I have a Mikrocular colour cam and totally new to this webcam imaging as I usually use my dslr for prime focus on my 127 slt
but tonight i tried to get the webcam working but the screen remained black?? I tinkered around with the sharpcap settings and got the cam to lighten its image slightly but still was not showing any detail it was around 7pm and still light what am i doing wrong?? any help would be most grateful
1) Check frames are arriving from the camera (frame count increasing in the bottom left)
2) Make sure the camera responds to light (shine a torch down the telescope/into the camera sensor) and check the image brightens
3) Point the camera/telescope (or camera/lens) at something well illuminated and adjust exposure/gain to get a picture of mid brightness (even if horribly out of focus)
4) Adjust focus to get a focused image - preferably on something distant so it is not too hard to change to 'infinity' focus when moving back to the sky
5) Start thinking about astro imaging...
If the moon is about then you can do all of the above at night, as the moon makes a nice bright target, otherwise it's often best to do the first 4 steps in daylight.
Sounds like you have done 1 and parts of 2/3 so far. Some things that may help:
The camera should have an exposure slider (and maybe gain too) in the right hand side. Turn either/both up to increase the brightness. Note that for a webcam, which controls appear are the choice of the webcam hardware manufacturer...
Remember that the sensor in a DSLR is about 50mm behind the front of the camera, where in your new camera it may only be 10-12mm back from the front of the camera. That means that to get focus on your 127, you will need to push the body of the camera further back than you are used to (to get the sensor in the new camera in roughly the same place as the DSLR sensor goes). If you don't do that you may need a *lot* of turns on the focus knob to find focus.
Finally, remember that the field of view will be very small - you are using a telescope with a 1500mm focal length along with a small sensor camera.
cheers Mate thank you so very much!!... this getting old is telling its tale you cant teach an old dog new tricks Lol...
i bought this webcam to help me line up the scope with CPWI from the house this will help me temendously thank you so much for the outlay of what to do
