Measuring the QSI 660

Receipt of a new CCD camera for me is accompanied by capturing bias, darks and flats for measuring the CCD camera's parameters such as Gain, Readout Noise, Dark Current Noise and Full Well Capacity. These are fairly critical things to know about your CCD camera if you wish to understand how to maximise its performance via such things as using the Optimum Exposures Calculator. QSI cameras are built to allow the user to set the Gain to either High or Low. The High setting is recommended for when imaging unbinned at 1x1 (e.g. for Luminance) as this maximises the ADU (image brightness) produced for a certain number of electrons. The Low setting is recommended for when imaging binned at 2x2 or more (e.g. for Red, Green and Blue). This setting assumes that because of binning, there will be a lot of electrons acquired at pixels to produce signal and so it increases the number of electrons needed to reach a certain ADU (image brightness). Customising these Gain settings when imaging guarantees you maximise your CCD camera's dynamic range. 

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