Canon 1000d Settings

[BlueAstra]

I have a shiney new Canon 1000d, and have just started using it for astrophotography. I would find it really useful if other owners (1000d or 450d or equiv) could post what settings they use on the camera for DSO's etc. As much detail as possible, to the dark corners of the menu system!

(I originally posted this in the beginners section, probably in the wrong place)

[jgs001]

I have the 450d. I use mirror lockup, 2 second self timer, ISO800 (normally) and whatever exposure time I can get away with... in Manual mode (this takes a bit of trial and error). I use Liveview mode for focusing at 10x zoom. Make sure your quality setting it raw, and have a large card handy (2Gb is about 120 shots). I don't recall any other settings I change from normal.

For the moon, set the camera to spot metering, and make sure you get the centre AF spot on a bright point of the moon, set the shutter speed appropriately. Check the review, and make sure you have the histogram displayed (use the Disp button in review mode to change the view), check the brightness and adjust the shutter speed accordingly. Too much clipping (the clipped areas blink on the image) increase the shutter speed, not bright enough, decrease the shutter speed. Liveview is good for focus here too.

I've turned off, High ISO noise reduction and In Camera Noise Reduction. Also make sure you keep Highlight Tone Priority off. I think these are all default settings to off though.

On the 450d, the last menu item is a My Menu to which you can add the adjustments you often make. Things like Mirror lockup I've put in here to save me having to hunt through all the menus to find it.

HTH

[BlueAstra]

Perfect! I set the noise reduction options on thinking it would be better, but I'll turn it off now. Also set ISO to 1600 so will now turn it down. Good tips on moon photos.

I've been operating the camera with the supplied pc software, which I think is great. Do you have any preferred software for setting up a sequence of shots?

(Got a Canon ACK-E5 mains adapter for the battery off ebay for about £30 from the USA. Previously got one for my Canon S80 from the same source)

[jgs001]

I've not been using software, I have a timer remote I got from ebay and use that, data is captured to SDCard and run from the camera battery.

[themos]

A sequence? I do that with the EOS Utility program. You get a graphical interface like this:

and click on the stopwatch symbol to set the parameters.

[adamsp123]

I bought an "Aputure Timer" from ebay,the canon one, it came from China in about 6 days £32 and works a treat BTW I don't think it lists the 1000D but it works OK.

Pizza