ATIK 383L+ Mono CCD

Hi- I know the weather has been awful but was just wondering how you were getting on with the camera? Would like an Irish perspective on it as have read countless reviews from guys in places like Arizona etc. whos skies are hardly comparable to ours!

I'm leaning towards the 460ex colour. I know I'll take a hit on quality over mono but I'm concerned I'll never finish an LRGB given our skies. If I only managed 20x5min subs before the clouds rolled in at least I'd have some data to work with if they were colour as opposed to just 20x5 green subs for example. If weather was no issue obviously I'd be going mono, I would really love to try some NB at some stage so would be very interested to know how the mono is working out for you. Thanks

Very nice, Simon! Congratulations. Weather really has been awful lately

stang wrote: Hi- I know the weather has been awful but was just wondering how you were getting on with the camera? Would like an Irish perspective on it as have read countless reviews from guys in places like Arizona etc. whos skies are hardly comparable to ours!

I'm leaning towards the 460ex colour. I know I'll take a hit on quality over mono but I'm concerned I'll never finish an LRGB given our skies. If I only managed 20x5min subs before the clouds rolled in at least I'd have some data to work with if they were colour as opposed to just 20x5 green subs for example. If weather was no issue obviously I'd be going mono, I would really love to try some NB at some stage so would be very interested to know how the mono is working out for you. Thanks

Haven't done anything with it yet except build my darks library, I am still waiting for the Baader 36mm unmounted filters, my supplier has my filter wheel ready, just waiting for the filters.

I plan to image using MaximDL, it has a filter wheel controller, where you specify for example:

Position 1: Luminance
Position 2: Red
Position 3: Green
Position 4: Blue
Position 5: HA
Position 6: OIII
Position 7: SII

So when I image, I can tell Maxim to do it sequentially, so if I want 25 exposures of RGB, it will do them as RGBRGBRGBRGBRGBRGB....and so on

So at least I will have some data to work with too

wbean wrote: Very nice, Simon! Congratulations. Weather really has been awful lately

Weather isn't bothering me at the moment as I cannot image anyway due to lack of filters...lol

CarlightExpress wrote:
So when I image, I can tell Maxim to do it sequentially, so if I want 25 exposures of RGB, it will do them as RGBRGBRGBRGBRGBRGB....and so on

So at least I will have some data to work with too

That's interesting, never thought of that as a possibility...Let's say the night only allows us 21x5 min subs, is the generally consensus that 7xR, 7xG & 7xB would give a better image than 21in colour?

stang wrote: That's interesting, never thought of that as a possibility...Let's say the night only allows us 21x5 min subs, is the generally consensus that 7xR, 7xG & 7xB would give a better image than 21in colour?

You would be correct, with an OSC, you still have the Bayer Matrix which means there's more green pixels than red and blue, plus there's a better resolution from a Mono than an OSC. Don't get me wrong, I've seen some fantastic images with OSC cameras, Mono cameras aren't for everyone. Plus I plan on doing narrowband / hubble colours also