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Adapting a Webcam for Astrophotography

Posted by timothy on from the astounding-imagery dept.

Alien54 writes "Here's a guy who has done well taking digital photographs of the planets using not only a regular digital camera, but also using an old greyscale Quickcam. Lots of pics, of course, and some very nice shots of Mars and all the rest. He also has some higher end gear. See also these other related pages (link 1, link 2, link 3) Also worth looking at is the website of the QuickCam and Unconventional Imaging Astronomy Group"

3 of 74 comments (clear)

  1. Public Schools by OtisSnerd · · Score: 1, Insightful
    It would be nice to see the grade and high schools do this kind of thing, it would be something they could afford on their pitiful budgets.

    Of course, with all the politically correct crap they are required to teach, when would they have the time...

    ----

    I yam Popeye of the Borg. Prepares ta beez askimiligrated.

  2. Re:astrophotography rules by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

    That's REALLY annoying. Unfortunately, it'll pr-probably, er, catch on. Oh well.

  3. yes, I'm a spoilsport by countzer0interrupt · · Score: 1, Insightful

    I hate to put a dampener on things (this guy has perpetrated a really cool hack after all), but it's no more surprising that you can use a CCD from a digital camera for astrophotography than the widespread use of photosensitive chemicals (silver nitrate et al, IIRC) mounted on plastic film for the same means.

    Basically, anything that detects photons will do the job. Sure, these photons are quite low-intensity, but that's no problem if you have a nice top of the range Schmidt-Cassegrain to help you along. Just point it at the star, start your motorised equatorial mount and wait as long as it takes for a nice clear image to pop up. (And you can take your time, you've got all night.) And even if this doesn't work too well, you can use photo-editing suites to pick out the finer details you were after.

    Again, I'm not trying to steal this guy's thunder. (I'm probably just jealous of his 10" telescope after all ;-).) But astrophotography is rather easy with almost any camera once you have a nice big telescope to sit it on.