Cool telescope, hot astronomer.

[ArmchairAstro]

Hello,

I'm new to this forum so I hope I'm in the right place. I'm hoping someone might have the answer to my question.

I'm looking for a camera to take the place of an eyepiece on my 10" F10 SCT (2" optical back). In my youth I used to enjoy standing in the freezing cold with my eye frozen to the eyepiece, these days I'd rather the telescope does the freezing and I sit comfortably in front of the wood burner looking at a screen. Sacrilege I know but I'm old and creaky now.

I don't want to take long exposures or keep any footage, I would just like the telescope to be the one outside in the cold and me the one inside in the warm looking at the laptop screen and seeing an image at least as good as if I were standing at the telescope using an eyepiece. What would you suggest? Is there such a device?

Colour would be nice so I could use it for terrestrial viewing too (laptop upside down), but not necessarily a requirement.

Thanks.

[tooth_dr]

Something like a Mintron camera would do this.  It requires no software to run, just coax into the tv.  Mono is much more sensitive than the colour version so bear that in mind.  There will be lots of solutions, this is called EEVA.

https://stargazerslounge.com/forum/287-discussions-eeva-equipment/

 

[ArmchairAstro]

Thank you. I'll have a look...

[Cosmic Geoff]

This is the dream of many newbie astronomers, but it is much harder than it sounds.  Problems of finding the object with sufficient accuracy, small field of view of the camera, problems of focusing, etc, cause most to abandon the idea and convert their ambitions to visual observing, EEVA, or astrophotography.

[Peter Drew]

I had a lot of success with a 12" SCT in conjunction wit a Watec 120n+.  It is simply point and shoot with an integration exposure time range between a few seconds to theoretical infinity.  Best results were around i minute which revealed DSO images similar to what one might see visually with 3x the aperture.     🙂 

[The60mmKid]

Something totally different came to my mind when I read "hot astronomer," and I have to admit I felt disappointed when I opened the thread and didn't see what I'd hoped to see.

[Mandy D]

3 hours ago, ArmchairAstro said:

Colour would be nice so I could use it for terrestrial viewing too (laptop upside down), but not necessarily a requirement.

Just remember, you can always rotate the camera in the focuser to view the erect image.

[michael8554]

Worth reading the "EEVA Equipment" section of this Forum.

Michael

[PeterC65]

What you are describing is EEVA (or EAA). That means replacing the eyepiece with a camera and connecting it to a PC running live stacking software (the result will be MUCH better than just viewing live video). The live stacking software takes multiple frames and adds them together, correcting for any movement between frames.

Doing the above is just the beginning, as you can also add things like mount control and plate solving so that you can be sure which object you are looking at. Live stacking does really need a GOTO mount.

With this in mind, I would buy an astro camera, one described as a planetary camera (this just means that it doesn't have a cooler which you don't need for EAA). Cameras give a fixed field of view as you can't swap like you can with an eyepiece, and small sensors give a very small field of view. So I would err towards a larger sensor size. You can certainly buy colour cameras and these are what most people use for EAA. My personal recommendation would be for an IMX585 based camera, so the ZWO ASI585MC or the Player One Uranus-C. This has a mid sized sensor (12.9mm diagonal) and it is the latest Sony technology so it doesn't suffer from amp glow which can cause brightening of parts of the image (near to the on-chip amplifier).

Most people doing EAA seem to use SharpCap software. There is a free version which is enough to get you started and it is very well written.

One other thing. For EAA to be close to real time (which for me is the whole point of it), exposures need to be short (I use 4s) so that the stacked image builds quickly. Short exposures need a fast scope (low F ratio) which your SCT is not. Most people using an SCT for EAA will use a reducer, usually the x0.63, to speed up the scope.

 

[ArmchairAstro]

Thank you to everyone for some excellent suggestions.

As you say, it's not as easy as it sounds.

I have a Meade 6.3 reducer from my old 8" Meade but as it's a reducer / field flattener, I don't think it's compatible with the 10" ACF, please 'correct' me if I'm wrong...

The ZWO cameras seem to be ubiquitous and one never knows if they are just flooding the marketplace in the hope that people will assume they are good so it's nice to see a recommendation for them.

 

A quick word of consolation to The60mmKid: Isn't it always the way with Astronomy that we "didn't see what we'd hoped to see". 😉

[PeterC65]

If your Meade 6.3 reducer physically fits your 10" SCT then it's probably worth trying (I'm assuming your 8" Meade was also an SCT).

I can't comment personally on the quality of ZWO cameras as I have the Player One Uranus-C, but ZWO cameras are very popular and get good reviews. ZWO have cornered the market because they make a whole range of imaging / EAA kit that all nicely works together, so people tend to stay with the brand. In particular, they make the ASIair products which are a range of mount based computers that control everything and link to a phone / tablet / laptop via WiFi. The ASIair is only compatible with ZWO astro cameras though.

 

[michael8554]

The Meade 6.3 reducer from your old 8" Meade is supposedly NOT compatible with the already-corrected ACF.

But why not try it before shelling out a shed-load of money for the "Optec Lepus 0.62x Reducer for Meade ACF".

Michael