Пікірлер

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  @elwaine12 күн бұрын

  The heater ring can cause pinched optics. I use my C8 Edge for visual use only and so I do a quick check of collimation with each observing session. After purchasing a dew heater ring and the Celestron controller, I started to notice deterioration of the views after an hour or so. Rechecking the collimation showed clear signs of pinched optics. The diffraction rings took on an hexagonal shape instead of the concentric rings that were present at the start of the observation session. Turning off the power to the heater ring resulted in a return to perfectly concentric diffraction rings 10 minutes after the power to the ring was turned off. I’ll have to fiddle with the control settings to reduce the power to a level that prevents dew formation but doesn’t expand the corrector plate enough to mechanically stress the corrector.

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  @thierrymartin83785 күн бұрын

  We know how the focal length can be modified. We know the secondary mirror is playing a variable focal multiplier ( p'/p). A tiny difference betwwen the 2 mirrors has a huge impact at the focus . It is about microns . With Oslo simulation 2 microns difference between the 2 mirrors move the focus plan to 124 microns at the back focus at 2032mm Focal lenght ( can be a no problem if this expansion is in the tolerance of the focus ) . But this 2 micons can be worse if this done by the tilt on the primary mirror because the rotation on the primary is converted in linear translation in the focal plane for all the stars . This tillt problem is resolved with the Rasa using a big linear bearing. We learn with Google that the play in the lienar motion of the primary can be between 60 to 120 microns !) For the SCT the ideal solution is to block the optics once the focus is made. To help Celestron has installed (for the last SCT) lockers with tiny rods without no precision to guide them inside the optical tolerance required. In fact any SCT should be modified for atrophotography purpose. this it is not easy when you have never open a SCT before. Too scarry to damage optic.... But their are solutions - you can install a system to clamp the primarry mirror. ( 3 off brakes shoes at 120 deg at the edge of the mirror - you can install or replace with 3 off strong rods at the back of the telescope, guided with 1 1/4 lenght linear bearings , and 3 collets ER type, for clamping axially the rods once the focusis done . - you can block with 4 plastic screws the primary mirror in an specfic position like for the Schmidt blade) and to install an Ascom focuser on the secondary mirror for focusing ( Optec Fast optic dream solution) - For Fastar compatible SCT, to modify the secondary mirror holder in order to use a spacer ring calculated to translate de secondary mirror for specific reducer or barlow focal length , and in order to finalise the focus, to install a Crayford focuser at the back of the SCT. - To make holes il the tube in order to lock the aluminium tube sliding with the primary mirror . -for the one having a workshop, to rebuit the slinding tube with tiny bearings at the both ends maintain by the elasticity of the metal . This is the mechanical solution for Theodolite in the past.

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  @tedterranova7 күн бұрын

  I really love your content. Your videos on the Celestron dew rings convinced me to stick with my dew straps. Thanks for taking the time to collect all this data and share it with us in such an informative way. I still wasn't able to tell from your testing if the strap should be on the dew shield, heating the air in front of the glass, or on the tube heating the air in the tube. Thanks again for all the work you do.

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  @Aero196127 күн бұрын

  Hi Ted. Thanks for watching. I’ve heard different thoughts on that. I put mine around the foam dew shield just in front of the corrector plate so that it can heat the air in front of the corrector plate. I just don’t see how the (seemingly) small amount of heat these dew straps generate can heat the OTA tube and the air behind the corrector plate. I am planning to get a second dew strap and place it adjacent to the one I have. One thing about that stupid Celestron dew ring is that it definitely kills dew. It’s just the other stuff it does that’s the problem. Good luck!

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  @johnsmith-rd9rr7 күн бұрын

  Sent ya a email

• 
  @Aero196127 күн бұрын

  If you did send an email, I didn’t get it…

• 
  @mleslie108012 күн бұрын

  Jame does the triger also work for "AF After HFR Increase" and "AF After Temp Change” or is it needed for those?

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  @zaphus16 күн бұрын

  Hi James, I'm trying to get this to work from the southern hemisphere but I just can't get it to generate any data (looks like it is locked up). Just trying by putting the coords for Melbourne Australia in (-38, 145.2) and limiting it to 100 catalog entries, and it doesnt seem to do anything. Looked at the Python, but that doesnt seem to work either, like that isnt the code you built the .exe from. Note that it works fine with your defaults, and I am using your horizon file

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  @Aero1961216 күн бұрын

  Try to download the "astroplan.exe" file again at drive.google.com/file/d/1M6DzEJgT6Wfns7S-gV05-4SlqJc6c0ru/view?usp=drive_link

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  @zaphus16 күн бұрын

  @@Aero19612 Works perfectly, thanks!. Can you share the python used to build that one? I only ask because I want to enable the RCW catalog as well

• 
  @user-dz7qm7zu2k18 күн бұрын

  Really useful work here. We need all the help we can get to avoid the dreaded “No guide-star found” during critical capture time. Setting up the tiny guide camera sensor to identify the center is ingenious. Thank you.

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  @Aero1961218 күн бұрын

  Thanks for watching. I hope it works out for you!

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  @TedByrneTVАй бұрын

  Wonderful overview and well presented- thank you. 🙏🏼

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  @Aero1961228 күн бұрын

  Thanks, Ted! Been a while since I made that video and have added a William Optics GT81 (385 mm focal length) to the lineup and I still stand by my conclusions: the SCT is the most versatile year-around scope, but what a beating… Enjoy the night!

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  @captaindanield5827Ай бұрын

  Time to move.

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  @Aero1961228 күн бұрын

  Haha. This effort is the single biggest reason to not to move to a southern latitude. Thanks for watching!

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  @captaindanield5827Ай бұрын

  The horse head / Flame was my first target. I go back to it every fall and winter as a touchstone to see how my equipment is doing and test new techniques. The one thing I always use to judge my image is the little companion star next to Alnitak. If it stands out distinctly, then I consider that a better indication of a good image. If Alnitak "eats" it up, then I think the image could be better. I can just start seeing the little star in your Antlia filter image. Not in the zwo filter image. - While i am sticking with osc for now, I am considering retrieving some HSO data by using a couple of duo band filters (Ha/Olll and Sll/Olll) to collect these narrow bands. Maybe the Altair filter set, either the 4nm or 6nm, still trying to find out if these filters create halos. Asi2600 mc and 152ed doublet F-8 (uder construction a 140mm triplet F6.5 - purchased lens cell, building the rest).

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  @Aero1961228 күн бұрын

  Yep. The Horse head kicked my butt the first time. Nice observation about the small star next to Alnitak! Been so distracted by the stupid halos. Still room for much improvement for me on this target, including adding significant RGB.

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  @marchoude2303Ай бұрын

  I just purchased the celestron dew ring but haven't used it yet. Will I still need to use a dew shield?

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  @Aero19612Ай бұрын

  You can get by with a shortened dew shield. I cut mine down to project beyond the OTA by about 3”-4”. Maybe could try with no dew shield but you may have to dial up the power on the dew ring. Some people, including myself, see star bloating and streaks on some bright stars at high power.

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  @zer0g77Ай бұрын

  I guess that after blur xt deconvolution star size in pixel goes down introducing undersampling. This makes quantization noise on eccentricity calculation spreading results. Try again by drizzling by 2 before blurr xt

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  @Dennis-tf2csАй бұрын

  So I'd be interested in knowing how you calculate that first number that you attach to each image - 0669, 0687 etc.

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  @jesuschrist2284Ай бұрын

  In nina when looking at most recent sub, what is a good hfr?

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  @Aero19612Ай бұрын

  That’s a tough question because it depends upon seeing (and guiding) and aperture of the scope you’re using. You should get smaller HFR for larger diameter aperture and better seeing. I have NINA write the FWHM into the file name for use later, but not the HFR.

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  @jesuschrist2284Ай бұрын

  @@Aero19612 as a noob, i think its tough to determine if my subs are any good while im imaging.

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  @johnmacdougall4545Ай бұрын

  Thanks for the analysis. This was extremely informative.

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  @Aero19612Ай бұрын

  Glad it helped, John! Thanks for watching!

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  @Microtonal_CatsАй бұрын

  So two years on: is it still great? I want to use it manually at 75 percent, not connected to NINA.

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  @Aero19612Ай бұрын

  Yes, it’s still my source for taking flats. I like it. Expensive, but works well. I don’t connect it to NINA either. I just set the power to 75% and take my flats. I have. “FLAT” sequence with exposure times set for each filter. I don’t mess around with the FLAT exposure optimization thing in NINA.

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  @Microtonal_CatsАй бұрын

  I trust James Lamb, he has the most scientific testing of astro gear. He says it's good, so I'm getting it.

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  @Aero19612Ай бұрын

  Haha. It is good. It is also very expensive. But it works, so I’m happy. Hope you will be too!

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  @hunterrice3484Ай бұрын

  I am having this issue where i follow your instructions and when it comes to the linear fit using b2 as the reference image, it only applies for G2 but none of the other two. same with the b1 only applies to the g1 but not g2 or b2 like shown in your video. If i continue to the pixel math step, i get an error telling me that it couldnt execute because there is no active image window. Do you have any clue what is going wrong with mine?

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  @Aero19612Ай бұрын

  Hmm. Not sure how you’re applying it. Load the reference file name into LinearFit, the drag and drop the triangle icon onto each of the other 3 images. Should work ok. Let me know if it isn’t and give me more detail about how you’re using it and I’ll try to help. Good luck!

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  @johnmacdougall4545Ай бұрын

  James...you don't get more practical than "...awesome is not going to happen here...". I love your videos. Data driven analysis

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  @Aero19612Ай бұрын

  All I know is that “awesome” ain’t happen’n HERE. Perfect is the enemy of the Good.

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  @AstroAFАй бұрын

  Hi James, bit of an older video but still relevant today. I’ve been experiencing a lot of what you’ve covered here. I have a very high precision electronic focuser, on the order of 7nm steps. I’ve just recently fitted it to an EdgeHD 8 and my step size and overshoot numbers have been very high with HFR being very inconsistent. I’m looking forward to working with some of the additional settings you’ve outlined here. Cheers! Doug

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  @Aero19612Ай бұрын

  There’s light at the end of the tunnel. It probably isn’t a train. Unless it is. That’s astrophotography in a nutshell.

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  @AstroAFАй бұрын

  @@Aero19612 haha! Probably the moon! Your discussion on settings led me to my solution, thank you!

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  @AmatureAstronomerАй бұрын

  Just cleaned and collimated.

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  @Aero19612Ай бұрын

  Both on my to-do list. Inadvertently rotated my corrector plate. Will try using the Tri-Bahtinov mask for collimating.

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  @davidrennolds9692 ай бұрын

  A very useful video. You explained a lot. I found it a very interesting video. Just wish we had more clear skies here in the UK. Thank you.

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  @Aero196122 ай бұрын

  Thanks for watching, David! Yeah, you guys have a more difficult time than I do in finding good nights for imaging. Good luck with that!

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  @TheoChannel1002 ай бұрын

  Great !

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  @Aero196122 ай бұрын

  Thanks for watching! This method of focusing does a great job of dealing with focuser backlash.

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  @rs11072 ай бұрын

  👍James, Thanks For Your Work👍 🔭Explaining A Complex Subject🔭 🪐I Will B Setting Up A C-11 XLT🪐 🌜Your Insights Should B Helpful🌛

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  @Aero196122 ай бұрын

  Thanks for watching. The C11 is a beast. Good luck!

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  @abmscopes2 ай бұрын

  Fascinating! I don't have your mathematics brain, but I came to the same conclusion and back focus as you have through trial and error. Interestingly though I long ago gave up with the Celestron reducer and my results apply to the starizona 0.63x reducer. At the starizona recommended back focus of 95mm I was getting the same star shapes as you do. After many lost nights fiddling with spacers I eventually found that I got pretty much perfect round stars at all edges by removing every spacer I possibly could and I ended up at around 85mm. A full 10mm less than it 'should' be. So maybe this is more of a c9.25 issue than a reducer issue? I feel fully vindicated now anyway after your video! Even though I'm happy with my results, I've been assuming I'm doing something wrong by settling on such a significantly different back focus than the 95mm it should be!

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  @Aero196122 ай бұрын

  Thanks for watching! I’ve heard a lot of people saying great things about the Starizona reducer/corrector, so you should do very well wit( it. Like you say, the C9.25 might have a good bit to do with the back focus issues people encounter.

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  @miketronix2 ай бұрын

  Interesting video James! I noticed on my Antlia triband I end up having some kind of blueish colour in the core of my pictures like a circle background. You didn’t face any of that?

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  @Aero196122 ай бұрын

  Hey Mike, No. Nothing like that. I’ve been very pleased with the TriBand. Try taking some FLATs with and without the filter and then break the color images into RGB components to see if you can tell where the blue is coming from.

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  @miketronix2 ай бұрын

  @@Aero19612 Thanks James. Will give it few attempts as per your suggestion.

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  @rdiazmartin2 ай бұрын

  Honestly I have to say that with all that callbration and tuning i was expecting a much better result than 0.8 for this mount.

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  @Aero196122 ай бұрын

  I’m getting pretty good and consistent guiding with the EQ6-R. Below 0.53 arc-sec 80% of the time ( see kzread.info/dash/bejne/Y4KXsruaeJmbp8o.htmlsi=42lJsUmRe0yUf6op). Doesn’t really matter if I have the Redcat or the C9.25 on the mount. Given typical seeing for my area, the guiding has been as good as can be expected. Thanks for watching!

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  @jesuschrist22842 ай бұрын

  Perfect video ty

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  @Aero196122 ай бұрын

  Thanks for watching!

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  @devilsheadcoffee41492 ай бұрын

  Have you ever used the starizona .63 focal reducer/flattener? I have a very similar telescope, oag and camera configuration, and would hope their distance of 90.3 mm for the back focal distance would be more accurate than the celestron reducer. Thanks for the detailed video, it is much appreciated!

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  @Aero196122 ай бұрын

  No, I don’t have the Starizona reducer/corrector, but I’ve heard very good things about it. Just not sure I’m interested in a another $400 to $500 investment in this scope. The perfect is the enemy of the Good…. I may just settle for “good” in this case. Thanks for watching.

• 
  @Oscaro99282 ай бұрын

  I guess my explorer scientific 127mm f/7.5 with their 0.7x reducer/flattener would make a nice combination at 666mm focal length. Without focal reducer I have 952mm.

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  @Aero196122 ай бұрын

  The 127mm focal length is a good scope. Without the reducer, you can get good pics of small galaxies and not have to worry about the non-flat field in the corners. For galaxy clusters and some nebulae, you can use the focal reducer/corrector and get good star shapes out to the corners.

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  @stevekaiser49592 ай бұрын

  Hi James I have a similar setup with my Celestron SCT 9.25 scope and Celestron OAG guider with ASi174mm camera. Always get a lot of helpfull information for checking my setup or tweaking it. I had watched your youtube videos of creating a FOV indicator in Stellarium for the OAG . "Using stellarium "markers" to setup an off axis guider. " Changes to Off-axis guider view settings in stellarium v23" One thing I noticed, you seem to have changed your Mirror distance from the bottom of the OAG housing to the bottom of the prism. It went from 47mm to 45.5mm. Did you find something in your analysis of the setup that lead to the change? I run with 2 different cameras on my SCT. A ASI2400MC pro , full frame and a ASI2600MC pro APC imager. Right now I have the prism set at 49 mm from bottom of the OAG housing to (I think) prevent too much intrusion into the Full frame imager FOV. Does this seem reasonable to you? Thanks for any help on this. Always enjoy your videos. Take care Steve

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  @Aero196122 ай бұрын

  Haha. I see what you’re trying to do! You want me to go back and watch all of my videos. No way! I’ll try to go from memory rather than endure the torture. There are a coup,e do things going on… 1. Stellarium v23 - they changed the CCD/prism distance from (before v23) center of optical axis to BOTTOM of prism to (v23 and higher) center of optical axis to CENTER of prism. So that’s a 6.25 mm (for the Celestron 12.5mm prism) change just to make the OAG image the same from v22 to v23. 2. I also have a video (pre v23, I think) where I define an OAG “bull’s eye” and use Stellarium “markers” to place the main scope at a RA/DEC so that the guide star is in the bull’s eye. If it’s off, I make changes to the CCD/prism distance in the Stellarium Oculars settings so that the star will be in the center of the bull’s eye. That may be the source of one change you’ve seen. 3. And I’ve also changes to the physical distance from the center of the scope axis to the center of the prism to try and get more round guide stars (reduce the distance) without suffering too much of an OAG stalk shadow (increase the distance). So those are the things I’ve been exploring in the various videos. If your star patterns as seen in PHD2 look like Stellarium’s OAG view AND you’re not plagued with a significant OAG stalk shadow, then no need for any changes! Thank for watching, Steve….so I do t have to

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  @stevekaiser49592 ай бұрын

  @@Aero19612 hi James I wasn’t sure if you paid attention to the peanut gallery commenting on your postings. I always seem to find something of interest in your posting s. Probably because my setup matches yours , such good taste we have. Ha I obviously fell behind on watching your videos. Was sidetracked getting ready for eclipse. Sigh . Traveled to one of the mostly cloudy areas. Thanks for your postings and in depth explanations. Take care. Steve

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  @Aero196122 ай бұрын

  @@stevekaiser4959 I always try to reply but some comments do slip by me from time to time.

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  @stevekaiser49592 ай бұрын

  @@Aero19612 James. You always do a great job. I look forward to your videos since they are detailed and well presented. As a retired ME design engineer (robotics & machine vision) you keep my attention with the details. Thanks, take care

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  @Aero19612Ай бұрын

  @@stevekaiser4959 robotics and machine vision? What a perfect skill set for this hobby! Nice

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  @robb73422 ай бұрын

  New to mono and looking to take on the moon, so this was a perfect guide for me James. Solid presentation as usual - THANKS!

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  @Aero196122 ай бұрын

  Great! Some great tools in PixInsight for this.not sure how good they work for planetary though. Imaging the Moon is great for learning, especially when it’s near full. Have fun!

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  @jules25452 ай бұрын

  Hi James, thanks for this. All the imagery I produce I always find the SHO palette the hardest to get pleasing results, this is a great help.

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  @Aero196122 ай бұрын

  Glad it helped some! RGB galaxies wear me out. It’s always something…

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  @abhisheknamdeo2 ай бұрын

  I am in Bortle 7 and have been deciding for many months if I should with OSC+ narrow band filter or mono camera. Can I get the same results in using OSC from bottle 7? What should I go with?

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  @jesuschrist22842 ай бұрын

  As crystal, ty

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  @hobbeeswe74723 ай бұрын

  Very informative!

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  @jesuschrist22843 ай бұрын

  At least siril stacks clouds for me

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  @Aero196123 ай бұрын

  The most useful feature ever, haha

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  @KJRitch3 ай бұрын

  Hi James. What is the blue part on your guide camera and what is it's purpose? I've been using my Celestron OAG on my C8 for a few months now. I noticed during focus adjustment the helical focuser wasn't smooth throughout the focus range. It would be smooth then resistance was felt. When I removed the guide camera (ASI174MM) the helical focuser was smooth throughout the range. I notice the OAG guide camera barrel is a bit oversized for the guide camera. The two locking screws cause the guide came to push against the focuser tube that moves up and down. I guess it's not a big issue if you can start the guide camera near the backfocus point then only have to move a couple of millimeters to tune in the focus. I do wonder if the locking screws can cause the guide camera to tilt a little that might affect focus so that one part of the sensor is in focus and another isn't. I see what appears to me to be some stars in focus an others out of focus in PHD2. I have a ZWO helical focuser that can screw onto the top of the Celestron OAG focuser. The ZWO users two screws but a brass ring is used to clamp onto the guide camera body. The focuser is smooth throughout its travel range. It works with the Celestron focal reducer and its 105mm back focus but not with the Starizona focal reducer's 90.3 mm back focus. You can't get the guide camera sensor close enough to 90.3mm, 96mm.

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  @Aero196123 ай бұрын

  That blue ring as a par focal ring from Farpoint (bought on Amazon): Parfocal Ring for 1.25" Eyepieces, FP500 I don't think the two set screws will cause rotation since one screw pushed the camera against the helical focuser wall and the other set screw will push the camera against the focuser wall 90 deg away. That said, there can be some issues. I've had decent luck with the Celestron OAG. I have a later video that looks into the backfocus for the Celestron reducer. I got elongated stars at 105 mm and better results at shorter back focus (~85 mm). Thanks for watching!

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  @Ronbo7653 ай бұрын

  No posts in 2 mos. Where the heck have you been?

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  @Aero196123 ай бұрын

  Hey Ron. I ask myself that same question all of the time, haha. Yeah, been slammed with work so not much free time to make videos. I've got a few in mind.

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  @Ronbo7653 ай бұрын

  @@Aero19612 Great! Hopefully you'll post soon.

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  @TheNewfiePilot3 ай бұрын

  Having exactly similar star spikes on my RASA 8" with installed dew heater ring; how does Celestron not know of such an issue and continue to sell this product that causes such optical issues?

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  @Aero196123 ай бұрын

  Yeah. I see this kind of thing over and over with them. I think they have an idea and push it to manufacturing and let the customer identify the design deficiencies. Oh well. Thanks for watching!

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  @richardbamfield39223 ай бұрын

  Hi James, so its two year on from when you posted this. Is the issue with the home position and GSS resolved yet? If I have to remember to set it every time, I'm bound to forget one day. If it is, I'll give GSS a go.

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  @alejandrohenriquez73163 ай бұрын

  I went to Agendastro and saw several adapters but I don't know which ones I should buy

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  @alejandrohenriquez73163 ай бұрын

  Hello! Excellent video. Who can help me? I have a Meade LX200 10" and I have the Celestron 0.63X reducer. Could any of you give me the adapters, Drawer Filter and OAG that work best for me to achieve focus. Thank you, I await your responses.

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  @Aero196123 ай бұрын

  Hi Alejandro, I don’t anything about the Mead equipment. If you are using the same focal reducer as I have, I decided that a back focus around 85 mm works (check with my video to be sure). As far as what filter drawer, etc that works “best”, I’m not sure. You might that the Large OAG from ZWO doesn’t take up as much back focus as the Celestron OAG. Just add up the numbers, like in the video, to see what adapter lengths you need to make up the difference. Good luck!

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  @alejandrohenriquez73163 ай бұрын

  @@Aero19612 Thanks!

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  @jehocking243 ай бұрын

  Very nicely done you gave very good visual explanation and I understand it much much better thank you

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  @astrotennessee3 ай бұрын

  Thanks for this video. I bought an AM3 and 2600mm during the winter sale but ever since I've been going crazy trying to figure out what is causing trailed stars even when guiding is exceptional. I've bought a new guidescope, new guide cam, new cable management, new mounting solutions and nothing fixed it. Last night I turned off the cooler after seeing this video and sure enough, that was it. New fan ordered.

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  @Aero196123 ай бұрын

  Glad it helped. What focal length are you imaging at?

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  @astrotennessee3 ай бұрын

  Just 500mm (740mm after crop factor). I've been using a nikon 500mm f4. I suspect that the ZWO adapter having a tiny little bit of play in it is the weak spot that is picking up the fan vibrations. Ran the test 2 times and both times the stars round up nicely with the fan off. @@Aero19612

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  @jesuschrist22844 ай бұрын

  Any recommendations for a tripod for a sw gti mount?

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  @cryptojihadi2654 ай бұрын

  Wow, those were flat out stunning, even if those were taken with a mono camera, they would be stunning, but that fact that you got mono quality imaging from a OSC camera, is truly amazing. I had to laugh at our comment about coming back in a couple of days when you started Star Exterminator. It used to take my 4-year-old laptop over an hour to do STX on a 2600MC image using large overlap. However, once I found out how to make the GPU engage, it dropped to 6 minutes! That was with a bare bones nVidia GTX1050 card. I just bought a new laptop with an nVidia 4080 and it rips it out in 35 seconds! Interestingly using the onboard GPU, with the new laptop it only took 4.5 minutes. So faster than my old dedicated GPU.

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  @Aero196124 ай бұрын

  Thanks for watching! Yes, I'm very happy with the near-mono image quality I'm getting out of the OSC camera and these dual-band filters. Once upon a time, I did setup the GPU for crunching through the time-intensive calculations. I guess I'm going to cave in and set that up again.

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  @alimartins66694 ай бұрын

  great work James. thanks! Can you quickly elaborate on why 0 gain on LRGB Bin2? Shouldnt one go with 120 as it would give a lower read noise with same DR? Thanks again

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  @Aero196124 ай бұрын

  Hi Ali. My original thought was that I wanted to use Bib-2 for the RGB filters as I just want color, rather than detail. Also, RGB lets in a lot more light than the SHO filters so I didn't want very short exposures with the gain 120 and went with the 0 gain. In retrospect, I think I'm seeing the bad effect of high read noise that goes with 0 gain in bin-2 mode. Next time I use this camera, I'll either use bin-2 at 120 gain (and see how short the exposures are) or just go with the gain 0 in bin-1. If the bin-2 gain 120 exposure time has to be < 1/4 the current exposure, I may settle for using bin-1 at 0 gain.

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  @n0_h4ndl34 ай бұрын

  So this is very useful information. Very nicely described. I have a redcat 51 which I'm struggling with in sharpness. I'm in bortle 6 to 7 and use an asi533mc pro Recently i decided not to go monochrome as our skies are cloudy too often to have much time to deal with so many filters etc. So, i purchased the best filters i could - Altair 4nm ha-oiii and sii-oiii combos. I'm using an am3 mount and getting between .4 to .7 guiding. I have always felt that the 533 is wrong for the redcat due to pixel size - although 99% of the web seem to say its the best combination for the price. I am now thinking i went the wrong route with the filters and should have made the move to monochrome at this point but - oh well - money is now spent! The question is, do you think there is any benefit in getting even smaller pixels than the 294 for the redcat 51 given the poor conditions i have? I know some have tried planetary cameras (not cooled) and had some reasonable success but I'm concerned that the lack of cooling and sub length will not suit my poor conditions.

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  @Aero196124 ай бұрын

  Thanks for watching! And sorry for the late reply. Looks like you're getting good guiding performance out of your AM5. Your ASI533 is fine. Instead of spending more money right now, I would suggest that you dither and use drizzle integration. This technique reduces noise AND effectively cuts your pixel size in half for better resolution. Let me know how things go!

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  @n0_h4ndl34 ай бұрын

  Thanks for responding... I have always employed dithering and drizzle but possibly I'm not dithering enough. I'm using an ASIAir plus and dithering by 1 pixel. I did a calculation at some point recently which suggested I should dither by 3 ish pixels but I have a choice of 1,2 or 5 I think. I recently set it to dither at 2 pixels and will see if I have any improvement. Any ideas if there is much of a difference between dithering settings? I did get a nice hour or two the other day between clouds and moon and noticed a dramatic improvement so possibly I'm just struggling with poor seeing etc. It's early days on the new filters so I think I'll concentrate this year on enjoying the new mount and filters plus getting much more data per target. Many thanks for sharing your knowledge!

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  @n0_h4ndl34 ай бұрын

  I should add that after your advice on the dithering, I reviewed my dithering calculation: Main scope & camera: Redcat 51 250mm focal length ASI533mc pro (3.76um pixels) Focal ratio (from astronomy tools calculator) = 6.4 Guide scope & camera Zwo f4 120mm focal length ASI 120mm camera(3.75um pixels) Focal ratio (from astronomy tools calculator) = 6.45 The assumption, based on the technical data, is that the two cameras have the same (almost) focal ratio so to dither by my desired amount on the main scope, I should dither by the same amount on the guide scope. I'm going to assume that I should dither by about 10 pixels - I've no idea why (more research is needed!) - I'm blindly following the web on this magical figure! This is way different from the 1 pixel I was dithering by originally so I will change to that setting now. I guess the next question (if anyone knows) is... If you change the dithering amount during your capturing of data for an object, can you still use all the existing data or should you start again? I'm using PixInsight to process the data with the weighted batch script. Once again, many thanks for your video - I'd probably have blindly continued dithering at the wrong rate without it! I'll be bookmarking this video for future reference in case I can ever afford to build a new rig!

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  @keithjohnson57134 ай бұрын

  Hi James, Do you have an issue with Stellarium dropping out when using Windows Remote Desktop, I’ve tried using the various versions such as mesa but still have problems with Stellarium disconnecting. Clear skies from the UK

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  @Aero196124 ай бұрын

  Hey Keith, I assume you’re trying to run Stellarium on your remote pc? I have have had issues with graphics intensive software/processes running on the remote pc, including Stellarium. There’s an issue with the RDP runs that causes problems when running graphics-intensive programs. RDP does not use the graphics processor on your mini pc. Instead, it emulates the processor using the main cpu. This can really cause throughput issues and programs quit when this happens. I use Green Swamp Server (instead of EQMOD) to control my mount and some time back they introduced a live 3D graphic of the telescope in the window. If found GSS would randomly fail. That’s when a viewer of my channel pulled the thread and discovered the graphics emulation issue. Now, I use a simple Alt/Az “gauge” graphic instead of the rendered 3D graphic. Not as cool, but no failures so I’m happy. As for Stellarium, there are some things you can do to avoid failures. For myself, I rarely run Stellarium on the mini pc when I’m imaging. I might use it during initial startup, but then shut it down. There are options you select to cut down on graphics demand (look up the Stellarium .ini file for more details), such as reducing the frames per sec, turn off star twinkle, etc.