DSLR focus

[beren]

Got a copy of DSLR focus last night , its pretty cool software that assists in astrophotography with a DSLR camera { www.dslrfocus.com/ } .Depending on your scope and camera the program can control scope and focusing and image capture , for the canon DSLRs image capture is supported but as of yet i think Nikon cameras are not . Got a 82 page manual to wade through so im blank with all the detailed features but looks pretty specky, some fun or frustration for the weekend :)

[Astroman]

Nice little program. Although personally I would use a watch and a heartman mask. :)

Still the program does have some advantages and I am guessing after wading through the manual there will be more advantages. The dslrfocus website wasn't available when I checked though which is a shame.

Great find. Will bookmark it for future reference.

[[1ponders]]

It does support other brands Stuart. You have to navigate to the folder that is the default for the remote capture and set that manually along with a couple of other changes. See page 29 in the manual.

I'd love to be able to give a bit of a review of it. I've had it since the end of February, unfortunately the weather has only be kind enough for me to use it on 3 nights. :mad2: So far though the shots I've taken with it are a big improvement on my previous focusing efforts.

This is using 80-200mm zoom with 300D piggyback. Setting 190mm f/5.6 ISO800 single shot of 3 min focused using DSLR Focus

[Robby]

Ahh great Paul,
I need someone to teach me how to use DSLRFocus. I brought it a couple of months back but haven't actually used it yet. It got put in the too hard basket.
You'll have to show me next weekend!
Cheers

[[1ponders]]

I actually thought I'd get out tonight and play with DSLR Focus a bit more. Lovely clear night. Started to set up at 5:45. 6:00 comes along and on go the four huge mercury lights at the bowls club next door. I thought Ok they will only be on for an hour or so until dinners are finished. 7:00 The lights go on at the tennis club between me and the bowls club. Guess who's not imaging tonight.

I'll definately have a bit more of a play with it Robby before I come over. Even I I have to do it out a window.

[gbeal]

What? Bowling Club lights one side, and Tennis Club on the other, cor, I will never grizzle about my skyglow out north any more.

[[1ponders]]

They're both on the same side Gary. Not that that helps much. double tennis courts 5 meters from the northern fence, side by side so only one court length to the Bowls Club next to that. When they both have their lights on I can just make out Alpha Centauri in the southeast. Great if you want to get a suntan at night.

[Exfso]

sounds like an air rifle would come in handy....:eyepop:

[h0ughy]

I have the folloing equipment I purchased from this guy. I have not fully had time to work with them but I do have them for the pentax *IstDS



http://www.stellar-international.com/

Beren, does the software support the pentax camera?

[beren]

Houghy it should do so long as your Pentax has image capture software , with my D70 i need to have Nikon capture 4 running in unison to control the camera settings, at this stage only the canon cameras have direct control through the program....

[h0ughy]

Thanks for the information Beren. I will have to wait, or be turned to the dark side (canon)!

BTW how come you changed your picture. My wife was quite taken back by it as she thought it was a male Nerds only domain!

[Robby]

Finally got round to putting DSLR focus into action tonight...
Well.. Ummm... I think I will build a hartman mask!! Gotta be easier..
Anyway I persisted a bit and I think I got it to work manually. Tried the AutoFocus, but it kept moving in the same direction, getting more out of focus each time??? And it seems very buggy cause if you push the wrong button, the who DSLR program crashes and you have to start again!!.. I am using a JMI-NGF-S focus on my SCT controlled by Star-Mate and using ASCOM focus interface on DSLRFocus.. Have I lost you yet Paul!!!...
Anyway went back to manual focus and I think I managed to get the focus as tight as possible. Was monitoring the PEAK number and set the focus at the highest number. My first blunder was to use the biggest brightest star in the field for focussing on... Dumb idea! Ended up going to quite a dim star, and seemed to be ok.
I am imaging at the moment, so will be interesting to see how they turn out. Also put a couple of wires across the corrector to try and get diffraction spikes. Will report later!
Cheers

[[1ponders]]

That was the first mistake I made Robby. I actually find that it works much better with a moderately dim star. I'm still using it manually until I get my new gear in a couple of weeks, but I'm getting the hang of it using my old refractor with R&P focuser. Because of the limitation of my current system its still takes a while but it's a big improvement on what I can get with just my eyes. Plus I find when using a hartmann mask on a 4" scope I still can't see the image well enough in the view finder to judge whether its focused or not.

Did you select a star initially when using the autofocus? It worked fine the couple of times I used it on my old LX200, that is when I managed to get out.

I'll have a bit of a read and see what i come up with

[Robby]

Hmmmm, maybe that was the problem with AutoFocus.. I thought I had a star selected, and got wavy graphs coming up. Dunno what they mean!! :confuse2:
The manual seems to work ok. What values do you keep and eye on? I have just been focussing (pun intended) on the PEAK value.
Shot a dozen of Trifid, focus on final images still looks a bit soft.... Perhaps that is simply due to seeing and wobbling stars. :confuse3: Will see how they process tomorrow. Shooting M8 now for Mike's monthly competition.
At least it's clear!!!! Who needs to work tomorrow, might have to go for the long haul... The joys of being self employed. :2thumbs: Might have to turn the answering machine on for the morning!!! :whistle:
Cheers

[[1ponders]]

I've only been able to manually focus lately using the R&P focuser on my refractor and the manual focus on my canon lenses. When I refocus I move the selected star a bit, using the refractor, so the graphs my not give me a true reading. I focus (pun intended :P ) on the star image. When using the camera and when I was using the LX200 I used the radial sum value graph and the Vs Time graph as well as the image.

I've got about 3 weeks off coming up so expect a bit of a report in the near future. I intend (weather permitting) to give my new equipment a real run in, inlcuding the DSLR Focus

[Robby]

http://www.iceinspace.com.au/forum/showthread.php?p=26348#post26348
See results from last night in this thread. M8. Focus pretty sharp, and diffraction spikes add something extra. The M20 shot that I spent ages focussing came out crap....
But later on I did a shot of NGC6744, and it seemed a bit better..
See http://www.iceinspace.com.au/forum/showthread.php?t=2384

Conclusion... DSLR focus does work, with a bit of practice, and I will probably use it everytime I image from no on.

Cheers

[[1ponders]]

You will find it gets easier Robby. If you want an exercise in frustration try it piggyback with a zoom lense :P Also have a check on the option to focus and shoot just RGB. That might be my next exercise to try to remove/reduce CA.