Gina

That's coming on nicely Dave

Added the area to be covered with weed control membrane and gravel plus the position of the micro-observatory if I ever build it (circle).

Here's a very rough sketch of the property traced from a very pixellated aerial view.

Buy from FLO and be sure everything is perfect!

B is the focus sleeve. A is the depth of field. C is the aperture ring.

I always buy from FLO if they have what I want.

Agreed!

Fantastic image - wonderful Must have been very clear sky. What gain setting did you use? I've been working on this but not achieved anything like your image!

Yes, I have had this problem in the past.

I doubt anything about my observatory is square!! Don't worry about it as long as it works! 😁 The east fold down window is square (rectangular) as it's made from a twin-wall transparent roof panel but the woodwork generally isn't.

Oh dear! I don't like the sound of that! If they are going to do that I'm not interested! More than that - I don't want to see that sort of thing.

Depth of field only really applies to terrestrial photography though a stopped down lens (smaller aperture) will be less critical of focus. Trouble is, the more you stop down the less light gets through and you need longer exposures. Focussing for lenses is extremely critical and I have spent years trying to get this right. Having a 3D printer to create special parts helps enormously.

Measured the width of the weed control membrane and it is 3.3m. Width of sun lounge is 2.5m and from sun lounge to edge of house is 3.7m. Concrete path round corner of house is 1m. SE corner of sun lounge to boundary = 3.3m. SW corner of sun lounge to boundary = 2.4m. Length of sun lounge is about 5m which give an angle off-square of 9 in 50 which is about 10 degrees. Corner of concrete (round house) to boundary = 4.2m.

A few points about this. I don't need it to go so far to the west (RHS of the diagram) and I would like it to go up to the concrete in front of the living room window. Also I see no point in going round the observatory. The area is not rectangular as shown in the diagram but wedge shaped. I'll take some photos sometime.

Looks like I bought a sheet 20m long x 3.3m wide with the idea of this coverage.

I've just taken the weed-control membrane and partly spread it out on the ground. It's huge! I'll go back through the thread and see what I bought.

With some nice weather today I have been outside and looked at the ground between house and observatory. I think I have a plan. For a start I'm going to buy the heavy duty version of the plastic grid panels to make a path of the shortest distance as shown in yellow in the diagram. In the longer term I think I'm going for a gravel area in front of the house and up to the observatory. The ground is too waterlogged in wet weather to make a decent garden and I think I would be better off with gravel and containers. I already have the weed-proof membrane which I can secure temporarily with concrete blocks and slabs. 16 grids 500mm square will give me an 8m x 500mm wide path.

I have a 135mm f2.5 Asahi Super Takumar lens which is superb even at full aperture. I may buy another when funds permit as I like the FoV it gives me with the ASI1600MM-Cool cameras.

Welcome to the widefield set Carole 😀

That's different! 🤣

Absolutely!!! With knobs on! Nearly made me ill seeing that. Disgusting. I've never seen the point in making a vegetarian food look like meat! And as for 3D printing food... well... words fail me!!

Really lovely image. Yes, excellent!

Yes, one possibility I have in mind but didn't think of fence post spikes. Thanks.

Mine is wide open below floor level but I haven't had any problem with anything but water.

I've found Amazon good for refurbished items.