera), but it is certainly possible to do EEVA with a mid-sized frac and a well-matched sensor. I imagine you've already checked out https://astronomy.tools/calculators/ccd_suitability but if not, the key things to look for there are the 'native' arcsec/pixel of your scope/sensor combination, and then what happens to it when you use binning and/or focal reduction. In EEVA we like to build a bright image quite quickly compared to AP so a fast focal ratio is useful (f5 or below); that you can achieve with a focal reducer. Big pixels are also useful to improve SNR. If you already have a camera with smallish pixels then this can be achieved by binning so long as your arcsec/pixel doesn't become too much greater than 2. (I operate at 2.11)

Also worth looking at is the field of view for your scope/sensor/focal reducer setup. A large FOV is good, of course, for some kinds of objects (bright nebulae, dark nebulae and the larger open clusters primarily), and I think perhaps a mid-sized frac is best for those types of objects in the timescale of EEVA exposures (e.g. total exposures of 2-10 mins typically).

A bigger scope like an 8" Newt or SCT (the latter with focal reduction) is going to deliver better and in particular more detailed views of most galaxies and galaxy groups, of which there are many interesting examples, and if it is an astrograph (say f4 or so) even better I would say.

I certainly wouldn't get a goto Dob for EEVA. You do need good tracking and its remarkable how effective (in my experience) a fast 8" scope is (which would be classed as small for a goto Dob I suppose). 

You didn't mention software but that makes all the difference too. Much AP software is designed for offline processing.

Happy to discuss more

Martin

[Concretedan]

Hi Martin,

Thanks very much for coming back to me.  Really useful info in there.  I've checked astronomy tools and my scope and camera aren't listed but I believe there are other sites that do a similar job so I'll check them out. I have a 0.8 & 0.6 focal reducer/flattener for my scope which is an F/7 so will give me a F/5.6 or F/4.2.  I use CdC, Sharpcap Pro, EQMOD via bluetooth module and PHD when I can bothered to guide!  I suppose the real question is what would you recommend if starting from scratch for two and a half grand?  A very open question I know but DSO's are my preference and I'm not sure my frac is ideal for this with EEVA?

Thanks again.

Dan

[shirva]

Getting hung up on equipment mate,,  and stuck in an astrophotography mind set,, 

Gear I have is varied,,and I use it all depending on what I want to see,, 

Mounts,, heq5 pro,, eq3 Pro, azgti,, star adventurer,, allview,,,   

Telescopes,, Skywatcher explorer 200pds, evostar ed80,  esprit ed80 

Cameras,,   canon 600d, canon 450d modded,, zwo asi178 mc,, qhy5lii colour, watec 902H. 

Software.. Backyard eos,, sharpcap Pro, asi studio,, astrotoaster 

It's about what you want to do with it,, unlike astrophotographers who may use a dslr and watch a blank screen for five minutes,, we watch live views or near live views when we stack our images,, it's all about techniques and every one of us have our own technique to capture what we like best,,, 

Some may be into planetary,, so a telescope with a high f number,, 

Deep sky,, now this can come down to using using existing equipment and using focal reducers to make the scope faster and give a bigger fov. 

The evostar ed80 is a great scope and with its 0.85 focal reducer / flatner is ideal,, lot of us like small fast wide field set ups 

But if you can go to a nice big celestron with hyperstar,, then  you have a large aperture and super fast scope.... 

Some of us just use the equipment for live viewing and don't even capture images,,, 

 

 

[Concretedan]

Cheers for the info mate.  Much appreciated

[Surreydocker]

The Altair 102 f7 triplet is listed in Astro Tools and you can use the Zwo camera with the 183 sensor which is also listed to give you an idea. I have the Altair Starwave 102 and 294pro camera and in Bortle 9 I have so far seen lots of the brighter globulars and planetary nebulae (using Sharpcap). Galaxies are tougher for me because of where I live (and lack of aperture I suspect) but I'm gradually getting there (I haven't been doing this for long). I guess my point is, give it a go with the gear you have then decide which way to go. 

Ian

[Highburymark]

5 hours ago, gilesco said:

It's somewhat supposed to be a bridge between visual astronomy and astrophotography.

Visual astronomy says look through this eyepiece and see what you see.

Astrophotography is more - look what I can see if my pupil had an exposure time of x hours.

EEVA tries to bridge that gap, look what I could have seen if my pupil could have seen all that data over the last 30s, or another arbitrary value.

I use a night vision eyepiece to enhance visual observations. We are all grouped under ‘EEVA’ on SGL, but there are so few of us using night vision (5 on SGL??) we don’t crop up on these forums very often. 

[Concretedan]

Thanks for the advice Ian. I'm going to do just that I think before I rush out and get any more equipment.  I've looked at astronomy tools and my setup and camera suitability look okay.  I'll give it a go and see where I end up.  Thanks for all your advice guys and I may post some pictures in the reports section, who knows!

Dan

[shirva]

8 hours ago, Highburymark said:

I use a night vision eyepiece to enhance visual observations. We are all grouped under ‘EEVA’ on SGL, but there are so few of us using night vision (5 on SGL??) we don’t crop up on these forums very often. 

I would be no 6 if I got my act together lol,, night vision is fantastic and came a long way,, von,, has done a fair bit to promote it on astronomy forums,, I think it will grow like the way video astronomy evolved,, slowly. 

I have the cascade tube and had it working, but wanted it as a unit to go on a dslr,, 3d printed parts,, but found I needed a focus assembly to get focus on different objects,,,,  maybe get back into it,,, it's true video astronomy 

[stash_old]

3 hours ago, shirva said:

it's true video astronomy 

Sorry differ from your view there - NV,IMO, is just packaged hardware - simpler as its in one hardware unit .

Agree with your previoud EEVA statement "anything goes" BUT without the Astrophotgrahy hang ups.

Next evolution of EEVA,IMO, will be crowd funded public space telecopes - to get past the one thing no Astro persion has control over - Clouds/Seeing (well in the UK).

Now where did I put my class "d" rocket  motors LOL.

[shirva]

18 hours ago, stash_old said:

Sorry differ from your view there - NV,IMO, is just packaged hardware - simpler as its in one hardware unit .

Agree with your previoud EEVA statement "anything goes" BUT without the Astrophotgrahy hang ups.

Next evolution of EEVA,IMO, will be crowd funded public space telecopes - to get past the one thing no Astro persion has control over - Clouds/Seeing (well in the UK).

Now where did I put my class "d" rocket  motors LOL.

That's the the thing with our side of  the hobby anything goes and no wrongs just opinions,, if it's what you like,, how can it be wrong