alan potts

Lovely shot and works great with the letterbox format, I actually had a MF camera back in 2004ish that took shots like this. Colours are very nicely done too. Alan

Came out nicely, I have missed this being in hospital, need to catch up on what everyone has been up to. Alan

Sounds interesting, the one thing I didn't get an answer to is why a file which is in fact only 541mb will not open in PS, on a 8gig ram machine. 541mb is nothing and it is telling me not enough RAM. Alan

Excellent shot, so much in there to look at and not over coloured for my eye, great work!!! Alan

I am not a fan of the Moon but you have captured it superbly well. Alan

I may try my 300mm F2.8 on the mount with my 071, it will be fairly wide field I would think. Alan

That's come out very nice, feel I may invest in one of the duel filters for OSC to help improve my NB content on my captures. Be a few day before I can use the scope after I have just had an operation, still getting better every day. Alan

That sounds like a good reason to forget it, I was only trying it because it was there in DSS, thanks Alan

Been in hospital and have just seen, I am raising this with my friend later, he is an IT guru and if sorted I will let you know. Alan

That is as good as I have seen, keep looking at it wondering which scope will show the most, but then with being somewhat new worried like hell to take apart a rig that is working very well, buy another mount maybe. Alan

Yes I indeed had a problem with my APM 115mm and a 379Red flattener, I am not totally sure we ever got to bottom of it, there was some paint off the inside of this flattener which I covered but the reflection continued after, it seem to go away though. Now though because I cannot get a 2 inch IR/UV filter in the optic path I have tended not to use it with my 071 camera. I did take a number of shots with my other camera 183MC and also with the same flattener. I never saw any internal reflection problem on these few hunderd subs, so what the issue was I don't know. Alan

A great question to ask anyone from home. Drizzle, I tried it in DSS just because it is there even though I am not totally sure what it does. Now I only have 8gigs of RAM on the machine here in the basement which I tend to use for everything, The drizzled file is 925mb which is a a bit bigger but not massive however its more than the normal 180mb area. My computer using PS CC tells me not enough RAM to open it, any ideas why, as I thought it would not be too big at this size, seems a bit strange to me. Alan

I don't mind what people do with what I post here, it all helps me. For what it's worth my brother worked at a job creation unit many years ago, there was a photographer there, he was shown a fair bit of my work on Rock concerts. I was pretty good at shooting with all the lights and and knew settings for this type of thing. About 8 month or so later on a wet day Brother and I went into a Gallery in Hull to see my photo's passed off as this other guy, the odd thing was I wasn't the one that noticed. Your result is very good but the stars are still horrible, added another hour last night and will do the same tonight, as it is clear, 19 days and counting. Alan

Beautiful shot you have taken there. Alan

I know your right and I am not going to argue as you know much better than me, 10 hours, I will make an effort to collect this much data but I get fed up of seeing the same thing on screen. I am really only doing recognisance on targets at the moment to see what I feel is worth more time and was collection 2-3 hours over the last few nights. We have had 18 nights on trot clear after a run of 43 and I tend to spend about 3 hours out per night, in anycase I wouldn't want to be out a great deal longer with the weather we get, there's always another night. At the moment I am having something of a struggle with a medical condition that I am being operated on for on Weds, I cannot allow myself to get cold. But hopefully after this I can get back to something of a normal life once recovered where cold which doesn't normally bother me can be ignored. The prostate is very good at picking up cold I am told and in any case to sit for longer is difficult with a catheter, hopeful this will be a thing of the past in say a month, I'm in good nick so should be able to get back to normal fairly fast. I will look at APP which I believe is Astro Pixel Processor or something like, I have PS CC at the moment but no plug-ins for gradient, The green cast I tried to put right in a shot posted just above, where on my screen it has gone, for sure it was there. Can I ask what is Hlvg? I have only heard of Astro Flat which I have seen used on my data. Alan

Well Geoff, my default on this is PS and that don't want to know so I changed it windows picture viewer and that also don't seem to want to know either, I don't have anything else on this machine. I will have a look later in the observatory where I have two more picture viewing programs that my mate Venci rates highly. Ha ha over 2 minutes then they both open up in the programs, that could be my Net connection, appeared to have a bit of a purple caste on my monitor but stacks more in there than I have in mine, nice shot. Alan

Thanks, Bryan, the star colours may be ok but the stars themselves are not at all good, I had to stretch this so much to actually get anything. I used my 071 Zwo on this, it like the 183 are both OSC cameras and the only filter I have for either is the IR/UV block filter which someone recommend to use. The 071 is a nice camera showing a wide field and can be used on an array of scopes, for 1500 it has a good sized APS C chip, which I think is the same size as the one in my Canon 40 D. Going to add to this tonight and maybe tomorrow try and control things better, I don't like to over colour my images if I can help it, at least I try not to. Alan

I will add to it tonight, it's a faint one for sure, can't get your image to open in PS, tried a few times, nothing. It is a rather nice area that I feel is worth spending a bit more time shooting. I have to admit with having 2 new cameras I am rather hopping around doing an hour here an hour there so I can see what is what now I have this new Shapeless catalogue loaded. Alan

Mick, I do Flats and Dark Flats but was told not to do Bias as it takes two calibration out on the Flats, I was doing this a while back but stopped. It too has a green tinge on my monitor which cost a packet, so there is not much wrong with yours. I stretch this image so much to get this far and tried to remove then green a bit but it is still there. I may add another 45 minutes tonight and try harder with the processing, it's a faint one though Mick. Just remember I could have used channel mixer to take green out, removed 10% Must try harder with the stars they look horrible. Alan

Always work of the highest standard from you and one for me to leave alone, I had enough problem with the bubble. Alan

A beautiful shot of yet another image I have not seen before. Alan

Rather like this it has come out fairly well, I tried it but didn't get it as good in OSC. Alan

Well I have had to stretch the living daylights out of this to get anything really, and used all 2 hours 8 minutes of data, guess this is just not enough for this patch. The stars have suffered and just can't find my book on star masking so they look pretty awful. There is something nice about the image though I am not sure what. I posted this as I have not seen it before and I am jumping around targets to see whats up there. I don't know if the dark patch on the right is meant to be there or is a result of poor Flats again. Please feel free to offer advice. Alan

I hope you get some nice weather, would be happy to send you mine, superb here and has been for nearly 3 weeks. Alan

Very nice scope I always fancied the 150mm though the 100mm is nice and short compared to my 805mm. That would give me 330mm 420mm 550mm and above 1000mm in the shape of the M/N 190mm, must try that one out. Hope it comes quicker for you. Alan