Hi,
I'm interested in doing some planetary and lunar imaging. My scope is an f/15 180 mak, and will be on a NEQ6 soon.
I'm going to get a reflector sometime in the future, but would like to have a crack at some basic imaging with what I have. I have zero experience with all things photographic beyond taking pictures with my phone for eBay and classifieds here.
With a budget in mind of around $400, what would be a recommended starting point? The gear I have is in my signature, so all I'm looking at is the capture device.
Bearing in mind the limited budget, these are my questions:
1)should I consider a second hand camera?
2)what are the advantages/disadvantages of colour vs monochrome CMOS?
Considering all options, including used/second hand equipment.
Grab a ZWO 120MC, Firecap software (free) and probably an external SSD drive (NOT HDD!) to record video onto. Plus laptop to run. This will get you started for planets and moon. probably some low grade faint fuzzies, a zwo 178MC probably better allrounder to cover planets and can do longer exposures well. Its not the gear though, it's you that has to learn to capture and process and that takes time and patience. Start with defining what you want to capture, mostly its divided into solar system and deep space targets. The first requires fast high frame rate video capture and usually low pixel count. The second is opposite, needing long exposures, possibly paired with guiding gear as you learn, and lots of pixels. The zwo 120mc is a great starting point to learn on, though its more suited for solar system you can start to dabble in slightly longer exposures though very short still. It'll let you understand how to capture and how to process. You will be capturing at something like the fov of 5mm eyepiece, so expect atmospheric conditions to be obvious and sharp focus non existant (that comes later in processing). Though a feathertouch style focuser to get as good as possible is highly recommended, a must if you are serious .
the rabbit hole is deep indeed. I wish you success and enjoyment. btw the zwo 120mc are currently a usb3 version and i've heard a bit better imagers than the original usb2 version I've got. So you will find a price difference between the two on the 2nd hand market so I'd look for the newer one if you dont buy new (which should all be newer version). I guess you could go for the 120mm (mono) instead but starting out the colour is what I craved and might be better for your efforts. but with a budget thinking hat on, the mono will make a good camera for guiding better than the colour version. So depending on how fast you learn and progress. I dont recommend diving in and get everything right now. so slowly and spend wisely. I upgraded and use my 120mc on a solar scope now, it was also fun to experiment modding it by adding a peltier to it for cooling, no obvious difference in the images than without it. also grab SharpCap (also free), I just prefer firecap and both have pros/cons. zwos cooled versions are really good performers if you can afford to stretchthe budget a bit, maybe next cam? No gear is ever good enough. Other free software to grab: PIPP, AutoStakkert, DSS(though I think maybe a reducer might be a good idea for those wider starfield shots, I use DSLR for mine so no need there Only imaging I do through a scope is planetary with zwo).
PIPP is great for imaging planets, run your capture video through it and center object and maybe crop frame and get pipp to output bmp series or avi to drop into autostakkert which aligns stacks stretches sharpens planetary/lunar nicely. its great to get your target planet closely aligned in the frame like a well guided set up does. Youre likely to have drift to iron out so pipp helps you out to not throw away captures in frustration.
btw i see some of your questions hadnt been addressed. At this point pixel size I wouldn't matter with. nor megapixels, as I said earlier the widerfield imaging really needs long exposure times as it typically faint structure in galaxies and nebula you are trying to capture but solar system objects are either so active and moving fast (sun/moon) and succeptible to the watery effects of the atmosphere in the image. This is tackled by using high speed video to take as many frames per second (where an SSD to record to is vital as HDD are too slow, plus it results in a lot of data captured 100GB of video in a few minutes is not uncommon so best to have a good external SSD to fill up raather than your system drive and risk corrupting everything). With the main planets Mars, Jupiter, Saturn they all have detailed features to capture plus they turn fast enough that you can really only capture a few minutes videobefore the planet will have rotated to blur features out when you stack. Video gets split out into single frames, so the faster fps you can squeeze out of the camera the more frames data you'll have to work with (again split to bmp with PIPP and use its quality feature to only keep the best 2,000 frames for example) The more frames you get the better the chance some of them will be at being in clear focus with crisp details and then chuck the frames into AS and the details get pulled out with its automatic wavelet processing. I try to get better with same data using PixInsight but find I can't better AS just match it, anything I do to the AS output is noticably overprocessed. With your Mak you should be able to grab panels of the moon to stitch together (micrsoft ICE is free and great stitcher, make panels in AS then stitch ). For solar system I think small pixel sizes will get you great detail but usuall come with more noise. Deep space are usually larger pixels and have lower noise. Plus thats where you need to stretch the image more than planets to bring out the dim subtle structures. So really both targets are at odds with each other and there's no ideal camera for both. When you look at the range of zwo camera and other brands they have a lot of options but when you examine the specs you see they tend to be either high speed/low resolution or long exposure/high resolution so you can grab the right camera for your targetting needs. Since you are starting you no doubt want to shoot everything and there are only a handful of cameras like the zwo 178 that are capable of imaging both (jack of all trades, master of none type thing). I still think the 120 is your best starting point, see how you go, see what interests you in the sky to image in particular etc then you can make a better choice for an upgrade, which at a guess will look like a reducer, 178MC or simliar for deep space and a guider using your retired 120.
Colour or mono, on paper mono is best, should give lowest noise and possible to use filter wheel for colour imaging too,but Not sure a good idea as a starting point.Colour you have to debayer your captures or they look grey, live previews in capture software can be grey too for that reason. Debayer your capture to get the colour on screen (PIPP again can also debayer while you are centering and sorting planets etc). Theres plenty to learn as it is for a starter and I think colourwill suit best. but if you're intent is only the moon a mono would be better. Not knowing though best satisfaction for now will be a one shot colour camera.
Stephen
Autostakkert 3 does a great job stacking your planetary and lunar image frames or video
It’s primarily (free) stacking software but does have a sharpening feature which I never use as it over sharpens your images , there is no setting to control the amount of sharpening
I use Registax 6 ( also free ) after Autostakkert 3 to do the final processing of the image ( sharpening , de noise , colour , brightness, contrast etc .. ) it does a superb job, easy to use, thoroughly recommend it
Cheers
Thanks again Steve, that's a fantastic help, and you too Martin.
Based on the advice given here I'm leaning towards mono at the moment so I can concentrate on basic technique. The zwo 120mm sounds good. Using this with guide scope in the future sounds like a smart upgrade plan.
Thanks for the software tips as well.
When I finally get things up and running I'm going to learn my way with the moon, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn. I'm keen on getting some good moon shots to start with. My first goal will be a good sharp image of a prominent crater with shadow.
I'll jump in with my two cents as a beginning astrophotographer who is only a little bit further along the learning curve than yourself... & it's a long curve, trust me.. but, no less enjoyable.
Get yourself a bhatinov mask to fit your scope; even on planetary targets using video, I find that getting sharp focus with a bhatinov mask on a bright star before slewing to a planet ensures that my video frames are as sharp as possible & the only factors that effect your captures are seeing conditions, thermal currents, etc... all things you cannot personally control so to speak. A Bhatinov mask will then serve you when you want to start on Deep Sky Objects where it is impossible to focus by eye on the object you want to image. The moon is not such a challenge to focus visually but, everything else you want to image, focusing will be assisted by using the Bhatinov mask.
You can buy them commercially through most astro shops or, if you would like to save some money, search for Bhatinov masks in ebay. You should find a chap in Melbourne who prints them up on his 3d printer. If he doesn't have the size you want, contact him via eBay & start a conversation. He has made two for me now & I couldn't be happier. They cost me $12 for an 80mm one & $16 for an 8" one including postage to Cairns; all he needed from me were some measurements & focal length of the scope & he was up & running to creating one for me.
I have no personal link to him, in fact, I don't even know his name, just his eBay handle...
Hi Stephen, the zwo 120mc and the mak 180 are a great combo, with the small sensor and long focal length scope you get a good image size and rarely need anything more than a 2x barlow.
Here's a few pics taken with my 180 mak and usb2 asi 120mc, captured with SharpCap and stacked in Registax.
Not really, I don't spend a lot of time processing I find that getting good data is the most important part, good focus (and good seeing) and then get the exposure right and the rest falls into place. I do most of the processing in RegiStax and a quick colour tweak in photoshop. The colour is there if you get the exposure right.
Here's a screen grab of a raw capture avi and another after stacking and sharpening in Registax
Thanks again for the advice here, and in another thread of mine where I was considering the 290MM. With the sale at Bintel I've jumped in and bought an ASI120MM-S. I went mono partly because of advice here regarding guiding with this cam later on, and also because I imagine starting on the moon in mono might be the best way to learn about gain and exposure.
Once clouds clear here in Melbourne (in a week!!!) I'll get it out for a session. In the meantime I have ASICAP (came with camera) and SharpCap 3.2 to play around with.
Cheers
Stephen
but do you realise once you have caught the imaging bug there is no cure, 
and you will be broke forever. 
No gear is ever good enough. Other free software to grab: PIPP, AutoStakkert, DSS(though I think maybe a reducer might be a good idea for those wider starfield shots, I use DSLR for mine so no need there Only imaging I do through a scope is planetary with zwo).
