Tommohawk

Nice result! I had my camera set up and ready to go last night but was too tired and turned in at midnight! My loss!

From a practical standpoint, I tend to work with a fairly dim screen when imaging, so it's easy to underestimate the actual image brightness. That's my main reason for referring to the histo.

I was passing on "received wisdom"... but will defer to vlaiv!

Agree with Craig - try around 20ms and crank up the gain if necessary to get around 75% on the histo - be sure not to clip in either RG or B. You can probably run for 3 minutes with Jupiter - Autostakkert does a great job of effectively derotating. I usually use PIPP and keep the best 50%, and then Autostakkert and keep the best 20% of the remainder, or something like that. I don't know exactly how the software grades the images but by running through both I reckon should get the best of both. Saturn looks good given how low it is.

Looks good to me - I wonder what gain and exposure and frame rate you are using, and how many frames you are keeping in Autostakkert?

As you say, surprisingly good for a modest aperture. Can you not maybe leave the Newt out under cover to save setting up every time?

Very nice Jupiter with moons!

The concept of magnification when imaging is tricky. If you are doing observation using an eyepiece, magnification means how much bigger the object appears compared to when viewed with the naked eye. But when imaging, you don't really have anything to compare it with. The image size on your screen will depend on a number of factors - the telescope of course, but also the size of the camera pixels, and the size of your screen of course. As has been said, you can get an idea of the object size on your screen using that link above or by inputting your gear data into Stellarium or similar. It took me a while to get to grips with this when I first started imaging if that's any consolation!

Well maybe not to your usual standards, but very good given the conditions, and a nice transit too.

Welcome to SGL, lots of useful info here as you've discovered... but can't help with advice for that particular mount I'm afraid!

ZWO cameras are certainly very good, but in the meantime you might like to try ASCOM drivers. They are freely available, although sometimes you don't get such complete control over the camera as with dedicated drivers.

This is an old thread, but related. https://www.cloudynights.com/topic/686999-starlight-xpress-ascom-driver-issues/

Yes but starlight express isn't on the list of cameras which Nina supports. It might have been updated since then but if nina doesn't support your camera you may need to select the ascom driver.

See here. https://nighttime-imaging.eu/docs/master/site/requirements/

Well that's progress I suppose. Is it something to do with the driver? Do you need to download a driver maybe? I think for some cameras which the imaging software doesn't recognise you need to use the ASCOM driver option.

Just as a BTW, here's the summary weather on BBC for my approximate manor, followed by the weather map for 1 am tomorrow, same area. Spot the difference??!!

I was looking for a new target and chanced upon this whilst scanning Stellarium - main attraction was it was all done prior to crossing meridian just as the sun rose, so I just set it up and let it go. My SHO filters aren't quite parfocal - probably due to the CC - but near enough so I focussed on Ha and accepted that the others might be a tad off. TBH my OIII and SII are usually pretty raggy anyhow, so probably wouldnt notice. One slight frustration - I recently swapped my ZWO RGB filters for Astronomik ones which are thinner. Previously with all ZWO filters I could focus on red and that was good for Ha and SII, and similar for green and OIII. This no longer works so I have to spend longer getting focused with the NB filter rather than using the parfocal BB equivalent. Hey-ho. Quite please with the result given all done in 5 hours - started about 10.40 and finished 3.40. I was hoping to go again tonight because the forecast was dry - but we've just had some amazing thunderstorms with lashing rain, whilst the forecast shows not a drop!! These met office folks should try looking out of the window occasionally. Anyhow I'm not going to risk it tonight, even though right now it looks clear. I need to put a rain alarm on my Xmas list. Needs more time rally and also some BB for star colours. Skywatcher 200P + SW 0.9x CC, ASI1600, 100 mins each of HA SII and OIII. gain 300. Guiding was quite good (0.8 arc/sec RMS) but stars as ever a tad eggy. Thanks for looking, feel free to comment!

Yes my understanding is that liveview is effectively video standard. So I wonder what method you are using? Yo could set a sequence, but thats the only other method I know.

I'm sure it'll be when not if, given how much progress youve made in 6 months!

Silly question perhaps but how are you taking an image? Theres a live view function which is a bit flakey, and also a snap shot button which you can set to loop.

Simple experiment I resort to occasionally... shine alight down the scope. If its all hooked up OK you should get something!!

Looks great... you obviously have the basics going well, guiding and focusing etc. Positioning and framing is often tricky especially if yore working on a big subject using a longer FL - centration and framing becomes more critical especially if combining multiple sessions. TBH as with many of these "named" nebula I often struggle to see the object in question. I think this is the "Elephant's Trunk"... is there supposed to be a head there??

Which grease? You will get lots of answers...... all different 😆 I used a teflon type last time, but TBH I'm not sure how much difference it makes. Probably more about the adjustment etc. (In my view)

Hi all! I'm due to retire soon, and my colleagues kindly bought me a star-registration gift. TBH I have mixed feelings about all this, but thats for another thread! The star in question is "Tom's Twinkle" aka Lambda Cephei. I promised to photograph it and amazingly the sky was clear just a few nights later ie Friday night - it is set close to LDN 1165 and I thought frames quite well together. I posted the result on our work thread and the dark nebula doesn't look so clear as on my screen, so we'll see what happens when I post here. The usual chaos when getting set up (Windows restart for no apparent reason, NINA failed to connect etc) but eventually: SW200P with Skywatcher CC (0.9x) ASI1600MM + Astronomik DS filters, NINA, about 80x RGB binned 2x2 30sec, and 80x LUM unbinned, Astropixel processor, PS. Slightly over-processed to maximise star colour, heart shaped stars (because I set the secondary mirror heater to 12V instead of 3V... Grrrr.) Hope you like it, grateful as ever for comment, thanks for looking!

Sound like a strip down is the way to go - it really isn't that tricky if you follow Astrobaby's guide. you can then check that everything rotates nicely and is properly lubed. That grub screw sounds stripped which is a pain - in fact the screw looks OK so maybe the housing stripped which is worse. I dont think you absolutely need that to adjust it BTW, but certainly easier. To get really good results you will need to guide though. And don't get obsessed about backlash! If you keep everything slightly "East heavy" you can have a fair degree of backlash and it wont matter.