Well after a long time imaging with a Canon DSLR I finally have upgraded to a new dedicated Astrophotography Camera the Hypercam 294c fan-cooled CCD.
This camera was £600.00 in my price range and had favorable reviews so after some consideration, I decided to take the plunge and purchase it from Altair Astro.
There is a steep learning curve moving from a DSLR to a CCD camera and most reviews went on about the specs without actually showing you any images so this review is not about the specs as those are readily available online. I just wanted to know, is it any good and what kind of images will it give me. So when it arrived I had a quick look at the software and setting then just got on with even though I had no idea what I was doing, to begin with.
The first target was the moon as it was foggy and not great for imaging and it produced a very good image of the moon with lots of nice detail so that was encouraging I think this camera will be great for planetary work. Then later on Orion came up and the sky cleared giving me the chance to try it out on a deep sky object. I use APT for my imaging and after I had done some testing with the exposure times and the binning and gain settings I got my first proper look at what this camera is capable of. Here is the image I got of the Orion Nebula with only 6 two minute subs that's it no darks flats or bias just those 6 subs processed in PS.
WOW, I could not believe my eyes what a difference virtually no noise no amp glow, and tons of lovely detail. I was impressed, to say the least.
So excited to do more with this camera I made a makeshift holder for my Astronomics 12nmHa filter that normally slots into my Canon 450d and rigged it up so it sat at the back of the two-inch adapter that screws onto the front of the Hypercam 294c.
Just need to get it to sit in there nice and snugly so it covered the sensor. That done I had another go the next night on Melot 15 and the Horse Head Nebula to see how it did with a Ha filter in front of it. Setting in APT was now a little more sussed out so I did 31 subs with the gain set to 3000 binning set to 1x1 as this camera has a gain boost function.
Anyway, who cares let's just try it out and have some fun was my attitude we can learn all the nitty gritty later. So here is my results from last night on Melot 15 and the Horsehead using the Ha filter and again exposure times are the same as I normally use with my canon 450d which is 3 minutes.
Gain I found out is like the ISO setting and increases sensitivity.
Here are my images this time I took 15 darks and used them with the images 31 subs for Melot 15 and 21 subs for the horse head.
As you can see the camera captures a lot of fine detail far more than I could manage with the DSLR and there are only 31 3-minute subs with 15 darks on Melot 15 with more data the possibility for great detail are certainly there.
So after only two nights out with this camera, I have to say I am very impressed with it and very glad I have made the upgrade from my DSLR. It's good to evolve with your hobbies and this camera certainly opens a lot of new possibilities.
There is another version that has a cooling feature rather than just a fan but that is 800 quid plus and to be honest, taking the darks on the night with this camera is easy so it matters not to me.
Some other good points about it are it runs off a USB cable so no having to change batteries all the time anymore, and it is much easier to focus this camera I just point it on a bright star using the Altair Astro software zoom right in and put the Bahtinof mask on then turn the focus till its spot on makes focusing a breeze to do.
Well, it is early days yet, and lots more to learn about it but if your thinking of getting this camera I can only say I am very glad I have it and it produces some great images which at the end of the day is what it is all about.
More to come as I continue to explore its capabilities.
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