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Yes that's beautiful, but like @Erling G-P this one never gets high enough for me to have a crack at from home...

Can't help with any advice but that's a lovely image!

No apology from me; it's a wow from me too. That's a stunning image and makes me want to try planetary imaging again... but I'm so hopeless at it that I am sure that will quickly pass 🙂

Stunning image.

Yeah I followed the same path with Registar, though in honesty I only use it in special cases now...

Thanks Bryan and Geof for bringing DeNoise AI to my attention. 80 bucks is quite a price tag for a one-trick pony but at least there is an evaluation version...

It's usually from the base of the thread. That's certainly the case for the flattener on my Esprit...

That really is a beautiful object. Nice capture.

Yep very nice indeed.

Good stuff - congratulations! That's a fairly short total integration time of 400s so, as ever, more data will help! The dark spots look like dust on your sensor so it may be worth seeing if you can blow it off with a rocket blower or get it cleaned...

Nice capture! It looks like you may have a slight tracking error or some tilt in your image train. What did you use to process the data?

Skywatcher EQ5 or Celestron CG-5GT are good starter mounts that you can grow with - I've never owned a Skywatcher mount but they are actually manufactured / owned by the same company as Celestron (Synta). Other than that, if you buy from the SGL for sale board check out that any seller has been on here for a bit. Most people on here care about their community reputation and won't rip you off... There are also some very good offers - especially on starter kit - as a fair few people are keen to encourage people that are new to the hobby. Feel free to ask if you have questions!

Hi Dean, "photography in the future" is the bit that jumps out! Most deep sky astrophotography (as opposed to lunar or planetary imaging) will require a GoTo computerised mount and mounts can cost more than telescopes! The advice for beginners is often to go for a Dobsonian (which is a Newton reflector on a very basic manual mount). That gives biggest bang for your buck in terms of the scope but will be limited in terms of astrophotography in the future. The SkyWatcher Skyliner 200p would be a popular choice and you'd have £100 left over for some accessories. However, you may wish to consider buying second hand. I sold a very serviceable Celestron CG5-GT and a 150mm newton reflector on for under your budget a few months ago... - check out the for sale board on here. If you buy wisely then you won't lose much, if anything, if you decide to sell it on if (a) you decide the hobby isn't for you after all or (b) your appetite grows and you want to improve your kit. Good luck and clear skies, Ian

Very nice Michael.

Thanks for the likes and comments everyone - much appreciated. Thanks Mark, much appreciated. The 10 minute subs needed quite a stretch so I had to balance sharpening with noise reduction (as ever). I know there is some blue in the background surrounding the PN in the first image but I left a little glow in deliberately as it made the transition smoother and I quite liked it at the time... I'm less sure now! Thanks Andy. I will process the 180s data just to see, but a quick look seemed to suggest there was nothing in those subs that helped the core. The RGB stars were easy and I just masked the nebula through the star field manually. When I first attempted a rough process (with about half the data) I found blending in the core a real pain but in this run through it seemed to go OK (which is why I ended up not using the 3 minute subs), though I did sacrifice some definition. Thanks again Dave. Thanks Bryan. The new scope certainly seems to have potential, though as I say guiding was more of a challenge. It's also the first time I've tried dithering - never seen the point before as I could clean up the few hot pixels my camera has with darks and pixel correction in AstroArt or PixInsight but I read a thought-provoking post by @vlaiv and decided I needed to introduce it into my capture process.

Ummmm. Gulp. I was really, really, really pleased with my version when I captured this back in the day... but this is just astounding. Don't know what you have invested in kit but I'll go out on a limb and say it's worth every penny. This will be a beauty when you add the colour... And it may be imaged a lot, but it's a beautiful thing nonetheless.

For single shot images and only 30s exposures these are incredible! Just shows what a light bucket you have on your hands! I'd really encourage you to take multiple exposures and start stacking. Deep Sky Stacker is all you need to get you started and it's free. PixInsight is excellent and very capable but with capability comes complexity and the greatest bump you'll get right now is taking multiple images and stacking them. By the way, it's definitely worth capturing your frames as RAW files - it will allow you to get the absolute most out of your data as you progress. JPEG uses compression and you lose hard won information so best avoided for processing. Excellent stuff, though. Well done.

Lovely image Adam - well done. The amount of data you've captured has certainly paid dividends. As Lee said I'm sure with a bit more time you could refine this even more so maybe come back to the data...

Yep - lovely stuff...

Well, after months of terrible weather we've had an amazing run of clear skies and lots of superb images posted as a result. I've been beavering away on a couple of targets shaking down my new Esprit 150 scope. This has been a bit unusual for me as part of that has involved buying a small lathe and making a custom adapter to couple the SkyWatcher flattener to my Atik gear. The adapter works really well and I am pleased with the flatness and orthogonality of the field. However, my filter wheel started behaving erratically and finally gave up the ghost and I think the Esprit represents the limit of what my CEM60 can handle as I've been having some odd guiding behaviour from what has been a very reliable mount. So acquiring the data for this has been a bit painful... I've first had a crack at imaging the Cat's Eye planetary nebula in 2014 and have been meaning to get back to it. For those that have tried it, it's a tricky target; the centre is very, very bright but the outer haloes fairly dim. I decided to shoot 10 minute subs for the faint stuff but I do wonder whether I should have gone longer... I've been tinkering and tinkering with the processing and can't quite decide which way to take this now, so thoughts very welcome. Here is RBG with the OIII blended in at something near its true colour but with the Ha mapped to yellow to bring it out a bit more: And here is an HOO version but with the outer haloes stretched a little less: Maybe I've left the background a little too light? I used 30s subs for the core (I captured 180s subs too but didn't use them) and blended it in unstretched. I was quite pleased with the structure on show given that my seeing is always pretty poor. Just for fun, here's how my core compares to the composite HST visible and Chandra X-ray Observatory image. Kit: Mount: iOptron CEM 60EC; Scope: SkyWatcher Esprit 150; Imaging: Atik 460ex; Atik EFW2 (and then a new EFW2.2 half way through); Atik OAG, Astrodon filters; Guiding: QHY 5LII and PHD2 Data: OIII 60 x 600s & 20 x 30s; Ha 60 x 600s & 20 x 30s; RGB 20 x180s per channel. All binned 1x1. Total integration time 23hrs 20m. Thanks for looking and clear skies. Ian

Useful thread. I've never bothered dithering as I can deal with hot pixels using darks and hot pixel correction but Vlad has, as ever, posted some information that makes me reconsider...

I'd have thought that you should be able to observe the phases of Venus at your focal length of 1200mm. It will depend on how well the scope is collimated, of course, and on your seeing. Chucking a 2x barlow - or better still a Televue Powermate - in to your image train will definitely give you enough focal length...

And for ease here it is again... Too close: Too far:

I have a TS 130, but the f/6.6 super apo version that is no longer available. I use it primarily for imaging but it delivers spectacular views on the occasions that I have used it for visual. It's not too unwieldly in my view and the manufacturer provides a very handy carrying handle that bridges across the tube rings. I also have a 90mm TS carbon fibre APO and that is also an absolutely awesome scope. As has been alluded to above, these are made by SharpStar. 365 Astronomy are UK dealers for SharpStar, and although they don't routinely stock the 130 it might be worth contacting Zoltan to get a price - you might find it considerably cheaper that the TS branded scope.

I have the first edition and as you say that covers Photoshop in its processing sections...