ZWO ASI camera tutorial

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matt113d avatar
Hi everyone,

I have just purchased a ZWO asi178mm camera for imaging DSO and planets (seems to be a good budget all rounder) and I was wondering if there is a particular tutorial people would recommend for the software and understanding gain settings etc. Until now I have only used a DSLR.

Thanks in advance!

Matt
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Michael Timm avatar
Hi Matt,

which software are you using? The camera can be used with nearly any kind of imaging tool like SharpCap, FireCapture or SGP (or any other imaging software). A tutorial should cover the usage of a particular program, not the camera itself.
The specific settings like gain or offset will differ from target to target. Maybe one hint: Use a very low gain setting with this camera. I experienced much better results as i started using gain 0.

Greetings,
Michael
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matt113d avatar
Hi Michael,

Thanks for the reply,

I haven't even received the camera yet so I haven't tried any. I was just wondering if there was an accepted "go to" software. In the long run I will most likely write my own program to do the image capturing, but while I'm initially playing around with it I wanted to find something intuitive to get me started quickly.

Cheers,

Matt
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Michael Timm avatar
Take a look at SharpCap then. It's basically for free (some advanced features require a licence key) and easy to use.
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潘旷达 avatar
You can look at this website. This is ZWO's official website:https://astronomy-imaging-camera.com/
潘旷达 avatar
You can look at this website. This is ZWO's official website:https://astronomy-imaging-camera.com/
altazastro avatar
I bought the 178MM back in April ths year and I have since used it with satisfaction both for lunar and DSO imaging.
For lunar imaging I use the ASICAP application provided for free by the camera producer.
For DSO imaging, instead, I use Nebulosity.
matt113d avatar
Thanks everyone for the responses, this is really helpful!
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