tomato

Another superbly crafted image Goran. Please don’t take this the wrong way, but aren’t large parts of the Cosmos just filthy with dust? I say this because the image reminds me of illustrations of the Black Country, which if you are not familiar with the name, described parts of the West Midlands in the UK characterised by the pollution from the Industrial Revolution. Don’t get me wrong, I’m from that region and am immensely proud of it’s heritage, there is a tenuous connection for me as the clouds of dust and smoke in your stunning image have their origins in Cosmic thermonuclear furnaces.

With the cost of those filters, I couldn’t see me putting them in more than once.☺️

Very nice, I’ll take two for my dual rig....😉

Great M13, you have NGC 6207 in there also. Good choice with the ASI 2600mc, I have the QHY version and have been mightily impressed.

Don’t be too alarmed by Sitech, I followed the excellent Steve Richards set up guide and although there are pages and pages of parameters to mess with in the Configuration file, I haven’t touched any of them. Sitech.exe links seamlessly to CDC, SGP, NINA etc, or you can use it stand alone like I did for the first few years. It comes with a comprehensive catalogue of objects so plenty to go at. The Sitech users forum is great, quite a few Mesu owners on there but I love the posts from the intrepid astronomers using the Sitech module to control a myriad of home made mounts of all shapes and sizes.

Looks great, Lucas has certainly given the mount a streamlined look, the Mk I is festooned with nuts and bolts. My Mesu is coming up to seven years old, on Friday night it was guiding at 0.35” total RMS, with about 100 kg all up load, with nary a belt mod or DFO tweak in sight.

Thread resurrection, I understand the nightly releases of NINA now support ASCOM compatible dome control, anybody used this successfully with the Pulsar dome control?

Probably no help but I have the Datacolor Spyder 5 Express model and after doing a bit of online research I use it with the DisplayCal free calibration software rather than the software bundled with the unit. This tutorial is pretty good: https://www.techspot.com/guides/2055-how-to-monitor-calibration/ I use a separate display monitor as I could never get used to how the display changed so much with the tilt angle of the laptop screen. I agree the green cast does not look right.

Wow, a branch of visual astronomy that hurts the wallet as much as imaging.

Fantastic detail and colour, really sharp. I never realised there was a gap in the tail between it and the galaxy until looking at this close in image.

How long to get “good” images? I think it all depends, I have seen first time images on SGL that look as good as some taken by renowned imagers with many years of experience. My first time images like most others I suspect, were not to this standard. However, I wouldn’t be hesitant about posting anything, I felt the same way as I had spent upwards of £5k on my initial set up and felt the quality of my images should reflect that level of investment. In the end I posted this image of M81 which should have been way better than it was if you took the kit used to capture it into account, but, hey, I thought it was pretty cool, but more to the point, I received nothing but encouraging feedback on this forum, and also many useful pointers on how I might improve on it.

Having spent the morning helping @Tomatobro install and commission the Pulsar supplied dome drive and controller, I must say I am very impressed with the simplicity of the process and the performance of the unit. For sure they aren’t cheap, but it delivers everything that is required with the minimum of fuss, if you aren’t into retro engineering and don’t have access to a fully equipped workshop then they are definitely worth considering.

I think in my very early days with the Mesu 200 I used the ST-4 port on the Sitech II controller with no issues, I’m assuming the Sitech controller shipped with the Mk II has an ST-4 port?

A very thought provoking post Olly. I accepted that a dual 6” refractor rig imaging at 1” per pixel was always going to be challenging on several fronts, and so it has proved to be. To be fair since @Tomatobro’s designed and fabricated top bracing plate, differential flexture has been managed to (for me) an acceptable level, but it does show up from time to time. To be fair, after this recent observation I checked and found both the bracing plate retaining bolts and the tube ring clamps looser than they should be, I will repeat the same imaging orientation and see if it improves after tightening. The AO solution sounds like an interesting and challenging project, I presume the SX unit would be the one to go for?

Here is my attempt, processed in Startools, and Affinity photo. Super clean data as usual, default workflow in ST, then adjustments in Levels, Curves and Selective colour in AP.

That's a good result under a full moon, as you point out, M101 is a challenging subject if you are not under dark, moonless skies.

Thanks for the reply. The subs from the OAG scope were fine, no trailing, so it must be differential flexture. I’ll tighten everything up before the next outing, see if that fixes it.

This is M51 imaged over 4 nights in April, the last night capturing Ha under a 85% illuminated moon. Total integration 7.6 hrs. Dual Esprit 150/ASI 178/Mesu 200 rig, binned 2x2. L 89 x 3 min R 13 x 3 min G 13 x 3 min B 13 x 3 min Ha(7nm) 12 x 6 min Calibrated and stacked in APP, processed in Startools and APP.

Amazing image Peter. It reminds me of a terrestrial photo of Mt Everest or the Matterhorn.

The recent welcome run of clear nights has allowed me to note a strange phenomenon on my dual Esprit 150 rig. I have been imaging M51 which is pretty much overhead from my location and on three occasions around midnight I have observed trailing on the non guided scope for about 3x3 min subs which then disappears. I should note the guiding has been steady and constant on all 3 nights at 0.4” total RMS. Also it is definitely a trailing issue rather than a change in focus, which would perhaps make more sense (except the motorised focusers are backlash free). Flexing between the scopes can and does occur on the rig but usually when they are near to a horizontal orientation, why would it occur when they are near vertical? Maybe slippage in the tube rings if not perfectly vertical would manifest itself as trailed stars?

Perhaps it’s not fair to comment, given I have never owned or even looked through a Tak, but all I can say that is when I looked at putting together a dual 6” APO rig for imaging I went with SW Esprit 150s based on a price/performance assessment from existing owners’ experiences posted here on SGL. Looking on FLO I think the Tak equivalent is the TOA-150B, for the price of one OTA I have dual scopes with FFs, tube rings etc with a few £k left over, and that is at current post COVID prices...

I’m no lunar imager, but that looks like a really nice shot to me, l’m sure you will be impressed with 314’s capabilities once you can image some DSOs.

Great images and very informative notes, shows you don’t need to have a close up rig to enjoy galaxy season.

IMHO I agree a level playing field is going to be very tricky on this one, galaxy imaging benefits from pristine dark skies, and we haven't all got those. But hey, it's only for fun, right?😉

Nice one! You should give the 3C 273 jet a go, I tried and think I captured it, just.