jimjam11

I dont do much planetary imaging but thought I would attempt it last night and it feels like the mono workflow is a bit of a nightmare. 1. Capture was easy. I used firecapture with it set to automatically capture 60s of r, g and b. This resulted in 3 files per run. 2. I stacked each file in autostakkert, again easy to do and it ripped through the 200 videos I captured quickly. 3. This left me with 200 mono images. What is the optimum workflow from here in terms of assessing quality, combining and ultimately processing to the best combined rgb images? I used pixinsight to combine some and registax to process but this is very time consuming and repetitive, it feels like I am missing significant opportunities to streamline?

Interesting. How does it work, I have never used it and the documentation seems sparse? If I want to connect CDC I typically connect it to my mount but it sounds like I am missing something...

What functionality do you think you are missing comparing v2 to v3? I think SGPro was the benchmark for acquisition automation software for the masses but it is very CCD centric and it hasnt evolved. The move to a subscription model was the final nail for me and I havent used it since. Before paying for subscription software check out Nina or Ekos. Both are free and much better optimised for CMOS imaging (especially Nina).

Your images look good, but they do look oversampled. 1. You could use the PI SubframeSelector process to measure FWHM on all your subs and look for outliers, but also compare them to the theoretical values vlaiv suggested. I use this on every sub I capture and record the values so I know what range to expect from certain combinations (e.g. ASI1600mm + ZS73 gives me typical stars of 3.9" with my seeing) 2. Depending on the output from SubframeSelector you might not actually be in focus. There is a skill in using a b-mask (which I dont posess!) and when I switched from b-mask focussing to autofocus I got smaller stars. Using something like the b-mask tool in Nina can help ensure you are really in focus. 3. If the ZS61 is like the ZS73 it will have a tendency to bloat brighter stars.

Adding a few more images... A 2 panel mosaic of the gamma cygni region Starless: The Cocoon nebula: A finally 10 hours of the rosette (4hr RGB, 6hr Ha):

It looks like you have the flat73 and are looking at getting the flat73r. I have both but the reducer isn’t perfect: 1. It doesn’t support full frame. 2. Star sizes are worse; my long term average fwhm is 3.9” vs 5” with the reducer. 3. Star shapes are significantly worse in the corners, spacing is very finicky (although easily adjusted). 4. I have never noticed an snr improvement, there are too many other variables at play. Having said that, it does give a slightly larger fov which can be very useful! It also feels better made and the rotator is vastly superior.

The stripes are walking noise most likely caused by not dithering as Miguel said. The inconsistent (not flat) background can have a number of causes, especially if your setup has light leaks or reflections which makes background subtraction much more difficult. I don't know anything about siril, but if I got a background like this I would he looking for samples placed too close to stars in the dark areas which are then fooling the background modelling prior to subtraction. APP can do a decent job but the nuclear option is something called a synthetic flat in PI. This will flatten the background although I don't think it will help with the walking noise: http://trappedphotons.com/blog/?p=756

Nina is excellent and very fast which is important with a cmos camera. An easy way of verifying your polar alignment is just to run the phd guiding assistant for a couple of minutes, it will give you an accurate value without you having to do anything! Ideally do this pointing south towards the celestial equator...

Or use sharpcap which is a doddle for polar alignment using your guidescope. No point bothering with a polarscope nowadays if you are imaging with any kind of computer because there are so many cheap, fast and better solutions. You can make this even faster by marking the location of your tripod legs after alignment so you can start from the same place every time.

Apologies. I am talking about sampling and what sampling rates are manageable on a star tracker. In general the star adventurer is fine with sampling of >4"/px at 30s subs without guiding or other faffing. With guiding you might be able to reach 2"/px but then weight becomes a problem. Basically stick < 200mm of focal length with a star tracker and your camera unless you like hard work and guiding!

Well spotted. The ZS73 is great but bright stars (especially those as bright as M45) bloat very quickly in my experience. This is especially noticeable when switching between my ZS73 and 200p. I would guess this is sperical aberation:

600d gets you 2.06"/px. Have you considered something like the EF200 F2.8 or Samyang 135 F2? These are super light in comparison and give a much better image scale for a portable tracker. EF200 gets you 4.4"/px and the Samyang gets you 6.5"/px both of which are much easier to handle on a star tracker.

4 panel mosaic of NGC7822 1 hr RGB, 1hr Ha per panel RGB - 20x60s Gain 76 Ha - 12x300s Gain 200

Far too heavy, and depending on your camera it will yield approx 1.8"-2.3"/px (@3.8u pixels) which is beyond its tracking accuracy.

AF makes a huge difference and most parfocal filters are not parfocal enough, so once you get your offsets worked out things become much easier and you will get sharper images. Nina is in the process (V1.11) of introducing a killer feature for people like us with temperamental sky. You can configure your sequence (e.g. 5xR,5xG,5xB) and then iterate through this group for as long as you have/desire (e.g. 10Hr). It means you can get a colour image within minutes, and progressively go deeper and deeper without paying the time penalty of full filter interleaving (1xR,1xG,1xB) which takes an age. It also means you smoth out fluctuations in seeing, transparency etc so all channels are better balanced. This was technically possible before but you needed to configure a ridiculous repeating sequence (create 5:5:5 events and copy/paste until you lose the will to live). Having said that, IMO the new sequence builder in Nina is seriously intimidating and it took me several nights to get comfortable with it. It is like no sequencer I have seen before but it has flexibility and benefits which makes the effort worthwhile...