Atik 4000 colour camera - sold!

[ollypenrice]

I won't post a OSC versus Mono review till the Astronomy Now version has been published. That's only fair to the mag. However, Here are some of my thoughts on the Atik 4000 OSC camera from a strictly personal point of view. I have decided to buy it becasue it will make certain new things possible...

1) When there is little pressure on the kit we can use the OSC to collect RGB data, or in effect (L)RGB. Having tried this on the Rosette and M42 I am satisfied that it does work. The stars come out nicely with - obviously - no alignment or parfocality issues.

Then we can take extra luminance and narrowband in the sister mono camera. Nice system! Very productive, and additional Luminance can be laid down for key areas of the image at a longer focal length while the OSC is getting the widefield data. Better still and blessed be the creators of Registar.

2) Running two tri-colour imaging rigs at the same time is harder than you might think if you're as absent minded as I am. However, running one tri-colour and one OSC is a piece of cake. (Famous last words...)

3) If you are cut off in your prime by clouds you do at least get something to keep with the OSC.

In other respects is OSC 4000 is as likeable as the mono already reviewed. The set point cooling makes a darks library easy to create and saves time. The square chip invites less rotating to frame things so your flats library tends to be more durable as well. Time saved. The chip is pretty sensitive - I don't notice a huge difference between that and the 285, though I know there is one. I would never personally go for a non anti-blooming gate camera, so that ticks another box. The Artemis Capture software is great. Even I can remember how to use it, though it would be nice to see the control of the chip window heater moved onto the dashboard, so speak, rather than being buried in the control files. And finally, while being only a little smaller than a DSLR chip, this one does not tax non-premium optics at the edge of the image circle. You don't need an FSQ, though it's nice if you have one! The Meade 127 is very happy with this chip.

So it looks like one major role for this camera will be as the source of the RGB, but it does produce a worthwhile stand alone image too. I just liked it, liked using it, liked having a kip while it ticked away for five hours and I thought it was happy here. So, more expense...

Just for info, Tom O'D and I have both posted Rosettes using the same colour data as collected by the test camera. Mine was last week, Tom's this. Additional L and Ha (and in T's case O111) was added from the mono. Tom's excellent M42 was done likewise.

Olly