arkosg

Hm, that seems odd. I often use my Trius in 2x2 binning mode for more sensitivity for those really faint nebulae, but most of this recent set of images are at 1x1 binning. And I still only needed a few ~45s images, stacked, to get the pics I shared. I know the Trius mono cameras are considered pretty sensitive, but I wouldn't think they'd be *that* much different from other, recent cameras out there.... Is the light pollution in your region particularly bad? Cheers, - Greg

Thanks Louise. Our skies are OK but not great - Vancouver is not that far away, and dominates the eastern part of the sky. That said, the skies are not terrible either. But they are definitely not super dark like some locations I've visited! The nebula images I posted are, as I said, using a nebula filter - in this case an IDAS NB-1. In the past I've used a Halpha filter. Without these filters, there is simply too much skyglow and I have a difficult time getting the nebulosity to show up. But with the filters... it's actually quite amazing! The really faint ones are still tough, but that you can see anything at all in most cases is pretty incredible. So if you're keen on nebulae, I'd strongly suggest some sort of narrowband filter (I find that the more general skyglow/light pollution filters don't sufficiently darken the background to bring out the nebulosity as easily). Cheers, - Greg A

Thanks guys. The exposures actually *are* included - but in tiny print on each image (Starlight Live includes this info automatically when you export an image). Exposure times vary depending on the object, but for this set of images I typically used 30 - 45 sec exposures on fainter objects, stacking 3 - 6 images (sometimes SLL would stop stacking early for some reason). The Trius is also being run at 1x1 binning - in the past, I've commonly used 2x2 - just to see what impact that has. Definitely means slightly longer exposures need, but (atmosphere willing) more detail. The 1x1 binning is also why the exposure info is in such small writing; at 2x2 it is a more readable size. 🙂 Cheers, - Greg A

Hello everyone! After a pretty dreary September and part of October, I was finally able to get out with students to do some viewing. Here are some of the objects viewed over two nights using Starlight Live software on my Borg 77edii (f/4) and Borg 125SD (f/5) with a Trius 694 mono camera. In most cases an IDAS NB-1 "nebula" filter was employed to help with the suburban light pollution in our skies. The first night (mainly 125SD) was much steadier and drier, but along the coast we take what we can get when it isn't raining! ;-D It's so much fun to see these objects from less-than-optimal skies... I often intend to quit much earlier, only to find myself saying (over and over!) "... oh, look, <object> is coming up... I should just have a look at that before I pack up." And then another hour goes by! Cheers, - Greg A Eastern & Western Veil Comparison of FOV between two scopes on the NA Nebula Again, FOV comparison on the Elephant Trunk Nebula And again, with the Rosette Nebula Pacman Nebula through the 125SD: And Crab Nebula: And the Cocoon Nebula: Finally, a few wider shots of objects using the Borg77: Flame/Horsehead, California Nebula, Pelican Nebula and Andromeda Galaxy: