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Supercooled QuickCam Astromomy

Posted by chrisd on from the pretty-cheap-pictures dept.

flowerp writes "Any serious astronomer would declare you insane if you mounted your off-the-shelf CCD webcam to a telescope in order to watch the skies, but there is a group on the Internet who do just that! They call themselves QCUIAG (QuickCam and Unconventional Imaging Astronomy Group). If you think those are just some crazy nerds, watch their astounding footage of planets and nebulae - and reconsider."

1 of 7 comments (clear)

  1. Interesting take... by pease1 · · Score: 5, Informative
    Actually, many serious amateur astronomers have played with webcams over the past few years. I played with a Logicom quickcam on a homebuilt 4-inch Reflector a couple years ago. By 2003 I'll have it mounted on a homebuilt 12-inch scope to image Mars.

    I first played with CCD's on telescopes in 1987. It has come along way since then; in fact some early amateur astronomers turned image processing software developers have even contributed serious advances in image processing.

    If you want to hack a really cool system, see how to build your own "Cookbook" cooled CCD camera and the related Cookbook camera website.