Jupiter ... What am i doing wrong?

[TechnoViking]

Hi ISSers

I attempted to take some video of Jupiter a few nights ago, I captured 20+ videos @ around 3 minutes each of jupiter so that i could select the best one and use registax to get some detail. But i found that all the video footage was overly bright with no detail at all! I ran the best capture through registax with no success.

I am using a Canon 600D DSLR + T-adapter and EOS ring. Attached is a screen shot of the video to give you an idea of what kind of quality I am getting. I understand that the video will never be as good as looking through an EP, but any hints or tips on how to improve the video capture would be greatly apreciated!

[WingnutR32]

To me, it just looks over exposed. Need to stop down the aperture more.

Looking at your sig, you have a NexImage camera.. Any reason to not using it over the DSLR?

[asimov]

Yes, over exposed & yes, I think you should be using the Neximage as well.

[TechnoViking]

Unfortunatly its the cheap 640 x 480 neximage, not the 5mp one :( i have attempted to use the neximage with not much success.

Here is one attempt. (screen shot of the video)

[TechnoViking]

here is the same video stacked, i suppose i thought i would get better detail with the DSLR :sadeyes:

[pluto]

On the 600D you need to set the exposure time to be much shorter.
From memory, if the camera is on manual, turn the dial that is near the shutter button (I think clockwise) until the image gets darker.
You'll want your ISO to be pretty low, it will depend on your scope. On my f7.5 ED80 I use around ISO400 but if you have a newt or something with a smaller focal ratio then you might go even lower.

[pluto]

Also I'm not sure how you're recording video off your 600D but I use this: http://sourceforge.net/projects/eos-movrec/
It will record the Liveview video so you can press the zoom in button and record 5x zoom Liveview.

[TechnoViking]

Thanks Hugh, Sam and Asimov!

I think what i am doing wrong is using the full 1080P video to record Jupiter, which seems to be gathering too much light. Ive done some reading on the forum and on the net and found that i am suppose to use the Movie Crop mode? which i have searched the menu for, but can not find it, I may have to read the dreaded manual :lol: I have only had the 600D for just over a week and im still learning how to use it, as its the first DSLR ive ever owned.

I am hoping Mark_Heli will give a few pointers, as his scope and camera are very similar to mine, and the results he acheived for Jupiter are very impressive. :thumbsup:

[pluto]

Hi James, the resolution you're taking the movie at won't affect how bright the image is, I'm pretty sure you just need to turn down the exposure time. Make sure your camera is on manual mode.
The crop mode could help as it will record a 640x480 movie just using the pixels in the centre of the sensor thus giving you more "zoom". Bit I'm not sure if the 600D has that...?
That program I pointed out in my last post kind of does the same thing.

[TechnoViking]

Your absolutely correct!! The 600D has had the "Movie Crop" function replaced by digital Zoom, which in essence does exactly the same thing.

Found some great info here for anyone who has the 600D
http://www.cameralabs.com/reviews/Canon_EOS_600D_Rebel_T3i/movie_mode.shtml

i will give it a go on sunday night :)

[Mark_Heli]

Hi James,

Attached are the EOS utility settings which I used to take the attached image last week.

I have found that an ISO setting of 200 and an exposure speed of 1/160 work really well. If you set the ISO too high or the exposure speed too slow, the video will be overexposed. You can change both of these settings through the EOS utility software without touching the camera.

In terms of selecting Movie Crop mode, see the attached picture which shows how I select this mode through the EOS utility.

I think that the EOS cameras do an excellent job for planetary videos.

Cheers,
Mark

[TechnoViking]

thank you very much for that info Mark!! I have made notes,and will give it a go on sunday - I think the problem is im trying to learn too much at once, which is getting me a little confused, everytime i see ISO, i think of disk images and burning software :rofl:

[Eggmoon]

James / TechnoViking,

I am in the same boat as you... trying to learn EVERYTHING about using a DSLR on my telescope in 2 days if I can!!! In reality, it has been a few months, and still learning more each time I take it out!

I'm using a Canon 60D, and the movie crop mode works well. Can be hard to get the focus tight enough, but worth keeping going. I'm using the BackyardEOS program to do my capture, Registax 6 to stack and process... and the combination seems to be working well.

I have been bumping my ISO speed up as high as I dare, and using a shutter speed of about 1/200th of a second... theory being that I am trying to leave the shutter speed as quick as possible to try and help "freeze" the atmospheric turbulence as much as I can.

Even had a go at some deep space objects the other night... reasonably pleased with how it turned out for a first go... but a LONG way to go for it to be really good.


Mark,

What size LX90 you using? Doesn't say in your signature block. I have the 8" LX90, would love to be able to get a photo of Jupiter as great as yours, but I am not close yet.

Geoff.

[rustigsmed]

Hi James,

I have a 600d you have the iso setting up too high. When in movie mode press ' menu' make sure 'movie exposure' is on manual. Go then right to the next tab heading, 'movie rec. Size' then choose 1920 x 1080, 30fps and select the '3-10' digital zoom option. Turn off sound. To get 30fps you may need to change the video system to NTSC which is on the far right heading (although being on 24fps is not the end of the world). Look for the iso button on top of the camera and choose it there. You can also play with the sideways button in front of it too you'll be able to see the brightness change.

That should get you going. I use the eos software which was supplied to convert the file to avi before using registax for stacking.

Keep in mind the seeing has been terrible for months plus Jupiter is at a low elevation this year, so a good video / image is hard to come bye! Very hard so don't be too disappointed with average results.

Best of luck oh btw you should download 'magiclantern' to your memory card, the settings are much easier to control from there.


Cheers

Rusty
[url]http://www.flickr.com/photos/80336656@N07/[/

[TechnoViking]

Thanks again guys, my sister has borrowed my DSLR for a few weeks, so im without it untill Boxing day :( , but i thought i would give the little Neximage a run again last night. Ive learned a few tricks from reading lots of IIS posts. I know it isnt anywhere near the quality of the all the other images of jupiter, but for a sub $150 webcam, and 10 x 1 minute videos im quite happy with the results, im sure there are options in registax that i have missed that could probably make this image better, but that is the fun in learning by trial and error :)

[niko]

wow! what a tremendous change between the image in the first post and the image in the last post!!!

well done

[Larryp]

Yes-a great improvement!:thumbsup:

[TechnoViking]

Thank you again everyone, I had a little success on the 28th with a semi clear sky, light whispy clouds and the moon in my face like a flashlight.
I only had 30 minutes before the clouds came in, but here is my attempt with the DSLR, im quite happy with it :) im guessing that my focus wasnt spot on, and i probably should have taken more than 1 minute of video to stack. Im just glad im going forward, and not backwards :)

Ive now run a 2m usb extension to my pier, so i can control the DSLR via my PC.

Thanks again all for your info, this has been a great experience!

all the best and clear skies!

James

[WingnutR32]

Well done, James.. You are certainly going to enjoy your progress in leaps and bounds.

[LAW]

That last image is great James, I tried imaging Jupiter for the first time the other night with my 550D. I haven't worked out how to get multiple .avi's into Registax yet (is it even possible?) so I was trying to find a single exposure that didn't blow out the surface detail but kept the moons in view.

I ended up settling on 1/800 ISO 1600. Unfortunately the moons are barely visible and the surface is still too bright, is there a way of combining .avi's with two different exposures?

[TechnoViking]

Hi Murphy,

I was using the following settings in video mode (Press MENU)
FIRST MENU
Movie Exposure: Manual
AF Mode: Live Mode
SECOND MENU
Movie rec.size 1920x1080 (3-10 zoom) 24fps
sounds recording: Disable
Metering timer: 16sec
Grid Display - ON (personal preference)

Press the ISO button and select 200 or 400 which i found to give the best results.

Its looking pretty good outside at the moment with some fast moving high level clouds which will hopefully bugger off in the next few hours, so im hoping to try the supplied software to control the DSLR - Have a look down this post and you will see a reply by Mark_Heli which has the full menu "screen shot" and a step by step instruction on how to set it using the supplied EOS software (Im not sure if the 550D has the same software)

I dont think you can stack 2 different avi's togeather unless you were to join the 2 AVI's togeather as one video then stack them? I use to know a great free program that joined AVI's , i think it was called DivFIX or AVIjoin cant remember which one it was :(
Good luck, and make sure you post the end result if it works, i would love to see it!

[2stroke]

check this out http://magiclantern.wikia.com/wiki/Magic_Lantern_Firmware_Wiki , havent got to play with yet as the 1100D is still in beta bah :(

[astronobob]

Very interesting thread James,
And well done on your Juup images mate :thumbsup:
Ive had a 600D now for approx 1 yr and havnt yet tried the Video mode, too much habit of taking stills, This thread has seen my mind taken a different light to taking the video plunge :P

Cheers and watching with interest ! ! :cool:

[Jen]

Hi James I was about to post the same thread as this one :D
A couple of days ago I had my first attempt in video mode of Jupiter also did you use a powermate or Barlow?
The seeing was fantastic and I have heaps of videos but i now don't know what to do with them next :lol: :screwy:
I will watch this thread with interest :thumbsup:

[Eggmoon]

Ok... firstly... I am not pretending to be an expert in any way, shape or form... I have only been gathering images for a few months now... maybe 3 months... hard to keep track when having so much fun!! :D

I have been using the movie mode on my Canon 60D... in fact, the "Movie Crop" mode... which only uses the centre 640 x 480 of the sensor... brings things in a LOT closer. Even without my newly acquired Powermate 2.5x I was getting great (great for my total amatuer status) results from Jupiter.

When I added the Powermate into the mix... let me tell you... I almost wet my pants with excitment!!! :eyepop:

I am using BackyardEOS to collect my images... you need to go to the "Planetary" section with the camera on "M" or "B" and hit the live view button... then switch to the movie mode on the camera, with the movie crop mode selected.

Being so highly zoomed between the two of them, Powermate and Movie Crop mode, it can be hard to get Jupiter to stay in the frame for long enough to collect enough frames... this image was stacked from an initial 4,000 frames... using AVIStack to reject the worst 33% at stage one, and the the worst 33% of the reminder at the later stage where you can select again in the process.

This is my best Jupiter image yet... two of the moons have come up ok... the stacking process in AVIStack seems to help brighten them up from the dim state they started in... but one of them, Europa from memory, seems oddly shaped.

In the short time I have been imaging.... I have already collected over 700GB of video data. No... I am not kidding... 700GB!!!!

Geoff.

[TechnoViking]

The first thing i do is the most painful part of the whole procedure, converting MOV -> AVI, im using Pazera MOV-AVI Converter, which is very basic and the end AVI product seems to have lost some of its detail! when i compare the 2 videos AVI in Windows Media Player and the MOV in VLC playing both the videos at the same time you can really see a difference. I wish registax could stack MOV files :( maybe it does and i just haven't found the option yet?

Next i open the AVI in registax, use the slider at the bottom to select the clearest frame, click Align, once that's done, i click stack, then Click Wavelet and adjust the sliders until i get something that looks kind of like Jupiter lol

Im not sure if im even doing this correctly, but as i have said before the fun is in the failure and the success !!!

I dont use a barlow or powermate, just a T adapter and EOS ring.

[Eggmoon]

James,

Using BackyardEOS skips a step in there... it records directly to AVI's, so you dont lose any definition in the conversion step. There are also other tools that capture in AVI too. What they all do is take the "Live View" feed from the camera via the USB and convert that into the AVI file. Works like a charm! I am not saying the way you do it is wrong... just offering my method as an alternative.

And no... Registax cant import MOV files (be just as nice if the Canons could record in AVI instead of MOV)... thats why I went and found software that records AVI directly. I have also lately swapped from Registax to AVIStacker... although I do also love the results I get from Registax, I found that Registax occassionally spits the dummy and doesnt load some AVI files... but AVIStacker seems to have no trouble.

AVIStacker does take longer... but you can also set up a good batch process if you have a zillion AVI's you want processed.

There seems to be many packages out there... and for a begginer like me they are very daunting.... even learning Registax, then AVIStacker seemed beyond me at first... but slowly nutted them out. So worth it though... loving making images!!! Wanting to try some deep space stuff next....

[Jen]

Thanks for he tips guys :thumbsup: yes registax is doing my head in when I try to put an avi file in it doesn't like it and when I try to stack images it's too big :screwy::screwy:

[Eggmoon]

Jen,

Try AVIStacker 2.0, not trying to say it's better... or you should swap permanently, but give it a go and see if it can load your fiels that Registax can't.

I have just started using DeepSkyStacker to try out some images I took of Orion... cant get it to do much for me at all... another learning curve coming up... *sigh* :shrug:

Geoff