OSC Camera Choice - Any Recommendations?

[jacko61]

I'd go with your original gut feeling and get the 2600Mc pro.  I did    After using the 533mc pro for a while I decided I didn't like the square format at all - it made framing large nebulae and galaxies such as M31 very difficult. The 2600 has so much more real estate I can fit almost anything in the frame and there's always the option to crop.  The oil on the sensor issue seems to have been well and truly sorted so if you buy new you shouldn't have that to worry about.  One thing that amazes me is how the camera just works with no drama.  I can image one night, pull the roof back over leaving everything covered in frost then the next night it'll just work again despite having been covered in moisture all day.  It has a built in tilt plate and a built in dew heater for the chip and in UK versions, the chip protector has a built in IR cut filter so that's one less piece of dust covered glass you have to put in the image path. 

The only issue (if you can call it that) is the file size.  Each sub is 50Mb so you'd better have plenty of storage.  I've started moving all my subs to an external drive the day after imaging so my laptop doesn't clog up. Otherwise, it's a great camera that I'll probably stick with as long as I keep imaging.

Graeme

[scotty38]

12 hours ago, Stuf1978 said:

The 294MC Pro gets a lot of bashing for this and it's mostly unjustified. Mine has calibrated perfectly evertime, you just need to ensure your individual flats are over a few seconds long and jobs a good'un 😃

I agree with this and have/had both colour and mono versions and to me at least no issues at all once you "understand" them 🙂

However, if money is not an issue etc etc I would go for a 2600/268 in mono or colour as required, no question. I'd probably only consider the 533 if I was using a particularly long scope for particularly small targets where it might not matter that you had the smaller sensor anyway.

[Whistlin Bob]

I took a chance on an ex-demo SVBony 405cc in the summer for a second rig alongside my mono setup.  It also uses the 294 sensor and sells at less then £700. I've mainly been using it paired with an Altair 4nm filter on a 130pds. The flats have been tricky, but setting the gain really low and exposing for 10 seconds seems to work well. If budget is important, then I think it's a great combination.

[Elp]

16 hours ago, Stuf1978 said:

The 294MC Pro gets a lot of bashing for this and it's mostly unjustified. Mine has calibrated perfectly evertime, you just need to ensure your individual flats are over a few seconds long and jobs a good'un 😃

If you watch Adam Blocks videos on odd flats he demonstrates that it's actually the dark flats which cause the issue of overcorrection. Most threads I've read on the 294mc people mention the flats. My last flats were 5s long, it was better but the issue remained. Don't get such issues with my 183 or 485.

Dont get me wrong, I like the 294mc, but wouldn't recommend it to a beginner.

 

Edited December 22, 2022 by Elp

[scotty38]

9 hours ago, Elp said:

If you watch Adam Blocks videos on odd flats he demonstrates that it's actually the dark flats which cause the issue of overcorrection. Most threads I've read on the 294mc people mention the flats. My last flats were 5s long, it was better but the issue remained. Don't get such issues with my 183 or 485.

Dont get me wrong, I like the 294mc, but wouldn't recommend it to a beginner.

 

Can you link to this please?

I ask because the only one I recall was an issue with a set of "older" flat darks that had pixel values higher than the darks. When they took new flat darks the signal levels matched and the calibrated output was fine. Point being it was not a config issue as such.

[Chefgage]

On 21/12/2022 at 22:46, Stuf1978 said:

The 294MC Pro gets a lot of bashing for this and it's mostly unjustified. Mine has calibrated perfectly evertime, you just need to ensure your individual flats are over a few seconds long and jobs a good'un 😃

I might have to take a couple of sets of flats next time. I aim for an adu of about 30000. With my led light panel and l-enhance filter this gives me an exposure time of 400ms. My lights seem to calibrate fine at this exposure time (this is using the 294mc-pro).

Mentioned above at this low exposure time I might be limiting the amount I can stretch the image but my images seem to process ok (from my point if view). I might try taking two sets of flats and doing a side by side comparison using pixinsight (which is what I use for processing).

The issue I see though is exposing for a couple of seconds is going to give me a very hight adu value though isn't it??

[Chefgage]

On 18/12/2022 at 20:33, Elp said:

A flat exposure less than a second is unusually quick from what I've read and tried with various cameras, more so when using an lenhance. What do your overstretched stacks look like?

I will post up an overstretched stack later. Also you mention it appears greatly after an DBE in pixinsight. That is one of the first parts of my processing. I will post that up too. It's got me thinking now. I might just be assuming that my flats are ok and after DBE that is what it's supposed to look like. As I posted above I might take two sets of flats next time and do a side by side comparison. Only issue I have doing this is finding a way of doing a longer exposure flat as my light source is set on the lowest value to get me my usual 400ms flat.

[scotty38]

2 hours ago, Chefgage said:

The issue I see though is exposing for a couple of seconds is going to give me a very hight adu value though isn't it??

You should try dimming it by, maybe, adding sheets of A4 paper. That's what I do anyway.

[Budgie1]

3 hours ago, Chefgage said:

The issue I see though is exposing for a couple of seconds is going to give me a very hight adu value though isn't it??

For my flats I use a Samsung Tablet with an app called Ligthbox, which is dimmable. Then I put a white t-shirt between the scope & the tablet to dim the light, adding layers of t-shirt until I get the ADU & exposure time I'm looking for.  

[Elp]

5 hours ago, Chefgage said:

The issue I see though is exposing for a couple of seconds is going to give me a very hight adu value though isn't it??

Not if you dim the panel sufficiently. I use two opal, one light grey and one dark grey perspex sheet between the dimmed to lowest setting led panel and the scope. It allows you to take seconds long flats, usually 4-5 secs with UV IR filter and 10 secs narrowband.

I can tell the camera doesn't like fast frames because each bias is usually different with horizontal banding, none of my other cameras do this with bias frames. As a result the last few times I haven't used bias frames for calibration.

I use Siril for pre processing but yes, with a histogram stretch preview active you can see the unevenness on the raw stack, doing the DBE makes it worse.

Edited December 23, 2022 by Elp

[Stuf1978]

11 hours ago, Chefgage said:

I might have to take a couple of sets of flats next time. I aim for an adu of about 30000. With my led light panel and l-enhance filter this gives me an exposure time of 400ms. My lights seem to calibrate fine at this exposure time (this is using the 294mc-pro).

Mentioned above at this low exposure time I might be limiting the amount I can stretch the image but my images seem to process ok (from my point if view). I might try taking two sets of flats and doing a side by side comparison using pixinsight (which is what I use for processing).

The issue I see though is exposing for a couple of seconds is going to give me a very hight adu value though isn't it??

I'm using APT and the flats aid and target an adu of 25000, with my L-eXtreme I usually get flats between 4-5 seconds. I then just do my dark flats at the same exposure time as the flats and it calibrates first time every time. I shoot flats/dark flats every imaging session as my equipment needs tearing down so don't know whether that's relevant. The 294MC Pro really is very capable for the price, but given no budget restraints then I probably would have gone for the 2600MC Pro. 

[bottletopburly]

22 hours ago, scotty38 said:

Can you link to this please?

I ask because the only one I recall was an issue with a set of "older" flat darks that had pixel values higher than the darks. When they took new flat darks the signal levels matched and the calibrated output was fine. Point being it was not a config issue as such.

Probably these ones there is three , worth watching even if not a PI user .

 

 

[scotty38]

1 hour ago, bottletopburly said:

Probably these ones there is three , worth watching even if not a PI user .

 

 

Yes they are the ones I recall, the issue was the flats and flat darks did not match not that there was/is an inherent problem with flat darks.