Matt S

13 hours ago, Ouroboros said:

Did you also process the image using your MacBook?

I do, I was also struggling to find some good Mac based tools so I’ve ended up using crossover to run AutoStakkert and RegiStax. I’ve tried the new Wavesharp project that’s been based off RegiStax, as at least that runs natively - but it’s not really a replacement yet. Also tried LuckyStackWorker as a native option, but Ive not been able to get as good results with it yet (although I still don’t really know how to use it). 
 

13 hours ago, vlaiv said:

With 2um pixel size and Mak127, you really don't need barlow for planetary imaging.

Thanks @vlaiv - at some point can you write a book on all this please 😁

I’ve got some more footage from that night without the Barlow too, I’ve not got round to processing yet - I’ll make a point to do some comparisons when I’ve finished. 

I feel like I can still do better, and I’m sure additional shots and de-rotating would also improve things - but I’ve yet to learn that side of things!

After swapping the RPi for the MacBook it was a lot easier to play with focus etc. The weather and seeing looked good so I dashed late with Jupiter high.

Equipment:

Skymax - 127

ASI678

2xBarlow

processed with:

Autostakkert

Registaxx

Affinity Photo

Still learning the ropes with this, but here’s my first serious attempt at Jupiter. 10/9/23.

Equipment

• Skymax-127
• 2x Barlow
• ASI 678
• RPI4 / Astroberry
• firecapture

This one was the best 24% (I can’t remember how many frames I got)

Processing

• autostakkert 
• Lucky Stack Worker (for 0322) and Registax (for 0746)
• Affinity Photo

Thoughts:

• I think I shot for too long, probably for over a minute - more like 2/3 
• The RPI / Firecapture setup is nice and small, but the frame rate felt kinda slow
• using an iPad for viewing the preview to judge focus was tough, there was quite a lot of lag between adjusting focus and seeing the preview update
• it was nice and warm out, but although clear this possibly made for more wobble?
• I’ve seen some others post some much smoother/detailed images of Jupiter using the 127, so it must be doable… I guess I need to get some more nights out!

On 10/04/2023 at 15:41, ONIKKINEN said:

The camera is still not optimal and maybe you would have better luck with something else, i think you may have pretty much one of the worst combinations of kit for DSO imaging with all this, sorry!

On 10/04/2023 at 16:03, alacant said:

How about attaching your 678 to a camera lens instead? There are some good examples to be had for under €100 e.g. fixed focal length Takumar and Zeiss between 55mm and 200mm.

On 10/04/2023 at 16:30, ollypenrice said:

I entirely agree with you on the use of a camera lens. Surely that's the way forward with a small chip, tiny pixels and no accurate guiding.

Thanks everyone - bit of a learning curve to see what I can/can’t manage with my setup really. I’d never intended it to be a DSO setup, but it’s got me interested now… so I figured I’d dabble whilst I’ve lost the planets from my current location. 
 

I’d been going with the idea of getting a Svbony 503 after seeing someone use that on a Eq3 with good (to me) results.. I would of course like a new mount but that will be further down the road. 
I’ll check out using a camera lens - I may have something usable.

I tried again on M81 with some tweaks/longer exposures - but as you guys said, that’s when the tracking fell apart and things started trailing. 
 

I did however have a little more success with M3, although I found taking exposures over 20s more punishing than 30+ seconds pointing at M81 - I’m not quite sure why, possible the mount angle / wind, or possibly the difference in the target.

I still think my focus is off, I’ll need to figure out what I’m doing there - and I have a LOT to read/learn on what I should be doing to capture / process shots - but anyway, here’s my 2nd attempt at shooting anything other than a planet.

Nothing as lovely as I’ve seen you all produce, but it’s a little progress for me, so I’m pleased (it’s also nice having my scope solve and point then switching to visual - much more accurate than my go-to). 

A new post as this feels like a better place than my previous thread. 

I think I’ve got a reasonable plate solving setup now (albeit, it can still fail if it gets to a sot with few visible stars). 
 

I spent a bit of time trying to image M18, but had issues trying to process these in Siril (not enough stars, and when I relaxed this, it ended up rejecting 99 of the 100. I ended up stacking in Affinity, but I’m not seeing to much right now.

As this was a first run / seeing if things were working attempt I didn’t shoot any darks/flats etc, only lights. A mix of 10, 20, 30 and 60s subs.

I’ve attached a single Fits from one of what I thought looked a better shot… I guess my question is from  anyone with more experience than me is - does this look any good (for a single shot)? 

equipment:
Skymax 127

Asi678mc

EQ3-2 / Ekos (unguided)

m81.tiff M_81_Light_001.fits

Thanks all, some of those tips certainly helped.

I found a slightly better star field of view to begin with and then spent some time with gain/focus to try and get a good starting shot.

For some reason I’m struggling to find the focus unless I add the camera to the diagonal, but that may just be luck. Live/video made seemed useless to me here.

Solving worked this time until a third hop where it simply couldn’t see enough stars again, but at this point M81 was in the frame so that was good enough for now .

Still need to process my data, and I only shot lights (I’ve only been shooting plants so far) but this seems like a good starting point.

I was finding it hard to tell if things were focused correctly, if anyone uses a similar setup and has some advice on that side of things I’d love to hear your advice. 

Would anyone be able to offer me any advice on this? 
 

I had the chance last night to get everything running for the first time, and whilst it took me a good hour to figure out my focus was way off before seeing any stars, I couldn’t get a plate solve to work.

Equipment:

• EQ3-2 mount (Goto)
• Skymax 127
• Raspberrry Pi / Astroberry
• ASI678mc

So Ekos/Kstars is running fine on the Pi, and I’ve added my mount, camera details and scope to Ekos. Slewing to a rough target works fine, but is obviously off. 
I’d seen others have been able to plate solve with the Skymax 127 - so thought I’d give it a go. Unfortunately I keep getting told there aren’t, sufficient stars. 
 

I’ve downloaded the recommended index files (although haven’t downloaded all the LARGE optional ones), but I’d like to get any advice on what I could/should try?

Upping the gain more? Downloading all the optional index files?

I’ll second a vote for binoculars if you’re looking to spend ~£100. On my last camping trip I only had room for some binos, and it was great. Fast to just head out the tent and get some wide field views whenever - with my pair (not really Astro ones) I can still pick out the moons of Jupiter and the bulges where the disk of Saturn would show on a larger instrument. Some great views of the Milky Way and clusters too. 
 

If you pushed the budget a little, this is a pretty small scope that FLO recommends:

 https://www.firstlightoptics.com/beginner-telescopes/ursa-major-102mm-tabletop-dobsonian-telescope.html
 

I can’t speak from experience, but I’d imagine it would provide some reasonable views (and you’d avoid having shake from holding binoculars). 

Thanks - I’d not actually thought it was the camera (it’s pretty new, and ‘looked’ clean). 

Will give the window a blow/clean and see if that improves things. 

These seem to be ruining my shots now - the attached is the laptop view of my scope/camera pointed at the moon. 
 

With the barlow attached the spots are much more obvious and darker. 
 

should I be doing any flat type frames to remove these? Or should I get on with cleaning. 
 

The scope is a Skymax-127, so luckily it’s just the front glass that’s the most likely source… but I imagine it’s going to be a constant battle if I’m constantly needing to clean?!

I’ve been attempting some shots tonight too… I cant wait for the occultation though unfortunately. 
 

Nice shot!

will have to see what I managed to gather tomorrow

Thanks @Cosmic Geoff,

You’re right - I did mean to include some of that information but I must have forgotten.

Scope: Skymax-127

Camera: ASI678 / no Barlow 

ROI: 640X472

Processed in Autostakkert, Registax for sharpening and Affinity Photo for some small colour / contrast adjustments. 
 

Still learning my way around things - I didn’t realise there was an option to correct the flip in Registax, I’ll check that out!

Be gentle, this was my first outing at trying this:

Stacked:

sharpened:

I seem to have got fringing or some sort of effect going on to the right, is this a focus thing or a seeing/stacking issue?

This is the first time I’m using this type of camera/setup so there’s plenty of things giving me questions right now…

I’ve now got hold of an ASI678 which I’m using with my Skymax 127 for some lunar / planetary shots, but on my test run to see how things worked I noticed some little disks/blobs on my preview screen, and wasn’t sure if they would be an issue, or how to tackle them.

Quite hard to see in the screenshot - they were clearer when moving the scope around over the brighter parts of the moon. I’ve circled one.

I was a bit unsure if I had good focus, an probably ended up stacking probably far too many frames… I just sort of picked a spot in the middle of the quality graph but I’m finding the disks hard to spot in my stacked/sharpened image:

 I’m fairly pleased it’s this, but I’m also not experienced with what issues I should be looking for. 
Will these little disks likely get removed in stacking etc, or should I be doing something else?

I’ve had a shot at this using the usb/printer type cable (my controller has the usb port on it), however when I start up the server in EKos I get the following error in the log:

[ERROR] Serial read error: Timeout error. 
 

anyone have any ideas on this? It sounds like it’s looking to use the serial port farther than the USB - but that’s the limit of my understanding. 
Maybe I should buy the eqmod lead and try that… figured I’d try the USB route first and save £30!

I think I know the answer to this already, but I want to hook up my Raspberry Pi to my Synscan controller (it’s the stand alone unit attached to an EQ3-2).

Am I right in that I need to plug into the hand controller port (using a USB adapter), rather than connecting to the hand controller?

I’ve just got my ASI678 and hooked it up to my Pi running Astroberry, however it tells me the ‘Camera can’t be started’ when I launch FireCapture. 
 

Im running the  2.7 version on there so it should be up to date… The camera works fine in oaCapture so I’m thinking it must be whatever support FC has currently.   

After having a google it seems like this camera may/may not be supported yet?! However the info I’ve found seems rather vague at best and from maybe 2-3 months ago.

I saw one comment from a Mac user who had replaced a couple of files from the latest ZWO SDK to get it working, but I’ve not found anything on it related Linux/Astroberry.

Has anyone tried this camera/pi combo out yet or have any ideas I could try? I was hoping I could leave the Mac inside!

I’ve not got many filters (and I have to say, I’m not that fond of what I have as I seem to get glare/reflections at times), but I have found a light blue filter helps a little with Jupiter and also a ND filter helped take the brightness down a little. 
 

Tried a variable polarising filter, but whilst I could end up with a dimmer Jupiter, I didn’t really find that it helped me pick out any more detail. Getting comfy and in a good position to view the planet for a while and really let my eye get used to it helped more than anything else. 
 

Now if I can get my hands on a bigger Mak, that’d definitely improve the view 😅

On 31/07/2022 at 11:57, Avocette said:

It’s certainly true that Raspberry Pi 4s are in short supply at the present. I’ve been running two Astroberrys on 4GB versions I bought just after they were released in 2019. With your SkyMax127, you are unlikely to be tackling long periods of capture, and at this time of year, remote working is not so essential. Working locally close to the mount using SharpCap or other Windows software on a laptop would be an option, although it’s always convenient to be wirelessly connected via an RPi or other device.
While waiting for the planets to arrive in the evening skies, I have been using a my SkyMax127 guided on an AZ-EQ5, with short (15 seconds) exposures to improve the guiding statistics in blustery conditions. Here’s the result of 30 minutes of captures (120 subframes) processed only in AstroPixelProcessor. The KStars/Ekos/Indi package on Astroberry is now (v3.5.9) pretty stable. I used it to capture Lights, Darks, Flats and (automatically) matching DarkFlats.

I’ve been slow replying to things - this is a lovely image! I’d be pretty excited to get anything like this.
 

My mount isn’t as good, but I’d love to know a bit more about your setup for this!

I’m trying to decide what I should pursue in terms of a camera for planets. I was considering the ASI-224MC, but I’ve been wondering if I’d actually be better off putting a little more money into it and going for a ASI-678MC instead.

Largely I’m thinking the increased resolution (3840x2160 vs 1280x960) would actually give me some larger images I can better crop/scale once I’ve got the data.

For reference I’d be adding this to the back of a Skymax-127, so not the biggest aperture. I’ve not tried it with a dedicated Astro camera yet, so I’m wondering if there are any gotchas I need to be aware of (I’ve seen it used with lower resolution ASI cameras).

Does anyone have any advice on if it should work ok (i.e. I’m going to be able to fill the frame/sensor ok?).

On 11/08/2022 at 15:29, westmarch said:

You do know that most UK libraries have these for free on their ebook app. Ours is called Libby. Use it before it gets cut.

Wow - thanks for the tip. I subscribe to S@N currently and although the app has some good points and the fact I can read it in the apple news app is nice, I just really don’t like how it ends up treating the content. 

The Libby app has the PDF/magazine format - so that’s great for me. Much prefer to read it like that despite the need to pinch/zoom etc. 

My vote is for Sky at Night:

- I think we should support it/the show

- it’s casual but interesting - I don’t have much time to read so a lighter take on topics is good for me

- I like the monthly guides and tours

7 hours ago, vlaiv said:

u can get the same effect by slightly pulling eyepiece ~5 mm back in focuser and clamping it there - instead of pushing it all the way in.

I feel a little silly that I didn’t think of that - I’ll try this, I guess I assumed it was the length of the eyepiece that would affect it, rather than it’s depth in the focuser. 
I really noticed it using a 7.5 plossl whilst looking at Jupiter/Ring nebula. I was used to them being quite large in the view but once I added the filters the size seemed noticeable smaller. 

I’m sure this is exactly what I think it is, but I’ve not tried using any filters before and having now got my hands on some, whilst observing last night, noticed they had the effect of reducing the magnification of my eyepiece. 
 

Is that to be expected? 
 

Thinking about it, they obviously add ~5mm or so to the eyepiece. So if for instance I’m using my 7.5mm - could/should I consider getting something shorter for using filters with?

Unrelated last question to the thread topic, I was hoping a UHC filter would help give me some greater definition on the Ring Nebula. Last night I actually thought it made it harder to see - I think for some reason the seeing may not have been as good as my previous observations, but I still thought it might help define it a little more? 
I’ve got a relatively small scope (Skymax 127) so it’s not a great light bucket, but also thought a UHC would perform ok on something that size?! 
 

Still waiting to get something more suited for imaging the planets, but as my favourites are once again coming into the evening sky I thought I’d use the opportunity to practice and test out using my Canon 700d and getting focus etc.

I’m simply adding on the camera to the scope via a nose piece adapter right now, which seems pretty nice as I can then swap in an eye piece for visual easily.

Anyhow, here’s a few shots I managed (no stacking or anything, just single shots). Not impressive by any standard - but quite happy with my first go.

Saturn/Jupiter are quite fuzzy - I had to zoom in a lot given they’re pretty small on the field of view of the camer. I’m guessing more shots and stacking will help, but probably a more suitable camera is the way forward…

Almach - pleased I got some nice colour, but it’s also looking pretty fuzzy. Any tips for getting the focus right for this? I’m currently zooming on the camera screen, then adjusting the focus until, they’re as round/clean as I can make out.

My actual question in all of this is; I wanted to try and get my planet images a little better - whilst I can attach the camera and get it all centred nicely, as soon as I add my barlow I seem to lose any sight of anything -  not even an out of focus blob of light on the screen.

For reference it’s this Barlow: https://www.firstlightoptics.com/barlows/astro-essentials-125-2x-barlow-with-t-thread.html

I’d tried slotting the camera with a nose piece adapter already attached into this, I’ve also added the barlow to the camera directly. Possibly something I need to try out in daylight or on a large target like the moon - but this should work right? I’m just a bit puzzled as to why I can swap from my camera to eye pieces, or eye pieces with the Barlow and still have my target in view (if not needing to adjust focus), but as soon as I add the camera to the end, I seem to lose my target completely… 🤔😫

4 hours ago, Varavall said:

If £249 isn't too much, then I would look at the QHY5III462C with expansion kit

Thanks - I’d not considered these (didn’t know much about them). I can stretch to £250, I am trying to keep the budget down though. 
My plan was to run things from a Raspberry Pi 4 / Astroberry for cheapness, but After doing some reading I’m unsure if I’ll actually limit my frame rate by going that route.