first light new ASI071MC pro - lagoon-triffid

[Robert_T]

finally arrived just yesterday new ASI071MC pro :)

I did some darks in a darkened room and managed to get it up and running on the Espirit 100ED and even grabbed a little over an hour of 3min lights.

No idea what settings to use so just went "unity" (90) and default offset of 65. I cooled to -5deg (doesn't seem to be much noise benefit on curves below that) and made sure anti=dew was "on"

seemed to work Ok at 3min and my bortle 6 suburban sky. Oh and this was with the L Enhance 2in filter.

while my smaller ASI533 is meant to be more sensitive I think the larger pixels here more than make up. Colours of stars in particular are much more defined and I think lower noise.

the FOV is massive... with the 533 I can barely fit the Lagoon but here it and the triffid.

while the Espirit is meant to be good for Full Frame and this is APS-C I do notice some small deformation at the corners. Backfocus looks to be theoretically spot on 55mm + 0.7 for the filter but I may need to tweak for reality ... I wish I could remember which way when deformation is not toward the corners but 90deg to it.

Any advice, tips etc with this camera and settings are appreciated.:thumbsup:

[PKay]

You would have to be happy with that result Robert.

Unity gain is the best place to start.

As you well know, there will be a learning curve with your new setup.

In processing try playing with the colour balance and saturation.

Regards wonky stars, bit hard to see with the reduced image.

Well done.

[Decimus]

Well done, Robert. Now that we both have the same camera, I will be very interested in seeing your images. Talk about wide-field - your Esprit 100 is wider than my WO 102, and no doubt the reducer 8 adds much in that regard (my WO reducer 8 is in its box and unused); I couldn't even fit all of the Lagoon in, let alone the Trifid....Sorry I can't offer you any advice on gain, offset, etc as I am a total newbie. A really nice image!

Richard

[RyanJones]

Hi Robert,

Congrats on your new camera but how dare you get to use it straight away ? I got my 071 nearly 2 weeks ago and I’ve seen nothing but wall to wall clouds since ! Great first capture well done 👍

I believe if you search the great oracle that is google, I’m pretty sure I came across something that shows backfocus distances and the coma they create. Might help you sus out your corners.

Cheers

Ryan

[Startrek]

Robert
Sensational first image with the new camera
Well done !!

Just an observation and recommendation,
Looking at the curves on this camera when using Unity Gain your only getting up to 18,000e in the pixel well which has a maximum well depth of 48,600e so your dynamic range is limited at the expense of a lower read noise of 0.7e rms which isn’t a big saving
Unity gain is fine but give the camera a chance to show its wears and give Highest Dynamic Range ( Gain 0 ) a go, you will probably extract more detail especially on the longer exposures and objects with nebulosity
I found this with my 2600MC , HDR is the best setting for all objects and Sky glow , I image from Bortle 8 and Bortle 3
As far as cooling goes the dark current doesn’t improve much on the 071MC when you cool lower than -5C so that’s the optimum cooling setting. My 2600MC has a massive reduction in dark current from -5C down to -20c +

Have fun with your new camera and enjoy its capabilities, ZWO have certainly come a long way in the last 2 years with these OSC cooled CMOS cameras

Martin

[AdamJL]

Noob question.. but can I ask how come you don't see as much "blue" in the Lagoon nebula compared to the Trifid with this camera?

[Robert_T]

hi adam, it's mainly down to the filter I've used. The L-enhance is a failry narrow triband filter designed mainly to capture emission nebula. it's not so good at reflection nebula which is the blue of the triffid.

[Robert_T]

thanks Martin great advice. And I was thinking of trying Gain 0 when I start on the Orion Nebula as the extra DR will come in handy there. Funny a lot of folk seem to use much higher gains (150 and 200 being common) with this camera from what I'm reading... I tried some 150 but found the image noise objectionable and it doesn't really give much read noise benefit. And yes I agree sweet spot for the 071 seems to be -5deg which is where I'll building up my darks library around...makes things simple as it's a temp I should be able to reach all year round even in a Brisbane summer :-)

[Robert_T]

thanks Ryan. I remember seeing some images of star shapes and what they mean for likely backfocus adjustment...now when I actually am interested cant find them ;)

[Robert_T]

thanks Richard, for now I think the default unity gain seems a good compromise to get to know the camera

[AdamJL]

thanks for explaining :thumbsup: