simmo39

12 hours ago, JeremyS said:

Looking good 👍, @simmo39

Thank you.

11 hours ago, tooth_dr said:

Nice images Simon.  RIngs next on the list to sort  

Yep just looking at sorting out a tilt adapter, hopefully that will sort them out.

19 minutes ago, Pete Presland said:

Nice Prom on show.

Thanks, still need more practice at getting focus and processing, just wish the weather would help!

12 minutes ago, Altocumulus said:

The potential is there! You have, at least, a prom.....

 

Have you tried flats to sort out Newton, and what cam is this?

Hi, thank you. the camera is a ASI 120mm

3 minutes ago, Davey-T said:

Did you watch Gary Palmers video last Sunday ? lots of useful stuff on there.

Dave

Hi Dave, no I havent is it still about I will see if i can find it thanks.

It has fet like an age since I had last managed to use the Daystar scout last  ( 2 weeks ) and this in effort no 4! No body said how hard this was going to be! bring back the night!

Anyway here are a few shots from today, think im still having problems with focus all are the best 25% of a 1000 frames. Still nee to sort out the newton rings  but thats for the future.

Hints and tips most welcome.

On 19/06/2020 at 18:01, simmo39 said:

Thank you for the pointers, I have got mine working with a SW motor and a few odd bits. Not as neat as yours above but it does the job,  just need some sun to look at!

Hi got the print from Steve today and all fitted and working. Thanks for the help and advice.

Now can we have some clear skies?

This is just an experiment with some data i took on the 23 of this month ( third go at solar ) After getting a few welcome tips from the many people on this forum this is the result. I know the framing could be better but at the time I was messing about trying the tuning knob on the Solar scout to see what it did and I was fighting my motor focuser ( hopefully to be put right with help from a kind member who is trying to sort out a 3d print for me ). Anyway 75% of a 1000 frames. Still needs work and skills to be learnt!  

Thanks for looking and any hints and tips welcome.

45 minutes ago, Pete Presland said:

Very nice

Thank you. Still getting my head around the processing side of things.

3 minutes ago, Pete Presland said:

Welcome to the "light side" of imaging.

Thank you, But i see it still has the cloud problems! 

1 hour ago, Hughsie said:

Hi Simmo,

With embossing, I first make sure that i have flattened the image so that all previous actions are combined into one layer. I then copy the image using Cmd c (ctrl C) then paste it as a new layer above the original.

I then select emboss and ramp up the strength to 300%. Usually 1 pixel works or there about then you can play around with the angle to you get something suitable. When done I change the view (next to ‘opacity’) from normal to soft light. 

Hope that helps.

Hi, thanks. Ill give it a go. Im finding affinity abit of game at the moment, think its just me being so used to using PI.

Hi, Fantastic image. Im a new at the solar game and have just got my first bsolar scope also i have just got hold of Affinity. After using PI for deep sky stuff Im struggling to get to grips with Affinity, especially the embossing filter. How do  youn get it to work?

Nice images, make me feel so better thought i had a problem when i couldnt see a lot on the subs i had taken.

51 minutes ago, tooth_dr said:

M42?

T2 to T2 female to female. I have been doing a search and think i have found one.

4 minutes ago, tooth_dr said:

Looking very good.  I tried flats etc, and in the end I bought a tilt adapter, and the rings are gone.  Worth the £40.

Thanks, I have got one here but at the moment i cant get it fitted due to spacing issues, I need to get hold of a 10 to  15mm spacer.

Hi all, well had my second outing with the scope. It is now fitted with a heath robinson motor focuser! makes life a little better. Here are 2 of my runs today, both suffer from newton rings which i will need to deal with in the future. I had to crop the first image as i was heavy handed in the stretch and had all kinds of white bits showing, still i am happy to get someting but need to learn more about the magic art of proccessing solar stuff!  any hints, tips and pointer most welcome.

On 13/07/2019 at 15:29, johninderby said:

DayStar Solar Scout SS60-DS Motorised Focuser

Decided to motorise the focuser on the SS60-DS which should make it a lot easier to image the sun. 

The Skywatcher Autofocuser was used with toothed drive belts and pulley. As I had fitted a Orion finder shoe decided to mount the motor and bracket on the shoe. Printed out a finder dovetail twice the length and height as standard then bolted the Skywatcher bracket to it after flattening the base of the bracket in a vice first. It comes with a bit of a curve that needed removing.

A 40 tooth GT2 drive pulley was fitted to the motor. Then fitted a 232mm drive belt turned inside out to the knurled part of the OTA focuser to give the drive belt something to grip. Was a very tight fit but that’s what I wanted. Then fitted the motor to the finder shoe usung a 320mm drive belt and adjusted the tension. 

Tested it and it worked very smoothly. The belt would slip when the focuser reached the end of it’s travel so a built in safety feature. 

Thank you for the pointers, I have got mine working with a SW motor and a few odd bits. Not as neat as yours above but it does the job,  just need some sun to look at!

2 minutes ago, RodAstro said:

Well that's a brilliant shot.

What camera are you using? Looks like a 0.7x reducer will get the whole sun on your chip.

How was your setup, did you stop down or full 60mm, did you use a camera tilter and what processing did you have to do?

Cheers Rod

Hi Rod, thank you. Im using a ASI120mm with a 1.25 reducer and a IR filter. I had to do a bit of a fiddle to get the camera in the right place and need to sort out some proper spacers. The other thing i need to sort is a way to motorise the focusser to make life a bit easier. As  for the processing i ran the subs through AS3 and into reg6 and finally colour tweek in Affinity. I know its not the best pic but for my first run I am happy, I will do some more  work on it tomorrow. once again thanks for the help and pointers.

1 hour ago, Nigella Bryant said:

Wel done, brilliant first image. You might like to try ImPPG software for solar post stacking software. I use it al the time after stacking in autostakker 3. This is using ImPPG and a Lunt 60mm DS single stacked image.

That looks so good, I have got imppg and have just watched a tutorial about it. I will give it ago tomorrow and see what i get. thanks for the pointers,

30 minutes ago, assouptro said:

I agree some sort of electronic focuser would be really useful, I am pondering that too. And it is a totally different ball game to DSO imaging. 
I ended up using my Atik 314l+ and Fits files (that was slow!) then converting the best fits to an avi in Pipp before processing. 
I have a camera on its way, I’m not totally convinced it’s suitable but it was a good price on ukabs. It’s a brand I’ve never come across it’s a Point grey Blackfly usb3, it apparently has the same Sony chip as the zwo asi 174 so we’ll see!

I will have to look into that camera, thanks for the pointer.

6 minutes ago, assouptro said:

I’m new to this too! 
Great image! 
what camera did you use? 
also, a question about the scope.

I have a certain amount of image shift when rotating the helical focuser. How does your scope perform? 
cheers and thanks for sharing 

Bryan

Hi Bryan, Thank you.  I used an ASI 120 mm Its normally my guide scope camera. I think the pixal size is a little large for my set up so will iget a ASI 178mm when I can scrape some spare cash together.  I have a little image shift but found it hard to get good focus with the helical focuser, im looking into getting it motor driven as I think that will help. The scope its self im impressed with although i need to sort out the mounting of the camera as i could only get focus with the tip of the nose piece just in the clamp. I think i need some more time learnig how to proccess solar images, Its a lot different to DSO stuff.

Hi all, this is my first post on the light side, As it was getting to hard to do DSO stuff this time of the year i forced myself to buy a Daystar solar scout to dip my toe into the solar water! Here is my first image, not great by the standards set on the site but im happy that i managed to get the scope to work for me. Any hints and tips would be welcome,

Well this is the first image of the sun i have done, not great but im happy with it. I think I will get to like this scope once I can get a handle on the focussing side.

6 hours ago, Geoff Lister said:

With my GPCAM & x0.5 focal reducer, I keep the 90 degree star diagonal, remove the eyepiece, insert the camera, and adjust the focus.

Geoff

Thanks for the pointer, I got some images after much faffing. Will have to see what I can do with the focuser.

3 hours ago, garryblueboy said:

That’s a great shot well done 

Do you need a spacer for the camer to reach focus? or can it go straight onto the end of the scope?

35 minutes ago, RodAstro said:

Looks like we will be getting a report tomorrow simmo39

Full day of sun for you over there

Good luck with your testing and you should still be able to see the active region near the edge of the sun and maybe some nice proms.

Rod

Ill be out in the aflernoon as at work in the morning but ill be giving it a go.

Scope has finally arrived, just need some sun to do some test runs. Looks well made.