Well, it's been a couple of weeks now,and the weather at my place in southern Sydney has decided to turn it on. Good seeing and clear of cloud so far.
It's my new (to me) SBIGs first light, and I'm trying to get my head around the complexities of a proper, cooled CCD astro camera after using a DSLR for a while. I'm using CCDsoft for series aquisition of the ubiquitous M42 at the moment, and trying various length exposures at -5C to see what it captures and how it reacts. I've seen it gobble up the base trap stars and surrounding points of light in under 1/2 sec. The core starts to burn at 2 secs, and at 10 (which is where I am now) the nebulosity is starting to really grow. Geez this thing is sensitive. I'm worried now how I'm going to keep the blooming under conrol. I may upgrade the chip later to the micro-lensed KAF-1602 which I can import from the USA now for around $200. I'll see how the KAF-1600 goes first though.
Yikers - it's a heck of a learning curve! Lots of fun though....
