Ad Astra Observatory

As I said in my last post, I learned about “Configurations” in MaxIM today. Very nice feature.

I also a focusing tutorial for DSLRs in the Max 5 online manual. It’s a great tutorial, and has a key piece of information on it that is not immediately obvious:

“The two text panels [on the Expose tab of the Camera window] can be set show image statistics, including the location and value of the brightest pixel. When focus is sharp the pixel value will be maximized. To select the display mode, simply right-click on the panel. ” (emphasis mine)

I should have gotten a free copy of this manual while I was under warranty and upgraded from MaxDSLR. It’s not cool that I’ve had this software for 2 years and didn’t know about this feature.

Anyway, MaxIM, for all its faults (the list of which is long and distinguished), does have some nice features, and it sure does consolidate my astrophotography workflow into one package (for the most part).

MaxIM also seems to be one of the most-compatible pieces of software relative to other outside packages. PemPro, FocusMax, and PoleAlignMax all work with MaxIM by default (although PoleAlignmax also requires PinPoint/MaxPoint, which I don’t have).

I don’t see any reason to change my “astro-OS” at the moment.