Q S I 5 0 0 S E R I E S U S E R G U I D E
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time in the “Seconds” field to the time necessary to see a few bright stars. Setting the
exposure time as short as necessary to see a few bright stars allows you take more focus
images in a shorter period of time, generally allowing you to achieve reasonably sharp focus
fairly quickly. When you are satisfied with the focus, click “Stop”.
Note:
The Inspect tab next to the Focus tab can help you achieve critical focus
by analyzing the area around the brightest point light source in an image.
Review the MaxIm LE online help on focusing for additional details.
Take a single image
connecting to the camera, letting the camera stabilize at the desired temperature, and
achieving critical focus, you’re finally ready to begin taking “light frames”.
Click o
not
visible,
The
window
After
n the Camera Control window to make it active. If the Camera Control window is
select “Camera Control Window” from the View menu. Click the “Expose” tab.
will look similar to this:
Click “Light” under the “Type” to select a “light frame.” If you have a camera with a color
filter wheel, select the filter that want to use for this exposure. On a QSI 500 Series “ws”
model with internal color filter wheel, Filter 4 by default contains the “L” or luminance filter.
Set the exposure length in the Minutes and Seconds field.
Tip:
The Seconds field can accept values between 0.03 seconds and 32767
seconds so you won’t need to use the Minutes field unless that’s more natural
for you.
When the settings in the Expose tab are set properly, click the Expose button to begin the
exposure. While the camera is exposing the image, the Status LED on the back of the
camera will flash red. When the exposure is complete and the im e is being downloaded,
ag
it will flash yellow.