9 replies to this topic

[Richard Whalen]

Posted a bunch of images in photo gallery  under X2 mono

Album: LodestarX2 w/4.33" f7 APO AVX mount

20 images

0 comments

 

First batch in poor conditions, second night very good transparency and average seeing with 1/2 moon up. No guiding, post processing etc. Taken with X2 mono on my 4.33" @ f7 on AVX mount.

 

 

[TL2101]

Excellent job. Lots of detail.

[Dom543]

Very nice galaxy collection!

 

You are staying up late to see M57 in March...

 

Clear Skies!

--Dom

[Richard Whalen]

Thanks Joe & Dom,

 

It's been a very wet and cloudy winter and spring this year, so if it is clear I need to get my fix. Only been able to do 3 all nighters since January, and several partial nights. Almost made it last night, but faded out just before moon set, getting wimpy in my old age .

[geminijk]

Nice!

 

John

[CA Curtis 17]

Richard,

 

What are the exposure options for the Lodestar X2?

 

Regards,

Curtis

[Richard Whalen]

Hi Curtis,

 

In Lodestar Live you can stack mean, median, or sum or no stacking. Exposure 20ms to 300 seconds. However chip is to sensitive for planetary and lunar imaging in most cases.

 

Richard

[pjensen]

Great pictures.  That is exactly what I want to do.

 

What is the optical train from the scope to the lodestar?  Are you using a focal reducer or the scope is F7 normally?

[nytecam]

Hi Curtis,
 
In Lodestar Live you can stack mean, median, or sum or no stacking. Exposure 20ms to 300 seconds. However chip is to sensitive for planetary and lunar imaging in most cases.
 
Richard

Richard - the SX Lodestar s/w (Windows only) exposures steplessly from 1/1000s to as many minutes as needed and I often start a session with the moon or planet (currently Jupiter).

 

You are correct about the camera's sensitivity than even the crescent moon at 1/1000s needs the scope to be stopped-down ( in my case by partially blocking the scope aperture with the dome shutter) but a card over it would serve just as well :-)

 

Here's a couple of 1/1000s Lodestar shots of moon/Venus from last week and Jupiter fov from early March.

http://stargazerslou...-1427108718.jpg = montage
http://stargazerslou...-1427238725.jpg = 3-frame ef/20

http://stargazerslou...-1425770049.jpg = all @ f/4 DSO mode.

Edited by nytecam, 01 April 2015 - 05:08 AM.

[Richard Whalen]

Hi,

 

Scope is a f7 scope so no reducer.

 

Richard