SteveNickolls

I've often found a similar issue, it's likely down to your monitor brightness setting. Others find my images dark while I see them fine. Regards, Steve

You have my thoughts soldiering on through all the local light pollution you have to contend with happy-kat. I hope you have a few more clear nights now the weather has turned (tonight is now looking promising). The last time I was imaging was around 9 weeks ago-almost unbelievable. Best Regards, Steve

I know you haven't set me up on this Ian but as regards understanding and carrying out Alt-Az imaging folks might well like to get a copy of Joseph Ashley's book, "Astro-photography on the Go-Using Short Exposures with Light Mounts" and available from our sponsors at -https://www.firstlightoptics.com/books/astrophotography-on-the-go-book.html It does concern me that the popular, evergreen, "Making Every Photon Count", (specifically on page 44) states in my view quite wrongly - "With the mount, it can be seen that one type, the Alt-Az, can immediately be disqualified as being unsuitable for deep sky work..." For many people an Alt-Az mount is the ideal way to test one's toe in the very deep and expensive water that can become astro-imaging. An Alt-Az mount can be the real difference between someone wishing to try out imaging and sitting at home reading articles about it while saving up or waiting for a suitable second hand EQ mount etc., etc. to come along. I have to smile knowing that Joseph Ashley can compose his well thumbed 320 page book based mostly on the genre within the crack so quickly stepped over by the other book and which actually is testament to Joe's insight. This, 'No EQ Challenge' thread shows what can be done with such mounts and how much important learning goes off within its fertile posts. Above all have fun doing hands on astro-photography and be prepared to learn all the time (usual caveat-weather permitting). Cheers, Steve

Thanks for posting this very fascinating programme. Now we know the ancient Greeks could make delicately meshing teeth and intricate mechanisms how much better would they have built a bespoke CG-5 mount, no backlash I dare say :-) I do like the idea of making ones own gear wheels. Best regards, Steve

It will be interesting indeed to see how it fares. I need to compare its spectrum activity with the Astronomik UHC filter. Thanks for posting. Cheers, Steve

That's good, it will have put your mind at rest and you now know the SA's bubble is the one to follow. Now where are those clear night skies...? Best of luck, Steve

One or both levels were mis-aligned (at manufacture). Tiny bubble levels aren't that great. If you can try placing a normal spirit level across each leg on the tripod in turn and adjust the legs as required to get it all level; does the tripod's own bubble level then still say it is level? I understand that having a tripod dead level is not the end of the world for polar aligning but it does help you feel better and more in control. Cheers, Steve

Hi smr, I heartily concur with your view that if you can see a DSO with your own eyes you should be able to image it. M42 is a bright DSO. My imaging position at home is quite restricted, mostly to the NE through to SE and I've only been able to image M42 at a reasonable altitude with my Alt-Az gear which I don't have to polar align. The nights are now getting later and by 6 PM tonight M42 is already quite high up (28 degrees) at Az 153, roughly SE. By astronomical dark (7.23 PM) M42 is almost 32 degrees in Alt and Az 177, so almost reaching it's highest point. By 11 PM it has declined to an altitude of 17 degrees and Az 235 degrees. So if you have a good southern view you will have a few good hours to image it. If you haven't downloaded Stellarium (a planetarium software) I'd suggest getting it as it will help with deciding on which objects to image. It's free for main pc's but there's a small cost to place it on a tablet or mobile. You may well already have your own preferred software for photography which will become handy for processing. I can recommend Deep Sky Stacker for stacking frames if you haven't such software. It has it moments but it contains a guide helping of taking flat and bias frames. Best of luck on the next clear night. Don't forget to post your results! Best wishes, Steve

Hi smr and thanks for your post. I don't think there's a mystery over exposures, there are rules of thumb to help such as getting the signal off the left hand side of the histogram on your DSLR 'Live View' and to around a third the way across the histogram so you will have the ability to later perform processing 'stretching' of your stacked images to bring out the faint detail in your exposures. How long you will be able to expose for will be limited by your gear, local light pollution and the object you are imaging. However if you expose for too long the image will become saturated, white and have no detail. Some objects like clusters don't need as long an exposure. One technique astro-imagers use is stacking multiple exposures to help reduce the noise in the combined image. Now getting longer exposures depends on a number of factors, for example the FL of the lens you are using and your sum experience of using your equipment (i.e. how well you can polar align, avoiding causing movement when loosening and tightening ball heads or the mount clutch in the dark etc.) and your capability with your processing software. I don't know what DSLR you are using. Many have a 'Live View' to help with focus and framing. As you are literally just finding out things, like where Polaris is in the sky for example I would suggest first practicing focusing your camera and lens on a bright star or far away street light and taking time until you are happy the star is as well focused as you can make it. Do you have a remote shutter control/intervalomenter/ software to take images without causing judder? You will also need to polar align your Star Adventurer (SA) mount. The more accurately it is aligned the longer the mount will be able to track in RA within its design and load limitations. Follow the SA guide to setting up the polar scope and polar aligning. Take your time. SkyWatcher have a Polar clock Utility on their Star Adventurer Mini app that you can use with the SA as the app looks just like the polar scope clock face. I have found that finishing polar alignment when Polaris is on a division on the polar reticule means it is as accurate as you can make it. I would then try some shots of constellations, starting with 30 seconds at ISO 1600 to more easily check focus and composition then if all's well drop the ISO to 800 and snap away. See how long can you get pinpoint stars, 60-120-180-240 seconds, or more? Objects higher in the sky tend to suffer less from light pollution and atmospherics. As for imaging M42 it is a bright target so good luck, go ahead and see what you achieve. Remember if you are going to stack your exposures you need to take images in RAW format not JPEG. Also are you aware how to take dark frames, flat frames and bias frames? These will all help you get a better final image. A free stacking software is Deep Sky Stacker, and there are several free and at cost processing software products. The Star Adventurer mount is a good piece of kit for its size, I wish you luck with your experimenting. Cheers, Steve

Perhaps best try both out and see which you get on best with in the field. Well done with your first image btw. As regards focusing with DSLR and lens I've found manually focusing using Live View on a bright star or far away street light is fine rather than messing with BYEOS. Just take time to get focus. With shorter FL lenses this is harder as the stars are smaller but quite doable. You would use a Bhatinov Mask with a telescope. Good luck with future sessions. Best regards, Steve

He, he happy-kat, that is the absolute definition of being optimistic. At the moment I have a cold that is lingering on and on and dare not set the gear up outside to image so I'm happy to have excuses for staying instead in the warm. I'm sure though that once this spate of wintry weather passes we will get chance to brave the elements with our bits of glass and mounts. Cheers, Steve

There's a fair modicum of dust in that area, a number of more Sharpless objects too. Cheers, Steve

Hi All, I was taken aback last night with the unexpected clear sky so set up the Sky Adventurer mount and managed to get two and a half hours of NGC 1499, the California Nebula. The image below was taken with my modified Canon 700D and clip in Ha filter and 85mm lens. I managed 10 x 900s light frames at ISO 200 and f/s and stacked them in DSS with dark (x6) and x50 each flat and bias frames from my library. The exif tempratures of the light frames ranged from 11 to 15 degrees C over the imaging period. Processing was done in StarTools. Best Regards, Steve And I like a red version too-

I rather like the idea of a dedicated cooled astro-camera/FW and lens combination on the SA, just have to save all those thousands of pounds... Cheers, Steve

That should be fine as long as the tripod is rigid. I'm using an old Celestron heavy duty Alt-Az tripod and get a very responsive polar alignment using the tripod adjustment knobs. I attach a snapshot showing the arrangement. Cheers, Steve

Hi Wirral man, Thanks for the photo of your imaging equipment. I'm always impressed by the inventiveness associated with astronomy, I particularly like your extra weight below your tripod-hey even the colour matches the rest of the gear. Good luck with your future imaging and processing and don't let the light pollution spoil your enjoyment. Best wishes, Steve

The past two night's have been clear here and I began taking exposures of Simeis 147 (Spaghetti Nebula) as suggested by serbiadarksky :-) For Christmas I received a modded Canon 700D DSLR and an Astronomik clip-in Ha 12nm filter which were both used with the SA mount capturing exposures on both nights. The image below is a slightly cropped composite from 28x 600s plus 1x 780s and 5 x 900s light frames (in total just over 6 hours) at 85mm, f/2 and ISO 200 together with 32 assorted dark frames and a master flat and bias frame (each from x50 exposures). The frames were stacked In DSS and processed in StarTools. Judging by what others have employed in terms of hours of exposures to image this faint region I'm still happy to have imaged something I would never be able to observe from where I live. At the 2 o'clock position in the composition is Elnath and to the left, M37. Cheers, Steve

Hi All, Merry Christmas to all Star Adventurer users. Over two consecutive nights, the 27th and 28th December 2017 I was able to image the Flaming Star Nebula region in Auriga making first use of two new pieces of equipment received at Christmas, a modified Canon 700D DSLR and an Astronomik clip-in 12nm Ha filter. I also used my Canon EF 85mm f/1.8 USM lens. In all 31 x 600s light frames at ISO 200 and f/2 were combined with x22 dark frames, x50 flat frames and x54 bias frames in DSS and processed in StarTools. This is a first 'rush' of the imaging and I hope to tease out more detail over the coming days. Cheers, Steve