ToUcam Basics?

Greetings all,
I want to thank Derrick Lipinski, Roland Chavez and others for their inspiration (and aspiration) regarding the Philips ToUcam pro.

Is there a book, online resource or other source that provides an overview or outlines the basics of this type of imaging technique? Perhaps this is all very new and everyone if plowing new ground...

Thanks in advance.

-Steve House, St. Charles, Missouri

There are probably many sources on the web
dealing with how to use a web cam. I'm not sure
there is an actual book or text specifically aimed
at astrophotography, as I don't think the designers
of these cameras envisioned they would ever be used
for that purpose.

If you want to see some really phenomenal planetary imaging
using a web cam, I would encourage you to visit Thierry
Legault's and Antonio Cidadao's homepages. Talk about
High-Res planetary imaging, well... visit their sites and
see for yourself:
http://perso.club-internet.fr/legault/
http://www.astrosurf.com/cidadao/
These sites are fantastic resources.

Another one to check out is Ed Grafton's page at:
http://www.ghgcorp.com/egrafton/

Hope this helps, Steve.

Have fun.

Derrick

Hi Steve,
I'm not sure what level of text you might be seeking, but a very excellent resource for learning the basics of astronomical image processing is Richard Berry & James Burnell's Handbook of Astronomical Image Processing. The book has a very thorough background on CCD imaging technique including the mathematics behind it, along with the software AIP4WIN. Jim's website, http://www.jburnell.com also contains a number of tutorials he presents at seminars. A number of freeware programs such as K3CCD tools, http://www.pk3.org/Astro/ and Registax, http://aberrator.astronomy.net/registax will help get you on your way to capturing and processing great images. I've only just begun and I'm having a great time! As for techniques using the ToUcam specifically, Sky & Tel recently ran a couple of introductory articles on webcam imaging and if you search the web for ToUcam & astronomy you will find many websites with pictures and such, some with a few hints at the techniques employed. If you see something you like, ask how. Most folks I've asked reply.

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