HYPERSTAR V4 2-Year Review: Is it worth the price?
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- Опубликовано: 9 июл 2024
- #astrophotography #astronomy #hyperstar
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Those weird geometric shapes look so cool regardless lol “Super Structures on the edge of our galaxy detected on Bainbridge Island” x3
Agreed! They’re a feature, not a bug!
Good video, keep at it and clear skies!
I’ve made significant improvements since this video, I plan on releasing an update here in the next month or so when I have a few more targets under my belt with all these fixes. So far things are looking much, much better and I am getting to the point where I’m happy with images from it.
Hi Cole...I'm just starting out, getting a 3 meter ScopeDome installed. I have 3 Telescopes, 2 Saxons a 12'' Reflector and a 6" Refractor but recently obtained a Celestron CPC800XLT, I'm so looking forward to trying this HyperStar device, I'm only hearing good things!...thanks for you video, have subcribed, like your up front honesty...;)
Thanks for sharing your experience. How do you find collimating the hyperstar? Is it too complicated?
Collimating the Hyperstar is almost always unnecessary. I’ve ran sensor tilt analysis multiple times and have never had a collimation error. If needed, it’s super easy to fix. It’s all hand screws that can use screwdrivers as well!
HI Cole. I have a C925 with the Starizona 0.63 reducer. i have a Baader Planetarium SCT diamond steeltrack focuser at the back of the ota. If i get hyperstar is the stock focuser ok for deep sky or do i really need a motorised one? ie i will need to use the rubber knob to focus with Hyperstar. Thanks
You are almost definitely going to need to have AF for the mirror’s focuser. The only way you’d be able to get away without one is if you focused every night on a bright star with a bahtinov mask and have a carbon fiber tube. The aluminum tubes change focus throughout the night so much that I have to AF three or four times. I’m trying to find a way around this though
@@ColeRees ok thanks, i may get the Celestron motor focuser thanks
@@desbarry8414 I've got the Celestron motor focuser with my EDGE HD8 and Hyperstar and it works just fine with NINA. A must with any imaging train.
@@ColeRees I have NINA go through a AF if the temperature drops more than 2 degrees and at least once an hour during an imaging session.
Hello Cole, very good video, thanks for sharing. I am on budget now and want to get a cooled camera, which one would be better for my C8 and the hyperstar v4, the qhy 183c r the qhy 533c, thanks for your advice if you can. Clear Skies...!
The 533 sensor is better than the 183 sensor by a decent amount. I would personally recommend the 533mc pro over the 183. You’re losing a bit of sampling but the hyperstar is not diffraction limited, and a 3.76micron pixel is gonna be really nice.
@@ColeRees thank you very much for your advice, I will go for the 533c then. Clear skies!
Hi Cole, I just got me a Hyperstar V4 for my Edge HD8. Thanks for your video and sharing all the details. The weather is bad over here but a new moon is coming up next week and the clouds will go away. I exited to do the first light to it. I'm a bit concerned about the exact backfocus on such a fast system. I bought mr a 4/3" ASI 183 MC Pro cool with small 2.4 microns pixels with 6.5 mm of backfocus. I try to use an existing filter drawer with 2 mm thick Optolon filters. The rool of thumb is to add 1/6th of 2mm to the required backfocus of 39.8 mm. That brings me to 40.5 mm total. Can you say how sensitiv the system is to variation of fractions of mm in backfocus? You got the Starizona filterdrawer installed. What is its thickness? How did it took the filter into account? Do you know this? Thanks in advance and good new year Gunter
The Hyperstar should be ordered with the specific adapters they sell on their website. I would strongly consider either buying the starizona filter drawer, or matching its back focus exactly. I can tell you for certain that even 0.1-0.2mm of incorrect spacing will be enough to make the stars start to elongate in the corners. I actually need to re-do this video because I’ve learned so much more about this thing than I had known when I published the video. Getting good at the Hyperstar took me multiple years, partially because of weather.
@@ColeRees I would appreciate the renewal or update of your video. Thanks for the answers.
@@guntergeorgi1347 also I forgot to answer your question: the starizona filter drawer is exactly 17.50mm thick. I just measured it myself!
That is great my drawer is 18 mm. Now I wonder what else fits into the required distance to the focal plane? Starizona doesn't provide exact specs, so I got to look around. @@ColeRees
Good video! I use my Hyperstar + EDGE HD8 + ASI1600MM for DSOs and really like the speed, as well as the ability to image in the city. Collimation is NOT fast and requires lots of patience and time. I use a HOTECH Advanced laser collimator (indoors) and then test on a star outdoors.
Same! I picked up my hotech collimator a few months back. I’m going to make a video on it at some point. After another year of tweaking, I have found that I can get the Hyperstar really good but still with bad reflections on bright stars. That’s my only gripe with it (and manual filter changes)
With the trade off of resolution for speed
Sorry for the late comment. Cole, you know that if you want to use your scope for Hypersatr you do not need EdgeHD, right? In Hyperstar/Fastar configuration light does not even go to the EdgeHD element. Regular Celestron SCT will suffice. Unless you want to do galaxies every now and then (long focal length and full field of view of the scope) you can save a couple (of hundred) of bucks and get a plain Celestron SCT.
I use all three focal lengths! Not as much as I used to, though. I now have a 0.7m newt for narrow field. (F/4.5)
I know people complane about zwo 183mm/mc but it can be real good with this setup.
If you can’t afford the 294MM, sure. The 294 sensor is roughly double the image size of the 183 though (for only a few hundred $ more) while keeping the pixels small
Someone should make a robotic arm that changes the filters on the RASA/hyperstar.
Maybe cool boy like you need. C14 with Hyperstar. Then, you will collect even better with larger bucket.
I've got the 294MM and 8" EdgeHD. Long considered the HS, but I never pull the trigger. The first reason is that I would need to buy new filters. I've got 31mm Chroma 3nm SHO. Neither the size, nor the bandpass would work with the HS. The second reason is that I'm lazy. I like the convenience of the EFW.
You must have a monster processing computer... each of those 1x1 bin subs is 93.6MB. At 15 seconds per... well, that's a whole lot of subs. An hour each of S, H and O would be 720 subs to stack. Do you do a single filter per imaging session? If not, are you taking flats in the field? For example, if you're doing SHO, do you take your lights with S, then take S flats, then swap out filters for H, take H lights, take H flats, swap out filter... see previous statement regarding my laziness :).
You nailed a few important considerations. I’ll respond to each of them, top to bottom. First, I don’t blame you for the filter stuff. It’s definitely cumbersome compared to an EFW. I have opted to shoot a single filter per night (at the beginning of the night) in most cases. Instead of multiple filters, shoot multiple targets and edit your sequence from night to night to use different filters. This is actually better than going between filters, as it encourages you to shoot targets towards the meridian so they are as high up as possible. 3-4 targets in a winter night is normal for me. Like you said, you’ll need new filters. That’s why I got 2” LRGB and I’m saving for the 2” SHO, although the SHO pallet is pre-shifted for f/2 like you said so it will not work for anything slower than f/2.3. You’ll need 2 filter sets, basically. (Something I’m okay with long-term because I want hyperstar 14)
Good news, even at f2, Baader 3.5/4 nm filters won’t saturate the full-well of the 1x bin of the 294mm after 5 minutes (according to some math I did) so long exposures are encouraged for SHO and can help keep total disk space down. In L I shoot andromeda at no more than 15 seconds, but everything else can easily get pushed out to a minute (I’m in bortle 5-6). I also shoot XISF and compress with LZ4 to save space (thanks, NINA!)
As for file storage, having extra space with you is a MUST for hyperstar. I have 1TB onboard my rig (should have gone 2TB), and I always keep 2 TB minimum extra on me with a GPro drive. Waterproof, crush proof, etc. if I’m in the field for a week or I shoot lunar on top of DSOs, I will for sure need that extra storage. I also keep 5 TB of spinning storage, just in case I fill up my 3TB. never have needed it, but its a safety net.
Getting a NAS to store your data long-term is key!!
If you were wondering about my flats, I use a 12v tracing panel that is plugged into my Pegasus UPBv2. I under-volt it to 8v and it’s perfect for luminance! Extremely convenient for when you’re out in the field. It’s about $60 on Amazon.
If you’re okay with shooting a single filter per night and being good about flats, hyperstar!!! You can’t beat the speed. It’s more than four times as fast as an f/4 scope and also has a perfect FOV for most DSO’s.
@@ColeRees I figured you had to be doing a single filter per night... otherwise, it's a giant pain. I can't imaging taking an hour of filter 1, slewing to zenith, throwing the flat panel on top, taking flats, taking the flat panel off, changing the filter, slewing back to target... rinse and repeat. Ugh. I mean... maybe if I was out at a dark site for limited time I'd suck it up... but man that's a chore LOL.
I've got a Gerd Neumann Aurora panel (315mm) that I use with my EdgeHD. I've also got an older Pegasus FlatMaster 150 that I use with my GT81. The 294MM has been an absolute bear to properly calibrate. I've been fighting with it since I got it over 2 years ago. My camera is EXTREMELY finicky. I've gone through multiple different filter brands/sizes, countless lighting and diffusion options, who-knows-how-many methods of taking flats. Some people have been lucky and gotten good samples of the camera. I did not win that lottery, or any other, unfortunately.
Scope-side, I've got a Beelink (similar to your Mele) with a 256G m.2 drive. More than enough space to handle a project - especially since I also use NINA's XISF compression :). I've also got a 2TB SanDisk Extreme that functions as my in-flight projects drive... and 16TB of NAS. Haven't filled it up yet...
I might have to look at the HS again. The other serious contender has been the SharpStar 15028 HNT. Nearly identical focal length, and I get to keep my EFW... though I do give up 2" of aperture, it's one stop slower and it's double the cost of the HS.
@@JonnyBravo0311 the 294MM isn’t too bad to calibrate if you follow good principles. 1 second minimum exposure was a big one for me. I can put out a video on my flats process to help you out.
@@ColeRees trust me when I write that I've spent literal days of my life doing nothing but taking flats. You'll notice I mentioned 2 different flat panels that I own. I've also used various high CRI LED video lights, tungsten lighting, incandescent lighting, fluorescent lighting and sky flats. I've used white cotton tee shirts, various stocks of paper, white bed sheets, shower curtains, acrylic sheets of various levels of opacity and various ND filters. I've used both direct and indirect lighting. I've done long exposures and short exposures. I've done various different gains. I've done multiple ADU targets. I even bought multiple brands/sizes of filters (ZWO, Astrodon, Chroma, Antlia).
Ultimately, I have a process currently that works rather well for my specific camera/scope setup. It's taken me a long time to get to this point, and I am extremely envious of people who are lucky enough to have gotten a camera that "just works". I see so many people posting on CN and AB and SGL about "never having any issues calibrating the 294"... and then I see the countless other posts of people who simply cannot get the 294 to behave. I have very seriously considered throwing in the towel and picking up one of the IMX533 or IMX571 cameras.
I really like what the 294MM offers... it's why I bought the camera in the first place, and why I've spent so much time and energy trying to tame it.
@@JonnyBravo0311 It took me months to figure out the right process for my 294, so i hear you there. Can you describe the actual issue you were having with your flats? When you took your flats and attempted to calibrate, what was not working properly? How were the flats screwing things up in the “calibrated” image? That might help provide the insight needed to solve this issue (and help others who are having the same problem if they come upon this thread!)
Speed sounds good for EAA but surely for astrophotography you still need long integration time?
Integration time is a function of your scope speed and cameras sensitivity to light. Being able to compress a ton of light onto a sensor will allow you to capture the same amount of light at a much quicker pace. You are correct that you need long integration time, but a faster scope (lower f/#) will always collect light faster than a slower scope. This is one of the things I will be covering in my updated review. There’s a lot of subjective and objective stuff that needs to be talked about with the Hyperstar. It will capture detailed structures way faster but with a tradeoff of it not being diffraction limited. StarX and especially BlurX have completely changed the game on this though. That will be the main topic of discussion in my updated review.
Go M's!
Have fun trying to get a good set of baader filters. I had a terrible bout with the Sii from them, it just did not do what described. Their Quality control is not that good.
I’ve owned the Baader filters now for a while but life has been so crazy that I haven’t shot any space pics in a few months. I’ve only used the Oiii and Ha, both of which seem fine for me. Fingers crossed the SII doesn’t have issues.
LOL, it costs 2500 in Germany. I had to pay more than that for v3
Ouch!! At that price, I would definitely say NO! I’d be much happier with an equivalently-priced refractor.
I prefer my asi 2600 over the asi294 with my hyoerstarv4 on c11 edge..
If they release an APS-C sensor in the future with 2.3micron pixels I would make the switch! That’s why I’m getting 2” filters
Gritougnaque!