Droogie 2001

Some years ago I went to the Science museum in London. On display was a mask of sorts which has been painted in the darkest black paint ever created. What was incredible was when you looked face on you could not see any detail or geometry, just a black void. I believe this was Vantablack which was both very expensive and not available to the public. I wondered at the time if it would be a great way to use it to flock / paint inside an OTA to reduce light. Well there is a new black paint, version 4 to be more accurate called Black 4.0 which seems to outperform Vantablack. It’s not cheap but is at least viable price, 150ml for £44.99. I am in no way associated with the product and I’ll let people look for the link the themselves, as above it’s called “Black 4.0” and sold by culture hustle. The inside of my built in retractable dew shield could be an option and maybe scope manufacturers may start painting this inside their OTA in the future. Has anyone tried this or thinking of this as an option?

Just finished the second episode which was also very enjoyable. I too liked the section on Dara's personal astronomy passion and equipment (plus the money pit / hole quote which I think many of us on SGL can relate to 😀). It certainly added to the programs authenticity. Good on Channel 5 to bring us an Astronomy / Science series.

Just finished watching the first episode and have to say I quite enjoyed it. Yes its fairly light weight and I was familiar with a lot of the topics. Particularly enjoyed the way the moon has been observed over the millennia. Good to see Dara presenting an Astronomy related topic again, I miss Stargazing live when he was presenting it alongside Brian Cox. He does not get too much into the technical aspects as say Brian would have, which is a good thing nor does he crack jokes all of the time. Will watch the second episode.

I see that Nik Szymanek has released a follow up magazine Shooting Stars 2. Shooting Stars – 2nd Edition – Astronomy Now Shop I purchased the original one many years ago and even have a signed edition! I have no doubt it will be great but just wondered what sort of content is in there. I use PixInsight so would be looking at tutorials around this mainly. Has anyone purchased a copy as I don't think it is being sold in shops for a quick flick through... Thanks

I agree HOO on the Elephant Trunk can be tricky to get a pleasing colour. I recently spent more time on getting the colour blend to my satisfaction than the actual post processing!

Hi, I have shared in a similar experience to you, in that I originally purchased a Celestron 8SE when I first became interested in Astronomy. However as I quickly became keen on Astrophotography I purchased a WO Star71 which made life a lot simpler, nice round stars with 25mins subs. Moving back to the 8SE has been a challenge but if you accept that its not got a flat field and the focuser is not especially good then I think it can be worth while. Is this an inherent property of the SCT, especially that its not an EDGE? - Yes I get egg shaped stars on the corners which relates to coma. Cropping is basically the best way of dealing with that although its a shame to lose some resolution and image detail from doing this. Within the centre you should get relatively round stars. I have taken 20mins subs with the 8SE and could have gone longer. My main issue is that the OAG stars are quite distorted but PHD seems to cope with this. Your guiding RMS looks good but don't be too taken with low RMS meaning good guiding. I have had RMS of 1.0 and have managed to get round stars within the centre of the image. Have a look at my FlickR channel and you can see some of the results (Link within my signature) . They are not very special but I am fairly happy with them. I do however find galaxies a lot tougher than nebula! Good Luck.

Nit picking but the Guardian reviewer can't even get the number of episodes right. Do they not realise that maybe the audience hasn't watched all of Brains previous shows.

Just watched the first episode on iPlayer and have to say I enjoyed it. Agree that there was not very much new content that hadn't already covered in his previous Wonders series, but that was 11 years ago. Have to say I did not see any reused footage. Really not sure what people want from this series. Do they want deep astrophysics discussion, is so then that's more of a one off Horizon episode. The 5 mins at the end which is a common BBC trait where they show actual scientists involved in some of the covered content is always interesting. As other people have pointed out its better than most of the garbage on TV these days.

Thanks JimJam. You are right I don't think I am missing any functionality, other than software stability and maybe improved focusing algorithm's. I have a good old CCD which is still serving me well so I think you maybe right about the CMOS focused. I'll stick with version 2 for the moment. Still trying to get outside to setup my new Pegasus FocusCube, its either cloudy or too windy!

Thanks. I agree there is a lot of nebulosity what with the columns of twisted knots of hydrogen gas. I will be definitely targeting OIII later this year.

Having not posted an image in a while and after finding some subs from last year I thought I would have some fun with creating a starless image of the core of the Heart nebula, Merlotte 15. I have been a bit lazy with cleaning all of the stars but not too bad if you don’t zoom too much… This is heavily cropped despite being imaged from the longer focal length of the Celestron C8 OTA: Celestron C8 Mount: Skywatcher EQ6-R Pro Camera: Moravian G2-8300 – Mono Filters: Chroma Ha 3nm 5x1200s exposures of Ha (100 mins) at -25c Total: 100mins Only 5 subs so not as much data as I would have liked. I had planned to add OIII but a combination of poor weather and location put an end to that. The full image with stars is posted on my Flickr account (link in signature)

Thanks. I have not tried NINA yet. I guess I am being lazy as I want to get up to speed with my new focuser rather than having to learn a new application as well. Interesting about yearly plan I did not realise you can forego the upgrades. Maybe once I have tested my focuser (weather permitting) I will have a look a NINA.

Hi, I have been using SGP v2 for years and it has served me well with very few issues other than the occasional drop out or annoying window behaviour. As I am about to receive a new Pegasus auto focuser I thought I would take a look at the latest version of SGP. So v3 seems to still be the current versions although I see that a v4 is in Beta. What I found slightly disappointing is that as well as a one off payment of $149 they have the dreaded yearly subscription fee model of $59 thereafter. As my new focuser is fully supported on v2 so this is a bit of an ask. Looking through the features list I don't see much that v2 cant do, is it mainly for new users with later CMOS camera support? Is there anything fundamental in the way focusing works in SGP v3 (or the v4) that makes it an essential upgrade? Thanks

Well I finally caved in and purchased the Pegasus power box Ultimate v2. It’s certainly not cheap especially when adding on the dedicated PSU and other shorter cables. To be honest I could not find a better alternative that would meet my requirements. All other options were compromises which defeated the point of the whole endeavour. Hopefully this will help my setup times and get me imaging more often. It also offers the option for other ideas. A USB compute stick could be an interesting project. Thanks for everyone’s advice.

Thanks guys. Saved me some time and hassle. It did feel the further I looked into the details the more I suspected it was not going to be suitable., particularly without a compatible CCD camera.