pete_81

Yep Worked lovely, thank you

Hi FozzyBear, Can you send the .conkyrc file you are using to monitor things. Yours is one of the cleanest I've seen and just looks like it works!

Thanks @jager945 And also for StarTools! Quite something on first playing! Just need to get more into post and set a work-flow. Don't all newcomers! Yep, I'm aware of the ISO issue, but hadn't thought it so extreme to limit cameras to ISO200! But agreed that the main issue is exposure time (with photons-per-pixel or f/#). Also hadn't thought of the extremes of M42, but yeah, certainly saturated quickly at exposures where I'd have thought it would be OK. Might have to resort to the crab for a bit and longer exposures on this, but hopefully that would give some indication on what I'm looking for with this post. Obviously, post is the main issue following this, but as a photographer during the day, my hope had been to 'get-it-right-in-camera' then tweak in post with the correct exposure settings. Any tips on exposure times and f/# therefore appreciated! Viewers, take ISO values cautiously!

Highly recommend APP, it's equivalent to Photoshop with all but the very highest level things, and a fraction of the cost, and even on offer at present! Yeah, the dedicated cam may be something I'm considering too but the lack of the clear nights (and light pollution locally) is making it not possible (yet!)

M42, Magnitude 4, ISO400, f/5.9, 240sec; Shows very nice detail in nebula, a good setting. Canon DSLRs and 30-image-stack

Wow Andy, @Newforestgimp, it was myself helping you out with the guide camera stuff and so pleased I did (although a little jealous of that image!) Yeah, my ISO100 and 30sec will never match up to the settings you used to get that, and I also remember the images downloading thinking how is that possible! I've spent more time like yourself trying to understand post, and armed with Affinity Photo, I have also tried StarTools which is mentioned in the Rosette Nebula post above. Initially took some time to get into, but my image above in Affinity came to this one in StarTools along with this tutorial Again nice image and good to see that all those evenings of stress are now just evenings of annoyance at the clouds like so many others interested in astro!

Stats now on my post too So you mention guiding - this is to reduce drift etc, but what about simple tracking? Tracking should give at least minimal star-trails for a little longer. Also, the D5200 should be able to cope with higher ISO, don't hesitate to push it up a bit more. My attempt on Orion nebula on my post was more to play with 1st attempt and also more guiding. I'm new to guiding too and the learning curve with it. So thinking to master (or get better!) at that, then go for attempts with DSOs using just the camera lenses I have before mounting to faster and longer optics. Look at photoshop 'levels' & 'curves' adjustments on the tiff, and spend more time on PS than lightroom, the amount of 'stretching' to be done I don't think one can do in LR, at least not as quickly as PS. But yeah, a good start and nice image! Post is as much a steep learning curve as the setups! @almcl@alacant, what edits did you apply to the tiff? ie - layers, levels, black5 white20, new layer, repeat, etc? This would be really helpful! Good luck and keep us posted.

https://stargazerslounge.com/topic/373659-rosette-nebula-difficulty-seeing-in-live-view-and-in-post-processing-is-it-there/ Bortle 6, D5200, Evostar 72ED, f/5.8 420mm. Rosette Nebula, Magnitude 9, ISO1000, f/5.8, P2 light pollution filter, 22sec. Visible following stretching (amcl posted this on above) but should try for longer exposures.

Aha, and the refreshed page shows other folks suggesting same . Have another go and let us know! PS, hope it's OK that I've taken your settings and listed them on my 'database' listing, link in the above comment.

Hi Elly, keen to see how this develops... Going to stab in the dark and guess your exposure time should be much longer. Image looks right location, but gut feeling is too short for a magnitude 9 object. I'm trying to build a list of DSOs with camera settings for starting things (https://stargazerslounge.com/topic/373623-dso-dslr-exposure-values) with aiming help for those new to DSO AP and keen to hear what camera settings are used throughout!

As a photographer with DSLR, I understand that I can take any typical lens and the brightness of the final image is essentially dependent on the "exposure triangle". For example, if I use a 70-200 lens set at 200mm, and do exposure for 1sec at f/2.8 and ISO 100, I could change the ISO to 400 and reduce exposure time to 0.25s (factor of 4 increase in ISO, factor of 4 decrease in exposure time) and the image will essentially be identical (allbeit with a minor amount of noise added and less camera shake!). Alternatively, I can take the aperture to f/5.6 (2 stops, or 4 times less light) with the ISO back to 100 and increasing exposure to 4sec, and other than increased DOF, the image will be the same (exposure wise). Similarly, if I switch to a 50mm f/1.4 prime lens, I can set exposure to 0.25sec, ISO100 and f/1.4 (again 2 full stops, so x4 increase in light, hence the 1/4 exposure), and again have the same image brightness. Focal length doesn't change the brightness, only the field of view in this case. So, purpose of this topic is to try to build up a bit of a database that would give users some idea on starting settings for when they're starting out. The real thing with imaging is getting exposure right, so as to not blow out stars too much (too long exposure) but obviously not have too short exposures, and I'm hoping this may help some folks (including myself!) with DSO photography. I've had a go with M42 using f/8 ISO100 30sec which seemed to blow out the stars significantly, but still can give some colour info Yet with f/8, ISO100, 10sec, there is obviously less saturation with the stars, but the nebula starts to become more in line with the noise levels of the exposure: Yes yes, I know... Take many exposures, etc, then ensure we all take flats, darks, bias and any other possible calibration frames! Before getting to that though, what are some good starting settings for different DSO's? And on that, yes, I appreciate there's not going to be a 'set' of ideal parameters - bortle levels, atmospheric conditions, time of year (darker evenings in winter), % light-transmission through a narrowband filter, and many other factors will all play a part, but I'm looking to have some general 'ballpark' starting settings for exposure and ISO, so perhaps newcomers don't try taking 500 images of M1 at the same settings as M42! Clearly M1 needs to be minutes, horsehead would be several minutes, M42 the order of 10's of seconds, and M45 even shorter, for given f-ratio and ISO. Then there's the large assumption of telescopes - they're essentially large lenses for cameras, so the larger telescopes working at f/5 only achieve a 'higher zoomed image' as the 'exposure' values depend on the f/#. Am I right on this? So! TLDR! With some relation to magnitude of a DSO, what camera settings are folks using?! Perhaps also include some info if other features are used (eg filters)? EG: Images above, just from single light file Nikon D7200 DSLR, Tamron 500mm f/8 mirror lens, no filters in imaging train, bortle 6 skies M42, Magnitude 4, ISO100, f/8, 30sec - stars saturated, light pollution visible but can be processed out M42, Magnitude 4, ISO100, f/8, 10sec - Nebulosity visible but many light frames required to get away from noise So, by having a bit of luck in between clouds, 40x 15sec exposures and the usual DSS image requirements, I've produced my first guided astrophoto, M42, and hope some guide settings lead others to achieve the same!

New to Astrophotography but not to astronomy (visual with underrated mount) and just upgraded mount to be able to support larger telescopes, and also get into imaging. Just completed my first AP night last night with EQ mount and D7200 with 500mm f/8 - have a look at my setup in my latest post here, showing it can certainly be done with just the gear you have already. Guiding is a game changer if you can do it, then think about telescope attachment somehow. Telescopes are obviously better, as are dedicated AP cameras, but everyone who's honest would advise build up in stages - EQ mount, use what camera you have, then add telescope (like buying better camera glass in case of DSLRs) and then dedicated camera, after buying a smaller house, allowing you to have some spare cash! So yes, you can do plenty of AP with EQ mount and bridge camera, just what more do you need to start into this wonderful hobby?!

Nice one Andy! I was out last night for my first ever guiding effort and happy to report I had some success with this. I've just updated my RPi post with my setup images and description of what I was doing and how I arrived at success (or at least things got working!). Have a read and see if there's anything that you may be able to take from it as a relative newbie? Pleased for you that you've had success also! Hope you have more clear skies soon to get out more!

So final update to this I think (at least for now). In effort to get better guiding and understand better setup technique, I'd read about Drift-Alignment (remember I've only done visual up to now, and with (AZEQ6Pro setup in) Alt-Az) and found Bill Gwynne's YouTube Video outstanding. I've had a blocked view of Polaris due to large tree (more on that later...) so copied Bill's drift-alignment when it was clear (for a period!) on Friday night. I was delighted to see the drift-plots came almost horizontal during my setup, indicating the mount was getting closer to correct polar alignment. Cloud then appeared so I packed up after a successful night where I became armed with a good understanding on how to align decently enough for next clear night... I've also taken the plunge and bought a stand-alone RPi4 4GB rather than the Pi-400 as advised throughout this topic. The plan here is to have shorter USB cables connecting mount and cameras (guide + DSLR) to the RPi with everything attached to the dovetail so only 2 cables (12V mount power & RPi power) will travel up from the ground and no other cables (USB) to get in the road! So this + Astroberry + VNC + Anydesk is my present setup. Images coming later in the post... So, last night was clear again and I decided to top the Polaris blocking tree. It missed the house and I was given first time views of Polaris standing on our patio. Then imaging setup began. Wow, being able to see Polaris in the finderscope makes setup so quick, doesn't it?! Ignoring drift alignment and fine tuning, I just wanted to get onto guiding as I've not done it to date. I've been seeing errors in the internal EKOS guider "GUIDE_RA: Scope cannot reach the start point after 21 iterations. Possible mount or backlash problems", so wanted to persist with PHD2 for the time being, as there's a wealth of tutorials and tools (drift alignment etc) documented readily on the web. I struggled somewhat to get things to connect between the various softwares in EKOS/Indi/PHD2 and eventually worked out that rather than setting PHD2 up independently using the ZWO camera and EQMod mount that I had to start KStars, enable EKOS and let INDI from here talk to all the equipment (mount + guidecam + DSLR), THEN start PHD2 and select connections to come from INDI, and I now have a profile for this: I ignored darks (stay with me!) and let the calibration run. The issue with EKOS internal guider may have been due to the balancing of the setup (I'd left things perfectly balanced initially rather than going East-heavy) or having the guide camera turned 90º. The latter I conclude as during PHD2 calibration, N moves push the guidestar E. Anyway, between gaps in the cloud, lighter cloud cover and selecting stars that were likely too bright based on Bill's video, I managed at long last see PHD2's status change from the calibration to read "Guiding"! YAY! I didn't align (2-star alignment) the mount, plate solve or anything, just wanted again to get the mount guiding, but getting to this point was again another success as I've not seen this point before. I'm sure everyone here will frown at the screenshot I took of my triumph but remember I'd not spend hours on Polar Aligning or optimising by Drift Alignment, I just wanted the mount to guide and not drift excessively. Plus the state of the clouds was NOT going to help my cause - the screenshot was taken AFTER I'd shot a couple of long (1, 2 & 5 min images with DSLR) showing the cloud-cover and throughout the guiding, the cover came and went also. Next time, I'd aim to setup better and drift-align as Bill's video, hoping to get better again. Setup wise, here's an image of how I've done things with description of why. AZEQ6Pro, with power cable and Wifi dongle (only purpose of this was to turn change brightness of polar finder illumination). 330mm dovetail with 3D printed holder for RPi and 2x Manfrotto type RC2 Quick Release Plates, one for DSLR and other for GuideScope. The cables then come from camera, guidecam and Mount head to the RPi, using 3 of the 4 available USBs, and all connected wirelessly to the router inside house. No issues with connection last night, although I do have additional wireless USB dongle if required later. My camera lens is the Tamron 500 f/8 mirror lens, which yes, isn't the flashiest camera kit, but certainly works. The plan later is to use the 1200 f/4.8 but remember the purpose of this topic - learn guiding and the main issues before getting into better imaging. As an indication, here's a 5min exposure at ISO 100 f/8, pointing somewhere in Orion (remembering I didn't do alignment, just used KStars to GOTO M42 before starting guiding calibration (and leaving it guiding once it started), hence saying somewhere in Orion!) I think my stars are quite good (spots, rather than trails!) so I'm prepared to call my first guiding experience a success. Next stages obviously are to do more with regards to aligning mount (actually doing the 1/2/3 star alignment + plate-solving), but clearoutside (coords changed slightly so nobody stalks me!) is suggesting I've a week of cloud cover before I get out again! 🙄 Thanks to all for suggestions on gear and I hope this lets folks know their help to beginners like myself is appreciated!

Nice one Andy! What changed? Or was this one of these "I'll just try one last time in hope?!" 🤣 We've all been there (or I'd guess most have as it's in line with the 'turn it off and turn it on' approach)! And to confuse you further, I've just spied Svbony SV305Pro, so yes, you can use Svbony cameras to guide! Although again you're into price realm of the 'well used' type! Keep us posted though as to what you decide. It's tips like this that suggest you can do it on a reasonable budget!

Hi Jon, just spied your gear list. Can you confirm if the sv105 or sv305 work "seamlessly" with PHD2? I guess Andy had the initial question about these working as Guiding and it'd be useful to know if there are other cheaper cameras available that actually connect and could be used potentially for Guiding? My initial concern was seeing reports and specs about the svbony cameras limit of 1sec exposure times... Can PHD2 override this and allow exposures up to, say, 5 sec? 2 secs seem to be the typical for zwo guiding. Just a thought...

Hi Andy, I understand your comment about just wanting it to "just work" only too well! Agreed that a simple fool-proof method is necessary for us all! And in answer to your last question, "Yes, any is better than none if setup is reasonable" but I think you know that So the 2nd port on the ZWOs etc (as we've established you already know) is only when you're using ST4 for guiding. Yes, you can use it by setting PHD2 to control the mount 'via camera' I think the option is. But would love to help and get you running without this (directly from PC). Can I suggest you look at https://edu.kde.org/kstars/ (there is a win version available, assuming that's what you're using?). This may look daunting, but it's really just Stellarium with extras. There's a little dome-like icon which is 'Ekos' and this connects all kit together. As I pointed out in my flow-diagram, I use controller to align, then everything switches to computer (i.e. kstars be it from macbook or Raspberry Pi). This does away with needing to install eqmod etc as all the drivers (INDI) are included. Then at least we'll see if things are talking correctly. Last ditch effort - what is the baud rate set to for Stellarium when directly connecting to the EQM35? Most need set at 115,200 for whatever reason (at least this is how I've needed things to be with OSX/RPi). If the pc won't talk to the mount, guiding ain't going to work to start with so need to iron this one out. Writing on the fly... just googled "eqm35pro stellarium" and first hit or SGL. Try cloudynight link, baud-rate then perhaps kstars if you're ok with the idea of switching over? What's your budget for guide cam? Just PM'd you about this too...

Duh! When Google just works... https://www.svbony.com/blog/using-the-sv105-and-sv205-as-a-guide-camera-with-PHD2 Although then one finds https://www.cloudynights.com/topic/623451-svbony-sv105 with one of the admins saying about the 1sec time limit again although others saying guiding is fine! Eugh! https://www.ebay.co.uk/p/16030617321 For <£40, is getting one to try worth it or is it just wiser to ignore these and go to the better options?

Hi Andy, Reading this last post sounds a little familiar to my first connections... I tried using USB via Stellarium connected into the bottom of the hand controller and was initially able to connect and goto, then I started noting odd results (handset date would jump to 2050 and other things, and I couldn't get goto working). So switched to just using handset for setup, then discovered the wifi dongle, used it for a bit via smartphone to do initial alignment, and then Stellarium app on phone as the go-to, meaning doing away with computer. This setup is great for my visual work and works really well as there is only one (power) cable extending more than 10cm from the mount head! Then I wanted to start dabbling in imaging, which up to now hasn't been successful. Maybe this is the time for folks to tell me to get lost that I don't know what I'm talking about, but figure until then that I'll continue offering advice, based on my experience and help from the stand point that I've struggled with the setup and spent hours (and my Christmas present allowance!) researching the best way for me to do things. Tell me to sod off if you want! 😂 Anyway, back to topic. What happens if the USB is directly into the controller mounted on the tripod? Can you tell stellarium to 'goto' after initial alignment (which if you're doing like me, would be setup on the hand-controller)? My main move forwards was this step - directly connecting PC to the mount. As a sidenote to the connections on this box, you're right about the ST4 connection applying the correction to the mount via the auto-guide socket, although the objective here (and for most folks I guess) is to avoid the ST4 all together and have the computer (PHD2) talk (guide) directly to the mount rather than going via camera. Not sure if it'll help, but here's how I have things setup... Sorry it's on paper rather than actual images but don't have access to mount just now! The only bit that's missing here is using KStars, which is the 'goto' commander. It uses INDI though to send coordinates to the scope when not guiding. Have just got new shorter USB-B cables rather than fishing out 2m printer cables, so things are going to be much tidier later! Alternatively, can you start PHD2 and see if you can connect the mount - not being a Windows user, this may be where ASCOM/EQMOD is needed so you may need to do more seeking here (youtube) - particularly if you change where the USB is connected (into controller or handset?) So what about guidecamera - have you got one as that's really the initial topic discussion (sorry about the 1sec exposure limit, in which case, I'd guess they should work)? What is important for guiding is probably a high pixel density (rather than high pixel count) - when guiding, any star image deviation from a given location on the image sensor is what the main camera doesn't want - there's no point in having a 35mm sensor on a guidecamera if only 10pixels in the centre are being used - the ZWO mono for example is 1MP (1280x960) at 3.75µm, which is 10% smaller than my DSLR pixels. The Svbony 105/205/305 have higher pixel density (smaller pixels), but whether their connection would work with PHD, no idea. Obviously the smaller pixels should give more accurate guiding but I'd guess setup (polar alignment, balancing, etc) is more critical.

Hi Andy, Sorry that we're not being more help here. Can you send photos of your available connections, into mount, controller, computer etc, and we'll try to explain better - I'm a newbie to this too, so facing the steep learning curve, but want to help with my findings as I learn! As Jon says, Stellarium doesn't guide, it's a 'go-to' program. Equivalent to other users is KStars. Sure you'll have heard/seen this mentioned plenty on SGL. We use 'Ekos', which is the connection to all hardware, which then talks to the mount via the 'INDI' protocol. Equivalent to INDI is ASCOM (as I understand it). EKOS controls all the decisions and controls mount as 'GOTO' via KSTARS, GUIDING via PHD2 or internal guider, and camera for capturing your final images. If you're successfully driving the mount 'GOTO' with Stellarium, I guess just opening PHD2 and using the 'connect equipment' should just use the same 'goto' cable to control the mount, see: (I'm using mac, hence the connection here being EQMAC, on Win it'd be EQMOD, and linux likely INDI. Note at this time, I'm using KStars on OS-X, and also updating my Raspberry-Pi mini computer to run the setup via the Astroberry OS, but all replies on SGL I'd use mac for, hence this screenshot and other detailing) Obviously the weather is the issue for most of the time, but can I suggest you try your setup to just connect to a guide-cam (if you have one as this is the initial topic discussion!) and mount then 'mock' a 'goto M42' some evening, then try opening PHD2 and see that all connections are made successfully, this is likely the best way to try this out and you'll learn issues as you go and come back here for more help as you run into new and more issues! I have had my mount setup more in the living room than outside of recent, and it's shown cables being too long/short, and allowed me to practice setup in the light (and warm!) in preparation for when the clouds break! I know I can't assess how good my guiding is at this time, although I have learnt more about the setup in this time. Hope this helps again?

What an amazing image! 'nuff said!

In a nutshell, the same cable used to connect to the controller (as step 3). These are the USB-B type. Step 5... Once you use Stellarium to slew to object, start PHD2 and it should pass the 'pulses' to the mount via the USB to handset to the mount, effectively keeping the guide star in the same position, meaning the mount is correctly tracking, i.e. "guiding"! ST4 adds the extra complication that the computer sends info back to camera for the camera to send to the mount. If you have USB to mount, this does the work for you Unless I've got it completely wrong! My setup requires 3 USB cables... 1) Mount (direct to PC via USB, essentially the same as mount-controller-computer) 2) Guide camera, to allow PHD2 to get signal 3) DSLR controller (allows computer to trigger camera), although I could set multiple exposure mode on the camera and ignore this but I don't think that's a good idea - might have to change settings if over/underexposing Want to hear others comment though just so that my understanding is correct!

Hi @SiD the Turtle, thanks for your input. I'd rather have lots of comments to view through and try to figure out which setup is likely to be best for me... Had thought about using PHD2 just from the amount of readily available help it seems to offer, and I've looked at PHD GUI compared to the internal kstars guiding one, just to get focus and connections tested, but once focused, star select, then press 'go' just sounds nice! (as appears to be case with PHD, not that I've got into the internal one yet...) Not looked at plate solving, need to get the above setup completed and at least try to capture some images with camera control from RPi (tested it today for basic functionality on the MBP but I've not actually ever ran guiding, camera and mount control from the same computer up to now), hence want to get this solved, then plate solving after, but yes, agreed that it's something to do once basics are addressed. I'm sold to the ethernet connection from the RPi, with wifi again being frowned upon so heavily! For the RPi4, what classes as an 'appropriate case'? Is the little red & white one suitable or stay clear? Also, for the RPi4, now that I have all working, what size (RAM) is 'minimum'? Obviously the 400 has 4GB which seems to be plenty, but is there any gain going to 8GB? Obviously it's not going to be used to do the image manipulation, just guiding & controlling mount + cameras (and vnc for image transfers as they'll be saved local (perhaps backed up on the Nikon SD, but accessing from RPi to transfer seems the easiest way to go at this point)

Hi @Newforestgimp, Not sure if this is off your topic, but I know I'd looked at the Svbony cameras for potential guiding, but had found a couple of folks saying their exposure times were limited to max of 1sec. I'm new to imaging and have had a steep learning curve (see my other posts, particularly this one) and use the Svbony guide scope (240 f/4) which I got off eBay for <£60 and a T7C camera (again under £70) which I ran into a couple of issues with but think they're now resolved, again commented in the linked post. I went down this route after watching the "astro on budget" youtube video. Not sure if this helps, but the 1sec limit on the Svbony was the primary reason I avoided this for guiding.

@alacant, misunderstood your initial post - the RPi has both USB2 & USB3, so didn't think it was reference to firmware. Updated camera on the RPi, and now connects and gets image to EKOS. Now just for a clear night and will get everything connected up and running! Thanks again!