Astromania filters for planetary imaging (review)

[Kon]

I thought I would give my opinion on the Astromania planetary filters that I am using (https://www.astromaniaoptics.com/products/astromania-125-inch-secializedlanetary-imaging-filter-set-3ieces-ultraviolet-uv-filter-methane-ch4-filter-infrared-ir-filter)and I have also seen a few posts asking for UV filters. I got mine from amazon UK to try with my 8" Dob. You get a methane, a UV and an IR pass filter. I was very skeptical considering their cheap price as methane and UV filters can cost sometimes double the price for what astromania offers for 3. I tested my methane last season only once as seeing was awful but nice banding in Jupiter so I am really excited to try this year when Jupiter will be higher up. The IR pass is nothing special, it works (saturn capture) and finally the UV was the one I was really worried about but it has delivered some excellent images on Venus (you can see my several Venus posts). With the UV i was worried of ghosting which was apparent in the colour asi462mc when I tried, but after a few tests with a mono, the ghosting was gone and I have a dedicated mono asi462mm. The UV has very good transmission and with the mono I can still get the max fps for my camera at 300 at 640x480 captures (recent captures 3ms with a gain of 350).

I do not have other filters to compare to, but from what I am getting, I am very pleased with the £84 (current amazon price); they are a bargain and anyone on a budget should consider them.

[orion25]

Wow! Thanks for sharing your experiences with this set. I just got my Astromania filters and I'm playing around with my Venus images. I got some good UV detail surprisingly with my 180mm Mak. Despite having a color cam (the ASI224mc) I didn't get the ghosting effect. I'll post the images, soon. I agree that this filter set is a good bargain to get a UV.

Reggie

[Kon]

8 hours ago, orion25 said:

Wow! Thanks for sharing your experiences with this set. I just got my Astromania filters and I'm playing around with my Venus images. I got some good UV detail surprisingly with my 180mm Mak. Despite having a color cam (the ASI224mc) I didn't get the ghosting effect. I'll post the images, soon. I agree that this filter set is a good bargain to get a UV.

Reggie

I would love to see a side by side comparison with the more expensive filters.