thomasv

Wow, thanks, interesting. I think I'll stick to OSC camera, should the clouds ever clear here.

Great pictures. So, I assume the 2nd one was taken with a tracking mount, and did you just stack the subs on the stars? I suspect there isn't any detectable movement of the comet against the stars in 2.5mins.

Thanks. I did play a lot with focus using the magnified live view (canon 6D) and picked these out from about 50 shots in total. And applied a touch of sharpen in Gimp.

Shot from the upstairs window after walking to the fields the past two evenings and being clouded out. Crescent of Venus can just about be seen. Just Moon and Mercury after Venus disappeared. And while focusing ...

Taken with Fuji X-T1 and Samyang 135mm at F2, 60x1mins from Bortle 5 with Idas NB1 filter. Got some walking noise as couldn't dither with the mount (Fornax lightrack 2).

Hi, bit of a late reply, sorry. I have the P30 pro and it's absolutely brilliant for daytime / general, even nighttime terrestrial photography. I did experiment with it a bit for astro. I realise the attached cygnus picture is a bit horrid, as it's jpg and did not do any gradient removal etc, I just wanted to use it to demonstrate the camera's sensitivity, I think you can make out NGC7000. The colour gradient is due to using a nebula filter in front of the lens, picture taken from light polluted area, and it is a single shot. People have been posting much better milky way pictures from dark locations. Unfortunately, there is a but, it has in my mind a 'showstopper' bug: https://forum.xda-developers.com/huawei-p30-pro/help/manual-focus-to-infinity-results-blurry-t3937296 which was reported some time ago, and I'm still not aware of a workaround. Basically in 'auto' mode the camera can focus to infinity, but it's a bit hit and miss, when you try to focus on the sky. So, then you would of course use manual focus, however, the P30 cannot be set to infinity focus in manual mode, it's stops just short of it. It's clearly a SW bug as the HW can do it in auto mode. This is very annoying as I'm sure the camera HW would be able to produce quite nice results using stacked raw images. Attached some other pictures also taken with the phone for fun.

Looks like cam is modded based on the signature. Heading to Tenerife next week with almost the same equipment, SA mini, modded 6D + sigma 35mm F1.4. If I get something similarly good, I'll be happy.

I use the velbon dv-7000n, and think it's excellent, very solid with the centre column brace. Obviously take the fluid head off, which is then wasted, but still good value I think just for the tripod.

Don't know if any help, but I've hammered pieces of pipe into the ground, into which the tip of the tripod legs fit. You could cover them with gravel as long as you can find them again somehow and just expose them when you setting up.

Hi, I think as it's being used with a lens, the spacing is not super critical as you can adjust focus slightly, as long as it's roughly right and gives you a bit of margin beyond infinity. I did cut the spacer so that it gave me the required 44mm flange to sensor distance. The posted picture was cropped and stars reduced, I can post a full sized unedited sub later.

Hi, yes they say the older non USM Canon 300m is actually sharper than the latest. I have a geoptik clone EOS to CCD adapter like this one: https://www.astroshop.eu/dslr-lens-adaptors/omegon-t2-adapter-for-canon-eos-lenses/p,43762 connected to a TS filter drawer unit: https://www.365astronomy.com/ts-optics-filter-quick-changer-for-36mm-round-unmounted-filters-length-10mm-including-filter-drawer.html then a spacer that came with the 1600, I just had to shorten it a bit. You may not need the filter drawer if you don't want to swap filters with your colour cameras, you can put an LP filter inside the EOS to CCD adapter I think. I also have the ZWO EOS to CCD adapter but I found the omegon more solid as its got a ring that you can tighten up against the lens.

Several clear nights in a row, so spent two evenings on this. When I say evenings, with setup and dodging the moon it's about 80min worth of each Ha and Oiii. Ha was 4 min subs, Oiii 5mins subs, with ASI1600 set to lowest read noise setting (i think gain=300). Canon 300mm F4 wide open and using Baader 7 and 8.5nm filters. Stacked in Astroart and adjusted in Gimp. Advice appreciated, I know it's probably too blue, as I was desperately trying to show the blue outer bubble. Just received today the Baader 'ultra-narrow band' filters that I want to try, but I have to do some hacking as I bought 31mm for availability, but my filter drawers are 36mm, so some 3D printing will be required. Attached a picture of the portable setup, as I'm just about happy with it, after trying many variations. The picture also shows the extent of light pollution, although it was taken in 'night shot' mode, so not quite as bad as this, but I do have two LED lights just outside my garden.

Are you aware of the Sony "star eater" issue, search it up if you aren't. I don't know exactly how big of an issue is for long focal length. Also, of course you'd need to consider modding it if you want good Ha sensitivity.

Finally had a chance to give a proper go with my idas NB1 filter. Don't like how the stars came out with red halos, otherwise happy and will keep the filter. Someone might be able to fix the stars who is more knowledgeable in processing. Used a modified Canon 6D with equinox 80ED (no flattener), F6, about 2.5 hours of exposures in Bortle 5 skies with LED lights just outside my backyard.

Here is the edited version, and also managed to plate solve it, I think it's coming from the correct radiant to be a Perseid.

Huawei P30 pro namely, quite fun. Only had it for a few days, for a phone camera it's impressive, of course a lot of the performance comes from extensive processing in the phone, so not for pixel peepers. Unfortunately already discovered a bug, which doesn't let me manually fix the focus to infinity, hope that will be fixed in a future SW update (auto mode does reach infinity). Anyway, here is Ursa Major above a lake, according to exif info it was 0.85s exposure at iso 65535 (exactly !), with main camera which is F1.6.

Thank you very much for the replies, nice to have some confidence that it is a meteor. I think I'll try to edit out the satellite trail. The white balance was set to daylight btw. I've tried to plate solve it on astrometry but it failed. I'll try again, perhaps another frame of the same area. Regards.

Set up for Perseid hunt, set alarm for 1:30am to start imaging for a couple of hours of darkness. I think I caught a few small ones, this one seems the biggest, however would be nice if people could confirm that it is really a meteor. I'm talking about the horizontal one, the other trace is probably a satellite. The area was just west of Polaris, even if it's a meteor, I'm not sure it's a Perseid. Thanks.

The evoguide is not corrected, so you'll get distortions on anything but the smallest of sensors. Have tried it for fun, but it was only sharp in the very centre of the aps-c sensor, below examples are heavily cropped.

I've just ordered what I think is the IDAS version of these: https://www.firstlightoptics.com/light-pollution-reduction-imaging/idas-narrow-band-nebula-nb1-filter.html Not in stock, so it'll be a while before I get it.

This may not be a very scientific test, just wanted to have a quick feel for my newly acquired idas d2 filter, so took some shots of the LED street light of our street. In order, first is now filter, 2nd is with Idas D1 and 3rd is with Idas D2. To me D2 doesn't look less bright than the D1, would you agree? I've also tried to look at the mean luminance value of each in GIMP and the D2 came out higher than the D1. What do you think, have I wasted some money?

A couple of pictures I've taken with the evoguide mounted on a fuji X-T1, both of course heavily cropped.

Just wonder if by 'reliably' you mean you don't have to discard any subs at 300mm 90sec? With the shape of PE being roughly sinusoidal, there will be some time periods with not much change for 90sec and some with a rapid change of error. I've only seen a couple of other measured reports of PE for the SA and if I remember correctly they were in the range of 30-50" peak to peak, so I may be unlucky with my mount. Another slightly amusing thing I've just found recently is that, since I use the polemaster to align, I used to leave the plastic polar scope cover on, but the setting circles on the polar scope can actually touch the plastic cover. With the RA clutch loose, rotating the axis by hand gives scratching noises as it rubs against the plastic cap. It might be in the manual which I've never read fully, that the cover is supposed to be left off for the whole session, not just during polar alignment.

I have to say I wouldn't be surprised if you get some trailing at 260mm focal length based on the periodic error I've measured for my SA, see towards the end of this post: Some people report good results for up to 300mm FL without guiding, I can't see how I could do that with my mount, I wonder if there is a fairly large spread in the extent of PE between individual SAs.

Is this a joke? Anyone willing to try, you'd be saving £1746, surely a no brainer