Selborne

On 17/02/2019 at 10:35, Nikolas74 said:

I was wondering if the dew shield has to be extended all the way ?? does it really makes a difference ?what if i remove it ?

If it is a dew'y night then yes the dew shield needs to be all the way out, in fact I also have dew heaters to stay on top of the issue.

thanks

Jamie

On 22/07/2019 at 22:19, Costabrava Skies said:

Hi Everybody,

This is the first time I have submited a question on this or any other astro forum. I plan to purchase a Skywatcher Esprit ED 100 with the aim to start getting into DSO imaging. Until now I have just done planetary and lunar imaging with my Skywatcher 12 " goto dob. I live in Spain and have pretty good seeing conditions. I know that I will need guide scope etc. but what I am not sure about is what equatorial mount to buy. I was planning to purchase a Skywatcher HEQ6 goto mount as by my calculations it should be more than enough to manage the payload but my local telescope shop are suggesting that it might not be enough and that I should go for the NEQ 6. This bumps up my budget which is already over the limit I had set myself. The ccd camara I will using will be my ZWO ASI 224 colour. I know it is not really designed for DSO imaging but will buy a better dedicated camara when I can afford it. Any advice regarding whether or not the Skywatcher HEQ6 mount is suffient would be very much appreciated.

Many thanks to to yoi all.

paul

Hi Paul, based on my experience with the HEQ6 I have the scope performs impeccably, I have modded the mount to belt drive, so to be honest if you are going to go the skywatcher route, I would recommend the NEQ6 Pro, as it has the belt drive as standard.  I find that I can keep tp less than 1" arc second using my HEQ^ modded drive using PHD guiding, so you should be able to achieve the same or better with the HEQ6 Pro (but of course you polar alighment has to be nearly perfect), I use QHY PoleMaster with teh HEQ6 adapter, it get me onto the pole star perfectly.  Hope this helps, thanks Jamie

I recently purchased a cooled astro camera the ZWO ASI294C one-shot colour camera and the new ASIAIR all in one astro-photography telescope top computer (Rasberry Pie), and the first object I attempted was the Pleiades M45,  I have to say my first impressions are that it is just awesome, there is next to no noise what so ever.  In the case of this image, I took 20 x 240s shots, no darks, no lights and no bias, as it was just a test, however with this result, I think I will not be worrying too much in the future with all the additional preparation shots.

I processed the image using AstroPixelProcessor software and then finished it off in Photoshop, the image did not need a huge amount of processing, mostly levels and some curve adjustment, so very happy.

The ASIAIR is probably one of the most complete pieces of technology I believe I have ever had the good fortune to use, one I got to understand how it worked, I was able to sit in the comfort of my living room to use it, as it connects via 5GHz wifi, the guiding works very well and the ease of use for setting the camera temperature and exposure time was very pleasing, what a wonderful plug and play piece of equipment, well done to ASI  !!

I understand that M45 is a bright object, so the next plan is to try darker more difficult target to see how I get on, I will let you know 🙂

thanks

Jamie

On 29/10/2018 at 08:35, SteveMunro said:

Hi Jamie, thanks for sharing your incredible Image. I have a quick question, if you don't mind, that is related to both scope and camera (i.e. I own A7rii and I'm wanting to buy the Skywatcher Esprit 100). What mounts are you using to attach the camera to the scope? I've been in touch with Bintel and, unfortunately this time, they are unable to give me the information I need so, as you are using both which I intend to use, can you please let me know how it all came together for you? All the best, Steve

Hi Steve,

I purchased mine from 365 Astronomy, Zoran there is very helpful, he calculated the tube length from the field flattener and put together a set of adapters which allow me to have a native sony mount adapter through to the M48 connection to the field flattener, it was not cheap the whole setup was about £60, but it is the right tool for the right job.

regards

Jamie

Hi Souls,

Your first statement is correct, you cannot mount filters inside the adapter,

Interesting that the new box is smaller !

many thanks

Jamie

Congratulations Nikolas, now you journey begins !  did you order the field flattener as well ?

Here is another shot to show just how sharp the Skywatcher 100 ED Pro Esprit Scope really is.  This is 3 x 30s Sony A7Rii Frames, stacked in Photoshop of the Hercules M13 Great Globular Cluster.  I think I have found my forever scope ? 

thanks

Jamie

9 hours ago, Nikolas74 said:

Thanks Selborne !!!!!! i ordered the Bahtinov  as well....now i am trying to find something for auto focus.......

Do you have any ideas ???

Nikolas.

 

Sorry Nikolas, no recommendations for auto focus systems, something I do not use.   I focus between each set of frames with the bahtinov mask, lock the focus and shoot.  Once the scope is down to ambient temperature, it does not seem to change much.

Regards Jamie

On 16/08/2018 at 16:14, daz said:

Not seen any of those Trevor Jones vids, but will go browsing tonight

I stated the name of Trevor Jones' You Tube page incorrectly, it is 'AstroBackYard', he takes a very light hearted view of the hobby and helps with the more basic things that we all having trouble with when first starting, plus the videos are quite entertaining with his dog Rudy ? 

38 minutes ago, Nikolas74 said:

I just ordered one from FLO.....  

You will not be disappointed, it is very sharp.  Make sure you have a Bahtinov mask for focus, as it is critical with this scope, the 10:1 focuser does help.

lets see your results once you have the little beauty ? 

I had a chance to get out in the garden last evening, had a go at capturing NGC 7023 - Iris Nebula, only managed to get 12 good shots, 240sec x 12, combined in Photoshop with Mean Stacking.  The dew was super heavy and currently I do not have any dew heaters (next purchase) so lost the battle after around 2 hours. 

One interesting point is I captured these shots with the long exposure noise reduction switched on with the Sony A7Rii, so each shot took 8 mins to take and save, but as a result the noise levels were next to zero at 800 ISO, and at the end of the day the noise is always our enemy.

I am very happy with the final shot,

thanks

Jamie

Hi Guys,

I thought I would share with you my first hand experience of the Skywatcher ED100 Pro Esprit Telescope, I have only had it a few months, but so far I am extremely happy with the results, it is so sharp and the contrast is very high.

I live in a small town, Stowmarket, Suffolk, UK, where the light pollution is not to bad, but still I have to be cautious with the direction I choose to point the telescope.   All my astrophotography is done from the back garden on my patio.

I have had a few different telescopes over the years, but I always found myself moving more and more into astrophotography, so after some research I selected the Skywatcher ED100 Pro Esprit, as many of the other users had commented on the sharpness and contrast.  As I wanted to focus on more wide field astrophotography the F5.5 speed giving 550mm seemed the right choice, I also use an ED50 Skywatcher Guide Scope with an Altair Astro ASI130mm camera for the guiding and of course PHD2 software, all mounted on my Skywatcher HEQ6 mount.

Here is a shot of the Andromeda Galaxy, 20 x 30s stills at ISO 800 on my Sony A7Rii, no filters just RAW images processed with Photoshop, Stacked Mean option.  I used the Trevor Jones video on his BackyardAstro You Tube page for processing DSO's and it seems to work very well.  What you will see from the image is just how sharp it is, something that really surprised me when I processed the images.

This has inspired me to spend more time outside in the garden to photograph more objects, plus I have recently purchased an Astronomic CLS Filter for my Sony A7Rii, so I am looking forward to using this to see if it improve the contrast.  I will keep you informed.

Also I am looking forwarded to trying my Olympus EM1 MK2 camera, yes I know it does not have the capabilities of the Sony A7Rii for light gathering, but it does have a really clever mode where it can stack the images in camera to reduce noise, so I will also let you know how this went as well.

Best Regards

Jamie