Neil_104

Thanks guys, glad to hear I'm not alone in this. I'd love to get some kind of observatory going in the future, whatever form that may take. It would certainly cut down on the setup. Even just a pier to cut out the heavy lifting and polar alignment would be a great help. But in the meantime it's another night, another target, another headache and another beer 😄

So I'm finally off and running with imaging M88. After setting up, polar aligning, aligning the mount, focussing on a star, having plate solving not working so had to manually search about a bit for M88, setting up & tweaking the guiding, to finally clicking the sequence run button, I'm not going to lie - I have a headache and I need a drink. It's not just me is it??! But bl**dy hell is it satisfying once it's all up and running and you can finally sit back enjoy the images rolling in. And enjoy that drink 😄

I'm very tempted to get one of these PSTs! I remember looking through a Ha scope back at Uni and it was so exciting seeing flares on the solar limb.

That's an amazing capture showing really good structural detail - as you mention, being able to spot shadows cast by specific components - mind blowing!

It really does! Or something out of Doom maybe 😄 Jokes aside, nice image Space Cowboy - impressive detail

Focal length is 1225mm with the Starizona (it was around 1025mm with the Celestron reducer). They mention that the reducer is a 0.63x reduction but that the C6 (and C8) are closer to f/11 than f/10, although if that were the case it would put the native FL of my C6 at around 1944mm which is very unlikely. Supposing the scope is indeed f/11 then the reducer is giving a reduction of 0.74x.

That really is an ultra-realistic sketch, very impressive! As per Ratlet, keen to know what you used, and was it done completely at the eyepiece?

A few images of the reducer.

Oh dear that's not too good about the lack of support from Starizona. I've not had to speak with them myself so couldn't comment on that personally. Aftersales support is so important though so I can fully understand any hesitation that may cause. But yes, the lower pic is from the old Celestron reducer. I think your summary of the Celestron reducer as "far from perfect but not unacceptable" is accurate - I simply cropped into the image to remove most of the coma around the edges. I took some pretty good images with it (at least, by my standards 😄), one of which is up on my wall and you'd need to point out the bad stars to a casual observer. There was always plenty of tidying up of the stars required in post-processing though. It really is night and day between the Celestron and Starizona reducers - I'm certainly glad I have it. I'll try to get some pics up of it. It also has some of the nicest coatings I've ever seen - a real rainbow of colour down into the lenses. A minor thing but, hey 🙂

I generally recommend a go-to SCT as a first scope. The ease of use (light, compact, portable) and ability to find tens of thousands of objects at the press of a button is a real plus, and you'll see way more in a night's observing session because of it. A Celestron SE8 is a great first scope, heck it's a great only scope. On the other hand, a dob is the more "purist" way and does come with the added satisfaction when you finally do find the object you're looking for! Good luck with whatever you choose! Edit: Re-reading your post, it sounds like cost may be an issue so the 8 inch SCT may not be an option.

So I gave it a go the other night, and I couldn't get it to work unfortunately. In fact, I seemed a very long way from even being close to making it work. I'll be honest though, I was genuinely quite excited when trying, it felt like a bit of an adventure 😂 Which eyepiece did you use? I was trying with a Morpheus.

I recently acquired a Starizona f/6.3 corrector for my C6 and have now processed my first pic with it, M37. I'd have to say I'm very pleased with the improvement over the old Celestron f/6.3 reducer I was using previously. (The slightly stretched stars in the top right are due to a slight mis-collimation - now sorted!) I've attached the corner of a typical image taken with the old Celestron reducer - you can see just how bad the coma was. No to mention the weird internal reflections I used to get from bright stars. When I first saw the preview image with the Starizona corrector on my laptop screen I'll admit to letting out a "WOW"! It positively leaped off the screen at me. Further advantages are that the star colours are much better saturated, without the massive amount of CA around them that I was seeing with the Celestron reducer, and they have a nice "glow" to them. One slight negative is that it slots into a 2 inch visual back. I'd much prefer if it screwed in place given the, ahem, somewhat expensive equipment hanging off the back of it, but I understand this gives some flexibility with back focus. The corrector produces a focal length of 1225mm, so ideal for smaller object like galaxies - and just in time too! In fact, I'm currently putting it to good use on M88 👍 If anyone else is currently struggling with the Celestron reducer and looking for something better then I'd wholeheartedly recommend the Starizona. It's pricey (I ordered direct from Starizona themselves) but a flat field in a compact 6-inch scope is definitely worth it. I'm really looking forward to imaging with this over the coming months and years.

Second that about the Morph, I have the 12.5mm and it works very nicely in my C6. Gives 120x (probably more since the C6 is closer to f/11) and so can be used most nights for planetary viewing. I used it a lot for Jupiter last year. If I had one tiny criticism it would be that the eye relief is almost a bit too long for my liking. I also have a 7mm DeLite and the eye relief on that is just perfect. In fact, everything about it is perfect. Gives a very good view of Saturn with the C6. In fact, it gives a brighter image than my 8mm BST - which is due to be sold soon, I know they get a lot of praise but I really don't like it, it just feels cheap to me (yep, I know, that's because it is!). It also show massive ghosting, which I find v distracting. Have you considered buying one of each? A Hyperion, a Morpheus and a DeLite covering your preferred focal lengths? That's what I'd do in your situation (and what I tend to do) and that way you can see what design you get on with best. Plus it would eliminate the "Maybe the DeLite/Morph/x/y/z might have been better" type thoughts.

Yep I had a few of those magic eye pics up on my wall back in the 90s 🙂 I'll give this a go next time I'm out - it sounds intriguing - thanks for posting!

Spectacular!

I concur, really nice drawings. Is that charcoal you use to get the dark sky around Mars? I think that way of sketching the planets really looks good.

I think you're being quite hard on yourself there - that's a v good image for only 100 mins dodging between the clouds 👍

Snap again 😄 I think the same way about my AVX. Some nights I can get 0.6" guiding out of it, other nights 2" at best. I'd like something a bit more consistent, but the weight of the EQ6R pro puts me off a bit. Oh, and the cost! There's something about trying to eek the best of a mount though, and when it works well it's quite satisfying.

I really like this - nice range of colours and some really good detail - great image 👍

Snap. Out of 2hrs 40 mins total imaging time I was able to use...........25 mins worth. I really should have packed up early but it was only the 2nd clear night since the end of Feb and I just wanted to get something....anything! It was still enjoyable though with Venus keeping me company, hanging low in the West 🙂

I'm seeing those types of stars this evening as well, and it's windy out, and I don't usually see those types of stars, and I don't usually image in the wind (but just can't pass up only the 2nd chance to image in 3 months)....so I'd say yes, wind can definitely cause that.

Even got a bit of natural amp glow going on in the bottom right corner 😄

Welcome & good luck with your project - the views will be even more satisfying after bringing that scope back to life 👍

Nice image, and that's certainly very encouraging to hear!

Wow - really impressive! I found it mesmerising watching that - thanks for sharing!