beamer3.6m

Not yet as just doing an imaging run... Will update when I'm finished.

It's this lens could be some stray light from nearby streetlight and also jpstairs bedroom light

I'm using it on an unmodded 1100d

So got the 135 lens... seems really solid and well made. It's first light tonight and this is a single pic of the preview on asiair. I using the lens at 2.8 I believe... why does one side (left) of the lens have the darker patch... is this normal or have I got a dud???

Wow The new camera seems to be working well!!! My preference is the 2nd (red) image... just seems more like I imagine it to really look if we were to stand beside it!

Wow, im impressed... I think I'm ok getting the data its the processing which I lack any skill at. I use Siril to stack but the poststack processing just confuses the hell out of me... WHat you have managed to pull out of the data is amazing

So much to learn!!!

If this is from my data, how did you get it so smooth... What did you do to process it? Your image is amazing by the way!

The 150p is a very capable scope so don't panic if it doesn't work. This forum is very knowledgeable.

And maybe I was wrong about the eyepiece, maybe it is a 2" if it only fits in the 2" adapter... my bad

OK so that all looks OK. You will need to twist the silver coloured wheels to the side of the focuser to move it in and out... There will be a small sweet spot for focus... start by just locating the moon... it should be obvious when you have it even if out of focus as it will be bright. Then turn those wheels so the focuser moves outwards and the bright moon should get smaller as it comes to focus. If you cannot achieve focus come back here.

Here is the linear .Tiff file without anything done to it other than stacking (no darks included as suggested). M31 raw stack.tif

Bubwith primary school (about 12 miles south of York). Small village school with good skies but no equipment... I am a governor and I'm sure the school would love this.

The right hand item in pic is for when/if you use 2" eyepieces (I.e. they are 2 inches wide... the eyepieces in the middle is 1.25" as it is the size of the shiny barrel which you measure not the eyepieces middle bit which you can see is quite wide)

It's not clear how your setting kt all up but usually the left hand item in the pic goes I to the focuser tube on the scope... the part with thumb screws should be pointing outside of the scope itself... you then put the eyepiece into the end and secure it with the thumbscrews. You then rack the focus tube in and out (should be wheels on either side to turn and make it move in and out... there can be a screw jnder the focuser tube which if overnight stops the tube from actually moving as this is tightened when using with heavy eyepieces to stop them sliding out of focus) to find the focus point. Apologies if this is teaching you how to suck eggs.

Good point. I will get that sorted so just the stacked tiff is available with no processing

So I captured a new set of frames without the CLS filter. These remain 180s lights and I also ran 60 biases frames and used my lights from the previous session as nothing had changed in the imaging train (I know this is not ideal). I then ran it through Siril without Darks, as suggested, and this is the result... which to my eyes is improved. I can see some banding in the image but the galaxy is more evident and there certainly seems to be more data in the image to work with... I attach the PNG and also the .TIFF should anyone want to play with it. M31.tif

Perfect, thank you

Question... do I still need flats or am I just using bias frames (that could be a really stupid question)

OK. For my next run then I will do without the filter and see how I get on... and do biases

I'm in bottle 4 area with minimal light pollution. I have 2 Street lights which are of a white light type (not orange). I use a CLS clip in filter. I will do the bias frames tomorrow as camera set up on scope outside in 'obsy'

So in essence the original data was not good... Sounds like I need a better camera for this???

Remind what bias frames are???

Thank you... I'm loving the mount and the ease of setup... I think for m31 I need to ditch the cls clip filter and see how it goes too.

Do you have any sample images you've taken?