Posts Made By: Chase McNiss

Finally got my 8" Newtonian back in operation just in time to image the moon before it started rising too late in the morning. The skyclock for my area was calling for clear and steady skies. At least it was half right. As usual the steady skies never materialized.

My image was taken using a Coolpix 4500 mounted on my 8" f6 Newt. Exposed in B&W mode , 1/15 sec @f5.1 through an 8x24mm zoom a-focally. I shot at a resolution of 2272x1704 with only 5 images loaded in the buffer before I had to wait for the camera to catch up. Single image used for final.

Question is; if I shoot at a lower resolution, how many lower resolution images will I need to stack to match the resolution guality of the one shot. I could probably stack a dozen or so images at 1024x768 or maybe hundreds of video clips at 640x480.

I see some amazing images on this site and I am thinking of trying out video, but I am not sure where to start.

Chase

Here is my first attempt at Mars using a webcam.

Still getting familiar with K3CCD and Registax. IR Pass filter is in route, can't wait to try it out. Made the mistake of processing on laptop and then transferring to desktop to send out. Sure looked different (color wise) on the CRT screen.

Thanks to all the good information and beautiful images I have seen on this site I avoided a numbers of mistakes but still a lot to learn!

Any recommendations welcome.

Chase

Got up at 3PM hoping the skyclock was right reagrding the seeing. Seeing was better than usual but the ground fog was typical. Overall good session. Tried the IR pass filter for the first time, need to adjust the white balance a little better during capture I think. Now if I could just remember to turn on my boundary layer fan on the scope.

TouCam 840 on 8" f6 Newtonian w/ 4x Powermate, IR Pass filter (685 nm) at f24

482 out of 1199 frames, K3CCD, registax and Photoshop.

Also recorded in B&W but need to get some sleep before I process those.

Clear skies,
Chase

The seeing was 4-5 out of 10 at best but it was good to get out and practice. No major mistakes this time, experimented with the white balance in K3CCD, still not there yet.

8" f5.9 Newt with 4x Powermate, TouCam 840, 249 out of 897 frames, Registax 3 and PhotoShop CS

Tonight is looking better seeing wise....

I seemed to do better on the moon this particular morning than I did with Mars. No color to deal with that's why. :S

8" f5.9 Newt, 2,5x PowerMate, 348 frames out of 900 stacked with Registax 3 and finished in Photoshop.

This is from the night of 9-21-05. 8" f5.9 Newtonian, 2.5x Powermate with TouCam in B&W mode with IR pass (685nm). 356 out of 900 frames stacked, light wavelets processing in Registax, final processing in Photoshop CS.

Since that night my laptop crashed and I have been unable to do any Mars imaging. Just got around to processing this image this morning before I am off to work. Wanted to see how it looked on the forum site, it really looks contrasty on my new laptop.

Clear skies,
C

Sorry to post this question here. I have also posted this question to the TouCam group but with all the expertise I see in this group I thought your input would fully round out any actions I take to rectify my current problem.

I recently bought a TouCam 840 and have used it several times on the moon and Mars with satisfactory results. More recently my old laptop crashed and I bought a new laptop.

I had no trouble recording AVI sequences on the old laptop and when I was running at a setting of 10fps I would usually capture an average of 9.9 fps.

Now with the new laptop and all the same settings that was used on the old laptop, I am lucky to records 2.8 fps second no matter what I set the capture frame rate to. I am dropping 3 to 4 times more frames than are actually being captured!

I have tried uninstalling and re-installing both the Philips software and the K3ccd software and this has made no change to the captured fps rate.

Is there something I am missing? Is there a computer setting I need to make to make the camera more compatible with the laptop? The camera software indicates that the camera is functioning properly.

I'm stumped!

Thanks in advance...
Chase

After 2+ weeks of clouds, rain and a flooded basement I finally got a break in the weather this morning. Not the best conditions, but we take what we can get. Forecast for the next week is more rain and clouds, so it was last night or maybe nothing at all before the opposition.

203mm f5.9 newt, w/ 4x Powermate, TouCam 840 w/ Baader UV-IR Cut filter, 725 out of 1799 frames stacked in Registax 3, light on the wavelets and finished in Photoshop CS.

Seeing was average 3/5 with high clouds sneaking in about 3AM. I think I am finally getting closer on the color, still have a ways to go but having fun.

C

Taken the same morning I was imaging Mars. Again the seeing was average 3/5 and transparency was variable with high thin clouds drifting through.

295 out of 1799 TouCam AVI frames stacked using Registax 3, final processing in Photoshop CS.

I always enjoy looking at Theophilus visually. Not too many times I can seperate all 4 central peaks with a 4" refractor, so it was nice to image it for the first time using the TouCam. I also like to study the terraced side walls and try to imagine what it would be like to climb my way out from the crater floor.

C

Finally got some clear skies here in the northeast.

Seeing was less than optimal at 3 out of 10. 382 frames out of 1195 stacked using registax 3.

8" f5.9 Newtonian with TouCam 840, 4x Powermate, UV/IR cut filter.

C