tomato

I inwardly groan when Vlaiv starts a post with “Take a look at your stars”…. But hey, he is spot on (literally) every time.☺️

Interestingly I get the same observation as Olly with my F7 refractors in that the dust bunnies seen on the flats are all on the camera sensor, and the LRGB flats are all identical, but with @Tomatobro’s RC 10 the LRGB flats all display different dust mote patterns so separate flats are required.

All other things being equal, mono will deliver a better result than OSC, but with the latest CMOS OSC sensors, first class results can be obtained, and you can always get something if your imaging session is cut short before you have obtained a full set of colour subs. I’m not a planetary imager but I would assume a colour camera makes this process more straightforward, especially on dynamic targets like Jupiter. My most recent camera purchases have been OSC sensors.

I bought a RASA8 on the back of seeing a galaxy image, but that was @gorann’s M31… My weapon of choice for all other galaxies is a SW Esprit 150 but I am interested to see what @Tomatobro’s SL RC10 with an ASI1600(binned 3x3) can do on the same targets.

Great M101, nicely processed in APP.👍

Here is Holmberg 124 in Ursa Major, made up of NGC 2805 on the upper left, and NGC 2814 and NGC 2820. I'm not sure if the knot on the LHS of NGC 2820 constitutes a separate galaxy, if not the image may not be eligible for the competition! A total of 7.1 hrs of data taken with the Esprit 150/ASI 178 dual rig, as follows: L 110 x 2 mins, R 46 x 2 mins, G 34 x 2 mins and B 24 x 2 mins, all binned 2x2. Calibrated and stacked in APP, combined in APP, further processed in StarTools, PI, AP and GIMP..

Nice NGC 3359 and a great job locating the Little Cub! I was going to have a go but you beat me to it.👍

"Venus and Mars are alright tonight...."

This is NGC 3344 in Leo, a face on spiral galaxy some 20 million LY distant, around 4.5' in diameter on the sky. This is a first time collaboration between myself using the Esprit 150/ASI 178 rig and second light on @Tomatobro's StellaLyra 10" RC/ASI 1600. Capture Details: Esprit 150: L 150 x 2 mins RGB 48 x 2 mins on each channel, all binned 2x2 RC 10: L 98 x 22 sec RGB 30 x 22 sec on each channel, all binned 3x3 Calibrated and stacked in APP, stacks combined and LRGB composition in APP, processed further in AP and GIMP. Lots of small galaxies in the image, PI's annotation only picks up the more prominent ones. I'm intrigued by the group of tiny reddish objects in the bottom left hand corner, how distant are they, I wonder?

I always start PHD before NINA and then connect to it, I’ve never seen this. I had a recent update for PHD, did this problem start after the update?

Great post, if I get a chance I’ll put the widefield cameras on my rig and have a go at capturing the “Little Cub”. May I point out a typo in the text, I presume the galaxy distance is out by a factor of 1M?

Brilliant! Who says it takes 11 days to do a ‘deep field’ image?👍

A great collage, are there a few very late night (i.e. very early morning) sessions in there?

Here are my five: The Dark Shark, RASA8/QHY268c The Spaghetti Nebula, RASA8/QHY268c,4 panel mosaic The Needle Galaxy, Esprit 150/ASI 178 dual rig Arp 84, the Heron, Esprit 150/ASI 178 NGC 3938, Esprit 150/ASI 178

Thanks for your comment, you have a great result there for 2 hrs of data, plenty of colour and detail in the core, and you have captured the faint irregular galaxy UGC 5086, to the lower left of NGC 2903. Have you loaded the EZ suite of free scripts into PI? I use the EZ denoise script a lot, it creates all of the masks automatically and does a great job 99% of the time on linear data. The soft stretch script is good also. Here is the link with the instructions on how to install the EZ processing suite, if you need them: https://remoteastrophotography.com/2020/12/easy-and-effective-noise-reduction-in-pixinsight

There is some nice detail in the core and the fainter arms are coming through well, I certainly think it is worth capturing RGB. Here is my effort from 2020, 8.7 hrs with the Esprit 150/ASI 178 rig.

Here is the very straightforward method I use for balancing a heavy side by side dual rig. In my case the scopes are in a fixed position on the plate bolted to the mount so I have to fix counter weights in the appropriate position, OK if your mount has the load capacity. http://www.wilmslowastro.com/tips/g11gemini.htm#balancing

Hi Vlaiv, No I binned at the image capture stage, I usually hardware bin 2x2 on this set up as these are mono cameras and imaging at 0.47 arcsec/pixel would be very optimistic, but you are quite correct, software binning would give me maximum flexibility at the processing stage. APP reports that the combined LRGB image has a FWHM min of 2.39 and a max of 2.50. It's looking clear here again tonight, so I will have another session on this galaxy at 2x2.

This is just over 5 hrs integration on the Esprit 150/ASI 178 dual rig comprising: 77x2 mins Lum 37 x 2 mins R 18 x 2 mins G 24 x 2 mins B Mindful of the perils of oversampling, these were all binned 3x3 so imaging at 1.41 arcsec/pixel. There was something strange going on with the seeing last night, I was getting good HFRs at the start but as the object climbed higher in the sky the numbers tailed off and the stars were visually poorer on the subs. Repeated re focus attempts would not improve them, but I did notice some variation in the guide star quality in PHD, so maybe there was some high cloud coming through later on that I couldn’t pick up visually. With high pressure in control I wouldn't think it was atmospheric turbulence, but there was a gusty wind last night in Shropshire. At this point I’m not sure if binning 3x3 is the way to go on my rig, I have had to move away from my usual processing procedure to prevent a very ‘blocky’ result. Not too keen on the blue/green stars either.

Thanks Gorann. Hiding under the foil are two ASI 178s, retro fitted with Peltier coolers by @Tomatobro. These are my sensor of choice for small galaxy hunting, I have had some success with this setup but still trying to optimise SNR vs resolution. I’m currently trying 3x3 binning… I look forward to your Esprit rig, I can send you details of the top bracing plate which has been quite successful at controlling the differential flexture problem associated with such a heavy set up, but if you have your own ideas I’ll follow them with great interest.

I have a dual side by side Esprit 150 rig, which can run with a variety of cameras. They are mounted on a Mesu 200 with an ADM adjustable saddle on the RH scope to facilitate sensor alignment. The bracing plate across the top of the tube clamps is essential to minimise differential flexture.

Agreed, not much to go wrong with them if the thread is correct, and at a bargain price.

Nice triplet. Not sure how good your sky is, but deeper images can reveal the tidal tail from NGC 3628, which is quite extensive.

That’s a great result, nice colour and detail on a target that is quite challenging in my book. The biggest improvement you could make IMHO, which you have already indentifed, is to capture more subs. I would say your imaging is coming along nicely.👍

With CMOS cameras I use APP to apply Darks, Dark Flats and Flats, again aiming for the Flats and Dark Flats to be a few seconds in duration. Darks are essential with my older amp glow affected CMOS cameras, and as I don’t always dither with a dual rig, they help create a bad pixel map for the cleaner IMX571 sensor cameras.