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3. Precisely focus the camera by using the telescope’s focus knob and the
Focus setting in the Camera Control Window. Set the Mode to Light 1x1,
and try an exposure time of a few seconds to start. Use the Medium setting
in the Screen Stretch Window. The focus point for the SSDSMI-2 will be
approximately 15mm inwards from the eyepiece’s focus point. If you are
having trouble determining best focus, try focusing on a bright star near
the deep sky object. If there are no suitably bright stars in the camera’s
field of view, you may need to move the telescope away from the deep sky
object to a bright star, focus on the bright star, and then re-center the deep
sky object in the camera. When you have a good focus, press the Stop
button in the Camera Control Window
4. Now, in the box under the Mode box in the Camera Control Window,
select AutoSave. Set the number of images you would like the camera
to take under Autosave (start with 5 or so), select the file folder in which
you would like to save the images with Folder, and enter in a Base file-
name for the captured images. Typically the name of the object being
imaged, such as “OrionNebula1”, will be entered here. If “OrionNebula1”
is the Base filename, and you choose to Autosave five images, then the
images will appear in the selected file folder as “OrionNebula1_0001.fit”,
“OrionNebula1_0002.fit”, “OrionNebula1_0003.fit”, “OrionNebula1_0004.
fit”, and “OrionNebula1_0005.fit”. Try exposures of 30 Seconds to start.
5. Click Expose, and the camera will commence taking the images.
Note: When the camera is taking long exposure images, it is critically important
not to touch, shake, or otherwise disturb the telescope, or a blurred image will
result. Also, make sure no surrounding light shines into the telescope during
the exposure.
Now that you have multiple images of the deep sky object, we will combine the
images to form one high-quality resultant image. To do this:
6. Select Open from the File menu. Find the folder you indicated with Folder,
open it, and select all images for stacking using the mouse left-click and
the Shift key. All of the individual images selected will open in Maxim DL
Essentials.
Note: In order to combine images, the images must first be opened in Maxim
DL Essentials
7. From the Process menu, select Combine.
8. In the Select Images window, click Add All. Then click OK.
9. The Combine Images window will appear. For Align Mode, choose Manual
1 star – shift only. (If you have field rotation due to a poor polar alignment,
then you can use the Manual 2 stars align mode.) In the Output box, select
Average. Make sure the Use Centroid and Auto Next boxes are checked.