Hi all
I was fter a more sensitive guide cam than a toucam and think ive found an affordable one.
Today my Q Guider (QHY-5 Cmos camera)arrived. It cost me just $300 plus $22 overnight courier. Ordered it friday PM and it arrived today lunchtime
I used the software that was recomended by the
vendor rather then the maker
here
A test image with an IR pass filter shows it is very IR sensitive. The sensor has a peak QE of just over 50% and is a great way for me to experiment with monochrome imaging. In theory it can be used for DSO imaging like a modded webcam though they do say it is mainly meant as a guider or planetary imager
The sensor is 10 bit CMOS monochrome
http://download.micron.com/pdf/datas..._1300_mono.pdf
Sensitivity graph on page 32 is shown here
The IR shot is of trees a few kms away through misty drizzle with the IR pass filter on the 6 inch scope, which is stopped down to about 60mm aperature
I cant wait to star test it. Although I dont yet have an autoguidable mount, I want to simply guide by putting a guitestar on the laptop screen rather then squinting down the off axis guider, I also am assuming this monochrome chip will be mugh more sensitive than the human eye
I also want to try planetary imaging.
The software and drivers I use came from
here
The video streaming app allows making an avi, taking .bmp, or 10 bit .fit images
The video isnt compressed so cannot get fast framerates at full res. which is a nice 1280x1024, that should be great for Lunar imaging.
I might also use it for imaging small Planetaries.
It does 2x2 binning as well, making it VERY sensitive
I should point out that Theo from Gamma Electronics was very helpful, and even though I rang him on Friday PM to enquire about the camera, after deciding that it would be what Im after, he even offered to send it as soon as I did the online bank transfer and sent him the reciept, even thgough the actual money takes a full busines sday to go through
He emailed me the links for the software and 2 rego keys (currently the writer of the software allows it to be registered on 2 machines, one to my notebook the other to the desktop pc). The software is free to those buying the camera. So I happily recommend Gamma Electronics. He had a few of the mono cameras in stock when I ordered mine.
The camera is usb powered and runs fine from my notebook. It as a bright red LED that blinks each time a pic has been taken. It has a thread that screws into a standart T adaptor, and so will screw onto a standard 1/25inch nosepiece which normally have T threads (mine does anyway). I wouldnt mind seeing if I could get an adaptor that allwos me to put it onto camera lenses too (300mm lens from bert and 50mm lens)
Scott