Mastering Gain & Offset in Astrophotography: Optimize Your Deep Sky Images!
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 6 ก.ค. 2024
- 🌌 Dive deep into the world of astrophotography with my latest tutorial on gain and offset settings! Discover how these crucial parameters affect your camera's ability to capture stunning images of deep sky objects. 📸
In this video, I'll explain what gain and offset are, how they influence your camera's photon reception, and the impact on your histogram. Learn the consequences of adjusting these settings and how to optimize them for the best results. Whether you're a beginner or an experienced astrophotographer, this guide will help you take your imaging skills to the next level.
Don't forget to like, comment, and subscribe for more astrophotography tips and tutorials! 🌠✨
Have questions or need further clarification? Feel free to drop a comment below or email me at Tony@HiddenLight-Photography.com.
Want to view the rest of the series? Check out these videos:
Part 1 - What is Shot Noise and Read Noise:
• Mastering Shot Noise &...
Part 2 - Diminishing Returns and Integration Time:
• Diminishing Returns in...
Part 4 - What is Dark Current:
• Mastering Dark Current...
Part 5 - Optimize Camera Offset:
• Optimize Your Camera O...
What to learn more about histograms? Check out this video:
• Mastering Histograms: ...
Want to learn about fine tuning your signal to noise using SharpCap’s Smart Histogram? Check out these videos:
Downloading and performing the sensor analysis:
• Maximize Your Astropho...
Deeper dive into Smart Histogram options and demonstration:
• Mastering SharpCap's S...
hiddenlight-photography.com/
00:00 Introduction and Foreword
02:06 Crucial Concepts
04:17 How is Well Depth Level Measured?
05:48 What is Actually Happening?
06:11 Let's Talk About Gain?
10:00 Let's Talk About Offset
11:32 Putting This into Practice
#Astrophotography #GainAndOffset #DeepSkyImaging #CameraSettings #HiddenLightPhotography
Another great video. You've quickly become one of the most educational channels out there and provide people lots to think about.
Thank you, I appreciate that! Are you facing any issues with exposures and gain settings? Also, do you have any requests for content?
@@Hidden.Light.Photography I've always just used default 300s for nebula and then shortened it for some instances where the core might get clipped (M42, galaxies) or blurred (comets) on my 2600MC PRO and never thought about it beyond that.. I have only just switched to NINA (your videos were very helpful!) so it made changing offset possible. The noise videos and integration time ones were great too. I just appreciate having a better understanding of the fundamentals of things rather than following what someone else says or just guessing even if a "rule of thumb" just works.
Maybe a good future topic could cover aberration inspector and how and when to tweak backfocus or tilt. For example my 2600 has slightly egg shaped stars in the bottom left on 2600 but not 533 and it’s more pronounced on the C8 vs a mid range refractor. Stacking and BXT fixes it but maybe I should do serious testing. For instance.
I’m very happy to hear the videos were helpful! I love NINA as it is very user friendly. I agree that understanding what things do helps greatly. I try to cover questions that I had early on when making my videos :)
I love these ideas! I’ll add them to my video list and make sure to cover them so stay tuned.
Another great video, thanks Tony
Thank you! Do you have a specific method of finding optimal gain and/pr offset?
@@Hidden.Light.Photography I have the ASI533MC and ASI294MC, using the Asiair I have set the gain at the recommended for both and have never touched the offset. I have not really ventured into changing either due to my lack of the understanding and conflicting info on the internet. Watching your video gave me a better understanding of both and realise what I'm doing isn't that wrong after all. I get excellent results so will just keep doing this but its nice to understand what happens if I do change them.
I haven’t used the ASI1294MC yet, but of the cameras I do have, ASI puts out a great product! I do have the 533 and love it! That’s exactly the point, you don’t have to overthink exposure, gain or offset, however, knowing what they do is important for if/when you want to adjust them. Do you have any requests for content or are there any challenges you’re facing?
There is a youTube channel, Herbs Garage, and he uses short exposures, 15 seconds, and 100 gain, using a 122mm refractor, Rising Cam IMX571 sensor camera 26mp HEQ5, uses polar scope for polar alignment, no NINA, no ASIAir, No guiding, no filters, shoots from a Bortle 3 area, uses Deep Sky Stacker and Gimp. Takes images of nebula and galaxies, clusters etc. Even has a C8 SCT on a AVX mount. After watching his results why to I bother with guiding and long exposures. Because I'm stubborn and that's what all the "experts" on youTube use.
I just figured gain was like ISO. The higher the gain/ISO the more light captured in a unit of time with extra noise being the downside. Then next year your DSLR camera gets updated and the read noise now is acceptable at even higher ISOs. With astro cameras there aren't new sensors coming out every year like consurmer cameras. I favor lower gains and there is something in the specs about the gain where the e-/ADU is at 1 and for me the gain is 90 for the ASI071MC. I watched Cuiv's episode on offset and used NINA to figure out 60 was the best gain but NINA default to 20 and restricted the highest offset to 80.. I tend just to shoot at 90 right now. I've heard of unity gain which is supposed to be some sort of sweet spot where some cameras like the ASI294 switch on and the read noise drops but the ASI071 doesn't have that feature.
You can technically get away with short exposures like with low read noise in the camera, just need to keep in mind that the noise adds up. Shorter exposures are the goal since it reduces the “pain” on subs that need to be thrown out. I’m actually going to be releasing a similar video going over the offset and how to find the best offset for your camera if you utilize imaging software that allows adjustment. I’ll research unity gain and try to come up with an easy explanation on finding it and then create a video on it :)