focusmax tips

[graham.hobart (Graham stevens)]

Hi all, after having played with the RC 10 and the moonlite both with Maxim DL 5 focus and Focusmax the other night -neither of which I got success at I thought I would trawl for tips.
The furthest I got with Fmax was a partial V curve then it stopped and said Star too bright- I was a bit confused about this because I used the find star button and then I thought it chose a star in the field then adjusted the exposure to maintain an appropriate flux?

The star was a small one on my planetarium software too!
Should I manually choose and centre a really really tiny one instead?
tips appreciated
Graz

[Bassnut (Fred)]

What was the mag of the star?. Mag 5 is generally optimal.

[Paul Haese]

Grahame, go to the focusmax site and download the video tutorials and follow each video, then each setting just needs fine tuning. If you get stuck I will need to see your settings on each page. It's probably something simple.

[DavidTrap (David)]

I use the catalog in Maxim to search for a mag 4-6 star (depending on which scope I'm using, bigger scope = fainter star) nearby to my target object to minimise the slew distance. Slew to that star, have Maxim plate solve and recentre so you know you're definitely pointing at what you want.

DT

[Octane (Humayun)]

Or, pay for PinPoint and use AcquireStar directly within FocusMax. All problems solved (no pun intended).

H