imaging andromeda with a webcam

[turbotim]

I want to image andromeda with a webcam i don't know if it can be done, do you guys have any suggestions? I am just trying to have fun i dont care how the pic looks i don't care if it is a fuzzy blob i just want to try it. Now this is what i am going to try tonight and will show my results. I will point my scope towards cassiopeia and try to point it at andromeda threw the finder scope, while the webcam is attached to my main scope. Now how long of an avi should i take? Please help I will take a 1/2 hour image tonight and show my results witch will probably be a whole lot of nothing:confused: ps i will be manual tracking!

[yeti monster]

Manual tracking is a real parlour game, as I discovered last time home. And that's with a bright image of Jupiter to follow. I would imagine that Andromeda just won't show up on your monitor and even if it does you'll need a small bright target to maintain your aim on. Good luck all the same though.

[Sam]

It'll be interesting to see what you end up with. The core of M31 is quite bright so if you're lucky it might show up on a webcam at the longest exposure you can do. Most webcam stuff is done on the planets and the moon given they all very bright so are able to show something with the low exposure lengths that webcams typically allow. The other option is a long exposure mod.

[turbotim]

Well, i tried but i don't think i know what im doing, when people image galaxy's do they take several long exposure pics and then stack them or do they take a long avi video? What about the mead dsi. Will that be a good thing to think about? Or should i try to save up the money and buy a dlsr. Thanks for all your help, Just for kicks here is my failed pictures of Andromeda! I dont even know if those are stars maybe just hot pixels and noise:mad: It can take a picture of a single bright star, at least it can do that and it does do good on the planets!

[brantuk]

You'd need to get your webcam modified for long exposure to get anything meaningfull from a galaxy - and then the right webcam must be used - the SPC900's are favourite or the 880's (can't remember the make) also the Celestron Neximage webcam - they all have similar chips. See this website for some ideas about LE with webcams:

Astronomiser - Automated Astronomy and AstroImaging Solutions

Have a good look round cos the site has a lot of valuable info on imaging with all sorts of cameras and links to the kind of images you can achieve with each one.

If you're serious about imaging and just starting out then "Making Every Photon Count" is the book for you - from Steppenwolfe here on SGL

[turbotim]

I thank you for your help and information thanks for the reply I will be reading that book and learning as much as i can thanks!

[teh_orph]

I've been able to image M31 with my SPC900 at the longest normal exposure (2 frames per second) without modding it - but the result wasn't very good! There are several reasons why...

- it's huge and you can only fit a small part of it on the sensor at a time - I just imaged the core

- since it's relatively dim it's hard to get it in the display, there are no brightish stars nearby that can be used to get it in the shot

- this makes focusing also a bit of a chore

Most of the problems stem from the small sensor size.

I'll post a pic of what you're looking for later this evening.

[teh_orph]

Here's my M31 picture - shocking no? 750 frames stacks at 5 fps...I think I need a longer exposure!

EDIT: this is with 200 frames of (stacked) darks btw. The noise is from the extreme stretching I've done.

[bus_ter]

You need long exposure A cheap dslr would be 100x better than a webcam.

I heard of a piece of software that's supposed to make webcams do simulated long exposures. I'm not sure how it works, maybe it just stacks all the frames realtime? or what it's called. Maybe someone else knows.

EDIT: I found this http://www.nimisis.com/projects/exposure.php