kirkster501

For us clouded out in the UK an image of total integration of eight hours can sometimes take several months to gather whereas that can be gathered in one night elsewhere. My own current Perseus A project is a case in point. I've lost count of the number of sessions where I only got two x fifteen minute lights. I've got all the data other than Green and I've waited four weeks now with no clear night. As it happens, tonight maybe the night! I can accept that the magazines want to show amateur Astro photography at its best but I kind of agree with the sentiment of the original post, that maybe UK based magazines (and subscribers) should maybe expect to see more UK gathered AP images. Indeed, images presented form overseas do not pique my interest as much as those from our own shores. And one more thing.... No Deep Sky West pictures should be allowed in the magazines either! My opinion of course.

Don't need darks with my Atik 460. However, I very much need them with the KAF8300 camera; the lights are a blizzard of noisy pixels. But if you image at a set temperature with a cooled camera, what's the issue with darks? Take a dark library at the temperature you image at. I have found the noise stays the same for years and that, in actual fact, you do not need to constantly refresh the library at all, as some people say. I have found this by experimentation with cosmetic correction; older darks are just as good as ones just off the camera. So I now have a master dark and BIAS for bin 1x1, 2x2 for 5, 10 and 15 minutes, so six master darks and BIAS. Per camera. That's it now. For 2/3 years. All in my calibration directory and I just select the appropriate ones. Indeed, I have also found that during image calibration and integration, the darks do not need to be at the same temperature even and that Pixinsight takes care of the linear change in noise with temperature and will scale accordingly. So a 10 minute dark is fine for 15 minute lights. OK, not the best practise, but I see no discernable difference. So why not have darks and BIAS? EDITED as olly was posting below

Many thanks guys! I shall research those.

Bunnies on the lens front surface will be so out of focus you won't see evidence of them on the flats.

Hi all, I demounted my Skywatcher Goto 300P years ago. I have the original mounting ears on the side of the OTA and replicated the original Skywatcher 300P base (the goto uprights are different between the goto and the manual). However, I get lots of slip and stiction in the vertical up/down axis which makes it a pain to use which is a shame since it is a lovely scope optically. I am thinking as a winter project to completely rebuild the base for this OTA from scratch and was after some ideas/inspiration guys please? Steve

To my eyes, the only deep sky items (other than stars) in the entire Northern Hemisphere that visually display colour are M42 (green) and, from a very dark sky, M31 (a sort of very indistinct yellow). I think I have also seen a bit of blue colour in Omega Centauri too.

Hi, is there such a thing as a 3D printing service at all? And if so any suggestion of a reputable one please? I have a mounting widget, thingy-mi-bob I need to make somehow... Steve

You download it from Github, extract, copy a the files to the bin directory where PI is located then load the new module. Just use default settings.

If you have Pixinsight try using Starnet. It is a free plugin module and does a better job than Straton or Annie's Actions.

I like that a lot, very nice Adam. I love the colours and well done grabbing the SII in our skies....! If I could be super critical, it looks like you have overdone Morphological Transformation (or whatever star reduction) method you use. The stars look a bit odd and blurred to my eyes.

What stops us progressing in AP in the UK is the climate we live under, simple. I'd gladly swap back to my original and much loved HEQ5/ED80/Atik 414 if we could have more clear nights.

Ok chaps I will look into that. Thanks for your thoughts and suggestions.

Hi, My 4 hour stacked luminance has some star and galaxy cores that are slightly blown out even when linear and stretching the image even carefully with HT (Pixinsight) blows them out. I'd like to do a masked stretch but that blows them out of the water completely. Is there something I can do to stretch that does not blow the star cores please? Something like DDP in CCD Stack whjere I can keep the cores below 0.85 or so? Thanks, Steve

It was a complete washout in Nottingham and continues to be today 🙄

No chance in East Midlands, it is lashing it down. I was really looking forward to this today

The weather is not looking good in The Midlands. A ton of rain these last few days and more predicated today. As per normal for any much publicised astronomical event......

Ok guys, thanks. The surfaces of the PM and sensor window look immaculate otherwise. What about using some form of flats for this?

Hi, Ive noticed when I use my barlow (Powermate x 4) and my ASI1174M on my Meade 14" there are a lot of bunnies and flecks visible in the live video. This is of course imaging at F40 and nigh on 10m of focal length. These go away if I don't use such a powerful barlow. The optical surfaces of these things is immaculate. This is not visible if I dont use the Powermate. What causes these bunnies please and what do you do to get rid?

Apollo 17 Landing site. Meade 14" ACF and ASI 174MM. Seeing was too bad for using any Barlows. Would like to do colour at some point. Still learning this scope and camera combination. Have not got it right as yet.

+1 Wondering this myself too. EDIT: Seeing was dreadful last night so don't beat yourself up if your concerns are on the basis of last night's efforts.

Indeed, on the MESU I mostly have pancake flat guide graph. But there are many nights here where the guiding is all over the place. From my records on a decent night i get abou 0.2arcsec RMS on the MESU. The NEQ6 is not as good - as it wouldn't at a fifth of the price - but still very, very good. 0.5 RMS.

My imaging scale with the G2-8300 and Samyang 135mm is 8.3 arcsec per pixel. I get guiding accuracy of 0.5 arcsec on the NEQ6 with the small guidescope which is well within half (4.15" in my case) of the optimal Nyquist sampling rate for guiding. I'd like to get a different mount for the above widefield so I can repurpose the NEQ6 for something else (my FSQ85 and a new camera) So this CEM25P at +/- 10Sec is an *unguided* figure ??????? If I guided it I could get a better figure?

£1500 for the CEM25-EC. I was expecting a lot less than that...... Will be keeping the NEQ6 in this role for now then. I then get a free weight training workout every time I do my wide field then

I think I am free for the 2187 one

Looks like a complete write-off weather wise in the UK from the long range forecast..... as per ususal with any exciting astronomical event.