malftobe

@jgoluch Not sure if it helps, but you can get an m42 adaptor for the Samyang 135 (canon mount) from ENS optical. https://ensoptical.co.uk/index.php?route=product/product&product_id=13220 I have a bit of a Frankenstein setup, so I couldn’t get the correct backfocus with the m48 adaptor and my spacing rings, but the m42 adaptor linked above works fine. edit: read a bit further up the thread and your quote is related to a question about a nikon version. Apologies, this is another canon adaptor. Might be helpful to others though!

Thank you for going into such detail with this. Your knowledge, experience and expertise shines through in your images and explanations. Really interesting process as nothing looks out of place or "stuck on" as you say in your final image. The subtlety with this is not lost yet is lost - or something! I can see myself doing exactly the opposite to try and highlight the "stars of the show" so to speak and making an absolute mess of it. If you hadn't mentioned it in your post, I'd be none the wiser and you could have saved yourself a considerable amount of time typing your reply! Thank you very much for the walk through. The subtraction then re starring of the mosaic stars does indeed make it seamless. The final image really is mightily impressive and well worth all the time, effort and stress the three of you put into it.

@osbourne one-nil Did you manage to get any further with this? I also have a Deco mesh system with 3 nodes and would like to connect my ASIair to the mesh for access around the house.

Phenomenal from the three P's! This image is truly stunning. I planned on attempting a widefield incorporating Barnard's Loop this winter, but have been clouded out so often that the chance has gone - maybe next winter! @ollypenrice It's well beyond my processing abilities, but do you mind elaborating on how you "enhanced" the mosaic with the extra data from your other scopes? I know you use photoshop extensively - are you transforming to size and manually aligning the more detailed images over the widefield?

Thanks for the info on the unreliable AA battery powering the portable mounts @Elp and @OK Apricot . Saves me a load of unnecessary head scratching and trouble shooting - probably whilst trying it for the first time abroad - thanks for doing my homework once more!!! Sorry for being really lazy in my language. So as not to confuse others, I haven’t had any actual problems taking spare dslr batteries, just imagined ones! I used to do a lot of multi day hiking and camping, so would take 6-8 spare dslr batteries on international flights. All with original boxes and literature. I never had a problem, but I’d worry beforehand that I would have to discard some batteries at the airport and have to ration even more than I normally would.

Thanks for the data on the power expectancy for an 86Wh Celestron. Although I've never tried it, the AZ Gti can use AA batteries, so I may be able to squeeze out an extra hour or so with the cooled camera by powering the mount separately. Have you had any difficulty with the airlines when flying with the Lithium batteries? I used to have nightmares about having to check my carry on bag full of all camera gear or having to throw away my spare camera batteries when I used to travel!

Leisure battery on location does sound promising. Let me know how you get on with the charger. An in car charger whilst driving would be ideal given I’m more likely to be on the road to charge up between sessions than somewhere where I can plug in for a good few hours. Thank you for starting the thread as it is one of those issues that has been buzzing around in my head for a while and it’s great to hear other people’s thoughts on the way forward for powering gear away from the comforts of home. It’s also reinvigorated my eclipse research which is great!

Seems an interesting idea. Not being particularly electronically minded what components would I need beyond the leisure battery? Compact charger something like this? https://www.amazon.co.uk/Aibeau-Maintainer-Automatic-Functions-Batteries/dp/B07WVX4B32/ I already have a small distribution board, is it as simple as connecting the +ve and -ve leads to the leisure Battery and then I can power my equipment with a nice 12v supply? https://hobbyking.com/en_us/hobbyking-powerstrip-fuse-protected-power-distribution-board.html?___store=en_us

That is extremely helpful, really appreciate the insight on the weather from a knowledgable local from Texas. Will you be traveling far on eclipse day? The light pollution maps around that area are the things I can only dream of! Any tips on hiring 12v batteries in Texas for us overseas visitors?

@Elp Texas looks a great option - probably the front runner at the moment for me all things considered. The path goes through some pretty cool places though, but as @ OK Apricot says it’s not really the best season in any of the locations. Purely on location alone, I’d love to be around the Great Lakes or further up into Canada, but not really a good chance weather window wise. We'll have to start / join a thread on the 2024 eclipse as there seems to be a few of us coming out of the woodwork on this one!! It would be great to hear everyone’s ideas and plans.

Missed this on the first read - but hiring equipment on location seems like the ideal solution. I’m selfishly treating your trip to Vegas as a fact finding mission!! Please do keep us all informed. I’m hoping to rent a car to stay mobile for the best chance of experiencing totality. Weather in April on the eclipse path looks 50/50 at best in the US and sadly Mexico not really looking a viable option at present. Your idea of combining with extreme weather hunting is a good combination where at least you’ll get a win one way or the other!!

Really interested in this too @OK Apricot I’m weighing up going to the eclipse next year and taking a portable astro setup to use at a dark site at night to go with the usual dslr and lenses for the eclipse. I’ll probably be in @Carbon Brush’s worst scenario - loads of Astro enthusiasts with loads of equipment (and batteries) heading to the states all at the same time on the same plane! So I really appreciate the insight above. My initial thoughts are like those of @scotty38 and use the rental car as my battery, but having had a car not start after leaving the lights on for 15 minutes - not sure I’d risk it now!

The one linked above is the one you need. Just a warning, there are 2 versions of the ADM "puck" for these mounts (and a seperate one for the eq6-r). If your azeq6 has been purchased recently - you want the "new type" DUAL-EQ6N It's a nice easy upgrade - the original puck is held in by three screws that are easily loosened with a small allen key. Loosen them, take off the old saddle - insert the puck and retighten the screws evenly then add the saddle on the top.

Seconding @Stu advice above about adding a horizon in SkySafari Pro - takes a bit of work - I used the tutorial linked above. But is invaluable for planning which targets are visible for me with a small back garden and lots of obstructions. Can scan around the sky and play with the time buttons to see when targets will be visible or set in the constraints of my small garden. screenshot showing house to NE And a tree to SW which loves being captured on images!

Interested in purchasing one of these too (having to steal wifes ipad currently). What length of exposures are you using when using the light panel above @ninjageezer for broadband and narrowband filters?

Just a little note to add my thanks to @mightymonoped for the inspiration with the fantastic images in the original post and the other contributors on this thread. I've finished my first attempt at pixinsight processing this evening - it'll take quite a few more attempts for me to gain the confidence to post my results! And another hearty recommendation for the Lukamatico pixinsight beginners tutorial videos on youtube as mentioned in the original post - really easy to follow videos that showcase some extremely powerful tools (tools with interesting sounding names for a newcomer to pixinsight that are dotted around in different menus). The videos are perfect for a beginner like me to evaluate what Pixinsight can do for my images by guiding you through the processing. Resulting in me being highly impressed with Pixinsight even on my first try when I have been apprehensive about trying it in the past due to its perceived complexity.

Thank you Tony and Peter, BlurXterminator looks an awesome tool and I must admit the tool is a huge factor in giving me a push to learn Pixinsight. Currently reading through the Blurxterminator thread but feel I'm getting a bit ahead of myself. I have only just done my first WBPP on a small amount of data. Really appreciate the details @mrflib - especially the processing workflow diagram. Anything to make my life easier is always a good thing! I only have onboard graphics (as I found out earlier today as I had to update the drivers on my laptop for processing as Pixinsight crashed when I zoomed in on the results of WBPP). I hope I am not derailing the thread @mightymonoped - I am a fair bit behind you in beginner terms!

Very nice images - fantastic results! I've also finally downloaded the trial of pixinsight. After bookmarking the Lukomatico's set of tutorials some time back, I'll hopefully get to follow along and do some processing tonight to get a good overview of what this software can do! Quick question @mightymonoped - I'm not planning to add Blurxterminator just yet - I think I have enough on my plate getting get my head around the basics in Pixinsight. As the tutorials on youtube from Lukomatico predate Blurxterminator, at what point did you use this process in your workflow?

Absolutely perfect. Thanks so much for the granular detail. It will really be a huge help. The new laptop has the hard drive and ram soldered in so no upgrades can be done. Can’t seem to get a decent sized hard drive in laptops these days. Quite a few with just 256gb, so considered myself lucky! The processor should be a big improvement over my previous. I miss my (still working well for many tasks) 2010 MacBook Pro. I did the dvd bay hard drive upgrade on that and maxed out the ram and other hard drive. Even replaced the battery. Can’t seem to upgrade much on most of the new models.

Thanks so much Steve for a comprehensive answer once more. And an apology for my laziness in the definition of my questions! Thanks for filling in all the blanks(as always!!) Hoping to keep all original data on an external hard drive, then copying the files/folders over to the laptop SSD when I process them. I will be retaining all original light frames and flats. Good to know I can delete a few files - the internal hard drive is only 512gb. I’m sure I’ll get a better feel for Pixinsight once I get up and Running and it probably deals with Pre process data a lot differently to Siril. The process folders in Siril fill up hard drive space pretty quickly!

My folders are looking a lot more organised now! Are there any files / folders I can delete when the pre processing is finished that pixinsight creates during the WBPP pre processing ? With a small hard drive on the new pc I need to be really well organised! So I will be swapping the files to process on to the ssd of the laptop to process. (Siril creates a huge process folder that can be deleted but that folder hates trying to be copied to an external hard drive as it creates tiny files and symbolic links) Still not got around to downloading the trial and giving it a go. I thought this weekend would be a good opportunity before the six nations starts, but kids and family have other plans!!

Thank you so much for the thoroughly comprehensive explanation and presentation. I really do appreciate all the time, effort and generosity that has gone into your answer to my question.

I have a question about best practice for organising folders for pixinsight for pre processing in WBPP. After a good few clear nights for the first time in forever and a few recent equipment upgrades, I am hoping I have some decent data to process! I am going to finally try the pixinsight trial so want to hit the ground running and have been searching the forums and watching the Adam Block videos on Youtube. Hoping to use the directory button and use the keyword grouping for multiple nights as detailed by @teoria_del_big_bang below I currently use Siril and use the folder structure Target name > Date >Filter > light flat dark (including dark flats) Would keeping the same structure be the best way using pixinights WBPP so I can use the add directory button and use data across multiple nights? Adam Block seems to use a variety of differently organised data sets of his own and others in the tutorials, so I guess I may be over thinking this!!

Also try a search for ZTF. If it does not show there either you may need to update the app,

I had same problem very recently with getting close but not close enough with the samyang focus. It’s on the last few pages of the imaging with samyang thread. It may help you. My problem was that the short adaptors don’t screw down all the way onto longer threads, so give an increased backspacing to the expected.