Cooled Canon 6D

[gregbradley]

I am wondering whats on the market for cooled and modified 6D's?

I am aware of the Hutech one but its very expensive.

Greg.

[rustigsmed]

http://www.centralds.net/cam/?product=astro-6d-cooled-eos-6d-2

[Joshua Bunn]

Hi Greg.
Lifepixel offer a conversion service:
https://www.lifepixel.com/shop/our-services/full-spectrum-camera-conversion/canon-dslr-full-spectrum-conversion

So does spencers cameras, but check the reviews for yourself etc.
http://www.spencerscamera.com/

Canera clinic in sydney do them aswell:
http://www.cameraclinic.com.au/index.php/en/infrared-modifications

Ohh... sorry Greg, I was giving you links to modifying the 6d... Mike Malik makes a cooler for the 6d i believe, not sure of its effectiveness atm... but i got my a7s modified by him.
Josh

[gregbradley]

Yes they sound good.



Do you have a link for Mike Malik?


Greg.

[Joshua Bunn]

Here is his email address. I found him to be very redponsive

mike_malik@msn.com

[gregbradley]

Thanks Joshua.

I am looking to get a 6D for nightscapes and lens widefield imaging. I wonder though if getting the cooling is worth it as the Milky Way season is in the cooler winter months anyway. So imaging at 5-10C does not allow much cooling before you would get frost. I may whack it on the Honders astrograph so cooling could be handy there in summer.

Its a pretty clean camera anyway right?

Is there much of a gain temperature wise? If the cooling is regulated that would also be a gain as you could use matched darks and biases. Not sure if a regulated cooler is available though.

Greg.

[Joshua Bunn]

Im not sure if the cooling is offered to a certain temperature or a temperature difference below ambient. The 6d is a very clean camera, I haven't done any tests re. Temperature vs. Noise or dark current for the 6d, you may like to ask Mike about temperature regulation for it.

He did a post on here about it with in the past year... so try searching for his name I guess. He hasn't done alot of posts.

Josh

[Camelopardalis]

When I bought my 6D I took a bunch of darks with the camera at ambient, in the fridge and then in the freezer. Got quite a spread. Let me know if you're interested in a peek at any of them.

[gregbradley]

Yes please.

I have seen the comparison darks on the Hutech website and they are quite convincing as well. But 28C below ambient would be pretty useless in winter unless you can stop frosting.

Greg.

[ZeroID]

With the cooled 450D's that myself and a few others have been experimenting with it's easy to get well below zero but extremely difficult to stop the frost effect. And as far as we can tell there is very little improvement on noise below zero.
We're aiming to hit about 4-5 degrees above zero, low noise, no frost.

I have a 1200D which I am also using. I was contemplating cooling but it's noise levels are very low so haven't bothered so far. Darks and flats take care of the minimal effect.

I'd suggest you go and take pictures first and see if it is necessary. I doubt if it is in this case.

[gregbradley]

Thanks Brent. Yes that is what I am thinking. The gain is minimal in winter and more of a summer gain.

Greg.

[Camelopardalis]

Here's one for starters...taken with EXIF temperature recorded at 13C and ambient of 10C, the central 512x512 pixels, levels stretched down from 255 to 128 to highlight the noise. It's very clean at ambient ~10C. This is ISO1600 for 5 minutes. Then the central crop no stretching for comparison. Colder ones when I figure out which hard drive I put them on :lol:

[gregbradley]

Thanks Dunk.

It looks a lot like my Sony A7r2 in the shadows. The 6D is perhaps a tad cleaner, hard to say. Close.

Its very clean for a Canon. I wonder what Canon did to make the 6D so much cleaner than other models.
As far as I know there was no new sensor tech. Some clever engineering tweak.

Greg.

[ZeroID]

Canon seems to have had a mixed bag with it's sensor noise performances over the years. The 450D was the first of the relatively clean sensors. The next I was recommended was the 1100D, same pixel count, 12.2 megs. Then the 1200D came out with 18 megs and is another goodie.
With Astro-imaging you don't need all the flash whiz bangs of a high cost camera, simple is good and a lot cheaper. My 1200D was on sale at $500, about the same price it was being offered secondhand on Trademe, Liveview and BYEOS is the only reason I have a couple of Canons, my 'real' photog hardware is all SONY.

[Camelopardalis]

I did take a bunch of other shots with EXIF temps around 0C but they must be on my desktop at home :mad2:

The 6D certainly appears to be the black sheep of the Canon family, although I was (am) pretty happy with my 1100D performance...I'll probably still even use it on occasion :shrug:

[gregbradley]

A modified 6D seems to be the best camera at the moment for nightscapes/astro widefield.

A cooled one might be more appropriate for someone wanting to do deep sky.

Greg.

[alan meehan]

Hi Greg I have a 6D that iam using on top of a skywatcher star adventurer
still getting used to it all,but so far I have found the noise level of the 6d to be very low I also use darks and bias .I have a cooled 40d done by centralds
which I use for my main imaging and intend to have the 6d modded as well
but not cooled also have a 20d,40d ,400d,1200d,all good cameras but the 6d is far the best and well made,i have a shot taken through the Williams optics 132 2hrs iso 1600 and is not bad for a stock standard camera

[Camelopardalis]

Yeah I've found the H-alpha response of the 6D to be adequate, certainly better than any other Canon (once again).

It takes such darn good daytime photos, I'm reluctant to mod mine :shrug:

For nightscapes you could bump the ISO up to 3200 and get away with a couple of minutes exposure per sub quite easily. I've found the EXIF temp doesn't jump too wildly with a sequence of short shots (2-3 mins).

[gregbradley]

Thanks for that.

Definitely I'll go the mod. Not sure which one yet. And I'll have to consider a cooling option if its worth it. If I use the camera for a nightscape the cooling mod is just an annoyance as I would need power for that. Mind you I often setup just outside the house at my dark site so that's just an extension cord.

But for longer exposure lens imaging cooling would be helpful in summer at least. In winter it may not be that useful.

What mod is considered the most useful? No filter and use clip ins for maximum versatility or add in an Astrodon or Baader UV/IR?

Greg.

[Camelopardalis]

My first subs were pretty interesting, with ambient temperature around 20C there wasn't a lot more noise, but noticeable. At 25C ambient it was certainly worse, but I've not done a thorough statistical analysis.

I'm looking to build a cooler box, as with my 1100D the noise at around 14C ambient is acceptable (to me) and I'm reluctant to open up my 6D at this stage. Dithering certainly helps too.

[Joshua Bunn]

Hi Greg,
I would say a sony a7s or a7s2 is better than the canon, the dynamic range is better and you can pull out much more in the shadows (cleanly) with the Sony, having owned a 6d, then selling it for thd a7s which i got full spectrum modified by mike malik.

I went the full spectrum modification, it gives me the versatility to shoot IR aswell. As for filters, there are several options for filters so thr camera can be used to shoot in daylight as before the modification. A UV/IR cut filter will likely be overly red or it will cut out too much of the Halpha emission, depending on how the cuttoff works at the red end of the spectrum. I use a HEUIB-II filter from Hutech, they are fantastic and can be used for regular daytime use also.
The 3rd filter down on this page:http://www.sciencecenter.net/hutech/prices/filters.htm
Is the one I use on my sony full frame sensor even though it says it's for crop sensors, it works fine and it is the one they will likely recommend for you.

Josh

[Joshua Bunn]

Ahh... sorry Greg, i didn't realise you would probably be using sony E mount lenses if you went the sony camera route. The filter I linked to before wont work in that situation.