nitram100

I bought my first astro cam 2 weeks ago, altair 183c and it's been sat in the box ever since. I understand now why astrophotography is utterly frustrating in this country! Not sure I can handle much more of this weather anymore! I've hurried up my plans to return to Australia due to this weather, I can't roll the dice each summer hoping for clear skies it's not a good way to live. This weather is low key depressing the hell out of me!

I can only observe when I don't have work the next day. No way in hell I can do a Nursing shift after a long night/early morning of observing !

Thank you so much for this!

Thanks buddy! In this pic that I've attached, I've highlighted the secondary. Should it be sticking out like that? Should I be able to see that part of the secondary at all? Because I installed a new 4 vane spider a few years back and wondereing if it is a little off. Thanks again

Never been that good with collimation, cleaned my mirrors a while back and not sure I have aligned everything correctly when putting it all back together. 10" F4.8 OO Camera is looking down a collimation cap in the first three photos and the last 2 are looking down a cheshire collimation eyepiece. Sorry if it isn't clear! Thanks for any help

Thanks a lot for your help and info, I think I need to read a bit more and make sure the 183c fan cooled is suitable for my needs as you say. If the fan cooling on the 183c doesn't help with darks etc What is the advantage of a fan cooled over a non fan cooled like a 224mc, just allows me to take slightly longer exposures of say 60 secs with less noise? Can I mitigate amp glow by stacking lots of shorter exposures? Thanks again for the help!

Thank you for the info mate! I had read about fan and Tec cooling. Would 275 still be a decent deal for that camera on abs? It's right at the upper limit of my budget for a camera at the moment. It would definitely be better than the ZWO 224 and 482 from what I've read!

Thanks very much for all the info, much appreciated.

Hi guys so the 482mc that I was bidding on I was outbid. But I did see this on abs, Altair Hypercam 183C Pro for £275. It has cooling so looks to be better than the 482mc? Would that be a good buy ?

Amazing setup. Mine will be a bit more humble, just the 10" Orion optics on a neq6 pro. Hope to get some average shots! I'm easily pleased haha

Thanks a lot for the advice. Looking forward to diving in and learning as I go 😎

Wow thanks Elp, sold on the zwo definitely over the dslr

Wow that is beautiful. That is 4565? If I could get anything close to that with my scope I would be chuffed. I'll be using a neq6 pro. Thanks a lot for all of the info guys and above poster offering the 224mc. I think I'm leaning towards the 482, seems a better buy for me. I saw the £180 dlsr on abs, looks very tempting. Are there any downsides to a digital SLR when compared to the 482? Do they need more adaptors etc Sorry for the questions, still learning 😎

Hi guys, which if these cameras would be more suited to my scope? Orion Optics 10" 1200mm focal length , f4.8 ratio. Looking to take planetary images and the some smaller DSO. Just want to dabble and have a little fun so budget won't stretch to a cooled camera unfortunately. Thanks for any help !

Just a silly thought but could we all contact wakefield council or whoever it is and complain about said light? Surely they can't ignore 100's of complaints.

Now that's a law I could get behind haha. 5 round mma fight bare knuckle , winner chooses the lighting situation haha

Aren't there laws that prevent other people's lights etc affecting your enjoyment of your property? I also read that people don't have a right to light up their garden? Anyways, had a recent neighbor install a flood light outside their front and it lights up my room at night , it's ridiculous. I went over and asked him to tilt it or stick a hood in because I'm not sleeping, they sorted it out. My immediate neighbor , lovely bloke but my god he is obsessed with outdoor lighting. I've had to tell him to lower them or hood them because it lights up my entire house and garden..luckily the garden is pitch black after midnight which is usually when I get started anyway. I've planted lots of lleylandi trees , hopefully in a few years I'll have a complete wall if trees giving me protection. Cheap lighting is definitely getting out of hand. One guy down the road has RGB lighting on his drive way, it's getting ridiculous. Really makes me want to move to the ass end of no where.

My orion optics 250 and EQ6 had been in my kitchen for a very long time and it was such a ball ache bringing it out for a session, so i purchased a cheap gazebo and some tarpaulin, now it sits underneath the gazebo wrapped in the tarp.

Just spotted an ASI 120 in classified for 85 quid, would that give any good DSO images? I see it's mainly a planetary imager. Thanks

Awesome thanks everyone, will keep an eye out on the astrobuysell site 👍👍 One question, can dslrs take decent planetary and lunar ? Cheers

Hi everyone, I managed to have my first dabble with AP a while back with a very old cheap meade deep sky imager II. I was looking to get another camera for better images , have about £250 to spend. Any recommendations? Uinsg with the scope in my sig ! cheers

It certainly is a joy for lovers of nature. I remember last week I was in the glass house mountains, a rainforest and a beautiful beach all in one day. It can be quite strange driving or walking down the road in a normal urban area seeing bats hanging from the telephone pole then a cockatoo flying past then a big huntsman spider for good measure haha, sometimes feels like an open safari haha Sardinia is beautiful too, I went to Cala Gonone a few years ago.

Yep it is a beautiful country. What strikes me the most is that the Milky Way is still visible from where I am even though I'm only 30 mins drive from the center of Brisbane. You only have to drive 30 mins or so to get very dark skies, it's incredible. Seeing Orion upside down is a bit odd, the sun moves from right to left lol and the moon is sometimes directly over head, it caught me all off guard.

Mindblowing ! To think this is only the beginning. We have 20 years of this with images being released weekly, not to mention the new data on exoplanets. Finally some good news in the world and something to look forward to.

Hi everyone I emigrated to Australia last week and currently driving a camper van from sydney to brisbane, found myself in a very dark part of rural nsw and holy jeez the milky way and sky are ansolutely mind blowing, firstly I don't recognise any constellations haha but I could see crux and alpha centauri. I pointed my pixel 5 to the sky and took an astro photo, this is what it took and the naked eye image is in all honestly probably better, absolutely mind blowing skies. I think the second photo is the LMC? Visible to my eye as a huge dark cloud, thought it was an actual cloud at first!