New camera! what calibration is best

[Robfal]

Just got a shiny new (well new to me) Atik 314L+ and was wondering what calibration people were doing with it.

With my Atik 16ic (now for sale) I used to do Flats, darks and bias frames however people say the 314 doesn't need darks. Others talk about bad pixel mapping!

What is the best strategy?

How do you do bad pixel mapping?

Can't wait for some clear skies

Rob

[johnh]

Well Rob thats a great CCD and has so few hot pixels you don't need a dark frame, to get rid of the few hot pixels many use sigma clipping combine or SD mask in Maxim which takes care of them. I use a hot pixel map but my ATK-16HR using the same sensor is older and so has more hot pixels so the map works well especially for H alpha which has many warm pixels - feature is in MaximDL and you click the hot pixel and it counts it in the map so when you press OK it takes it away but its a bit of work to click on all the bad pixels. For a new 314 I would sigma clip combine.

Have fun with your new CCD.

John.