CraigT82

Thanks all. I'm finding I prefer colour lunar images over mono ones, just seem to have a bit more life in them. Thinking about trying an ADC with the colour camera to see if I get them a bit sharper next time. Might even try using my 290mono with RGB filters to see how that compares

Thanks for the kind words! The colour is real but it has been enhanced increasing the vibrancy and saturation of the image. I doubt anyone could pick out the colour visually to the same extent but you should be able to see hints if it

Another colour boosted shot from last night. Probably my favourite area of the moon as there's just so many different types of topography, including variously aged craters (inc. Volcanic), Maria, highlands, numerous rilles, sinus, imbrium sculpture etc etc etc....! 8.75" Fullerscope with Altair GPCAM3 224c and APM 2.7x Barlow. 5 pane mosiac, each pane 500/5000 frames.

Chose to shoot some colour images tonight just for fun! I definitely prefer the overall feel of colour images over mono 8.75" Fullerscope with Altair GPCAM3 224c and APM 2.7x Barlow. 3 pane mosiac each pane 500/5000 frames

Yes I find focusing with DSLR and lens very tricky. Did you zoom in as far as you can go in live view to focus? Controlling the camera via a computer or tablet via backyard eos or similar can help you nail the focus and generally make the capture side of things much easier

Not bad at all! I think your focus is a little off and there may be a slight tracking error. Shotting some shorter and longer exposures is recommended for Orion as it has such a large dynamic range. Shorter for the core and longer for the wisps. Perhaps 5 secs and 45 secs to add in?

TBH as I was writing that I thought I was probably wrong, but whatever... I still dont believe the whole 'cells of turbulence' reason for smaller apertures cutting through seeing

I think the HEQ5 is equivalent to the Vixen GP2, but I think the Vixen SXW has a azimuth pin on a different circumfence to the GP2?? (struggling to remember what my SXW looked like underneath!) Calling @Stu to the thread!

You could also ramp up the magnification in order to dim the spikes. In my scope viewing Jupiter at 175x the spikes are all but invisible (venus might require a bit more mag as it's so bright

Yes... so perhaps when people say "smaller scopes cut through the seeing" they actually mean "longer F ratio scopes cut through the seeing"!

I think the ASI290mm mini has a USB 2.0 connection, whereas the GPCAM3 is USB 3.0. Altair do do a GPCAM2 290 mono which would be the equivalent of the ASI290mm mini and fair bit cheaper. I don't think it will do any harm to mix and match camera brands for guide/imaging cameras, however I don't do any guiding so not sure how it works!

Yes that's interesting, are you saying that that big frac was not held back by the seeing by the smaller reflectors were? It is true that a good frac may have a system strehl of 0.98, and in order for a newt to get the same system strehl both the mirrors would need to be figured to about 0.9995 - due to the strehl reducing effect of the central obstruction. Not many mirrors outside of NASA will be figured to that accuracy! Perhaps that big frac is actually superbly figured and is just optically better than all the other scopes there, or maybe with the objective at the front it isn't as susceptible to dreaded tube currents and the boundary layer that newts suffer from? And you cant ignore the potential miss-collimation effects with the reflectors either! Also the light has to pass through the tube twice, and so is doubly affected by any currents in there. Edit: just thought... If the frac is of a much longer f ratio than the reflectors, the depth of focus will be greater and the wavefront disturbances caused by turbulent seeing would be less visible at the eyepiece?

Yes I often hear this thing about smaller apertures cutting through the seeing but I don't buy it. If you look through a 4" F8 scope and an 8" F4 scope , you're looking through the same sized patch of atmosphere. I think the reason the views in the larger scope may look worse is that the larger aperture has the higher resolving power and resolves the bad seeing better, which makes it more noticeable to your eye, if that makes any sense! For example, say if you're seeing is at 1 arc second, and you have a small scope with a resolving power of 1.5 arc seconds and a larger scope of resolving power of 0.5 arc seconds. The small scope wont even notice the bad seeing and the image will look perfect, the but the larger scope will and you'll see the wobblyness of the image, but really the amount of detail seen will be higher in the larger scope, it's just the image will look a bit scruffier.

Don't be afraid of the Altair versions, they're basically the same as the ZWO units. I bought a refurbished GPCAM3 290 mono direct from Altair Astro for £188 and it's been an excellent performer. Altair often advertise their refurbished/used kit on their facebook page.

Hi Neil, If you measure the highest your current focuser will go (from OTA to top of drawtube) I will measure this one and see if it will go any higher.

Dont think I've ever seen one of those... good looking scope 👍

You dont need sharp focus on the tree just to align the finder to it

Thermals rising up from houses or paved areas cause this wobblyness. It's quite normal really and not much you can do about it. Observing out over open fields may help but not always possible

I think the chimney is too close. When you look at the moon or a star or anything else at infinity, you will be able to focus easier (without pulling the EP out)

What are you trying to focus on??

I'm not doubting that the Adc needs to be aligned with the horizon. I'm saying that unless your horizon is level (as seen through the scope) then the bubble level on the ZWO unit is useless!

My Google-fu tells me that the little bubble level is used only in fracs/maks/SCTs with no diagonal. The horizon will be level as seen through these scopes. With a diagonal it can still be used but only if the diagonal is level itself (not rotated to either side in the focuser). With newts it is useless!

So how do you use the bubble level when using with a newt and the horizon is at an angle?

Ah that makes sense now! You're not a time traveller after all

Nice capture 👍 Though the date format in the corner is very confusing!