(I guess the curse even knows when your equipment will be used in astronomy)I'm really exited with the possibilities, sharing some quick shots from tonight - here's the setup:
Celestron 6SE
Meade Electronic Eyepiece (discontinued) - I like that it has manual gain control, very useful at full-moon to dial down the gain/contrast to bring out shadowless features.
0.5x 1.25" Focal Reducer - could work either way with or without, depending on what you want to show.
3M Mpro150 Pocket Projector - long discontinued; 4:3 aspect ratio, 640x480 resolution, about the lowest lumens (15 lumens max) projector out there. On board battery last about 2hrs. While it's rated at ~40" projection, I can get astro vids to show nice on screen size in excess of 100" in dark environments.
Screen - I already have several options accumulated; 50" and 80" portable, ~20" rear projection. However the winds were gusting tonight (yay OK!) and I didn't want to bother with a flapping screen - mounted the projector as high as I could on the tripod and pointed it down to the bare concrete floor
Can't wait for the moon to wane, and bring out my lowly SDC-435 to give it a go. Yeah, there are several factors involved, including the incongruency of introducing even more light into observational astronomy - but I'm certain there are several situations where this sort of setup can be put into good use, either in an outreach setting or just for the fun of it. Our local club has a monthly outreach event at the local art district, under well-lit locations - I'll be giving it a try then.
I also have a 3M M220 65 lumens arriving next week; I didn't know initially if 15 lumens would be too bright, but from the past week of testing it's way more than enough imo - the 65 lumens unit does seem like an over-kill now, but will see how it goes. If you're looking for a pico projector, you might want to avoid 3M units as the analog input cables are propriety and may be hard to find (make sure they come with the unit when buying used). The other option would be aaxa P series projectors that have standard inputs.
These two moon shots are live:
This one is a picture display from a M42 capture I did sometime back with SDC-435 and 6SE, gives an idea of what to expect.
, that would be a night to remember for the wrong reasons.
) on the the back burner for the past year+, but it's still a joy to share the night skies with others, and I'm fortunate that there are more opportunities than my available time close to my location. Another pic - same setup, this time at a darker location - summer program at a center for children with developmental disabilities - some of the kids on wheelchairs or motorized we having fun driving over the moon, while others just wanted to roll around in it. The perceived resolution of a dinky analog NTSC output is much better than expected, and for the next step I'd like to try a Live View DSLR/mirrorless that can provide live HDMI output, but that would require a portable projector of the same capability.
