gorann

Thanks Steve! Yes, apparently IR penetrates dust better than visual light, so there will be a lot to enter into catalogues.

With my ASI 2600MC, things stop working if I failed to connect the 12 V power (so USB is not enough). Have not tried my ASI 6200MM without 12 V but I expect it would be the same. So all power need to be connected.

Thanks a lot! Much there to explore with a longer focal lenght scope.

The most stressful part of imaging for me is aquiring the data, because then a lot can go wrong and time is ticking towards sunrise. I really enjoy the processing as then there is no stress and I can try all kinds of filters and processes and aways step back if something does not work. The more you learn about processing, and the more tools you get in your tool box, the better and more rewarding it gets. For me it has taken years and I still feel I am progressing and have much more to learn. Fortunately, I found that I always liked processing and I think my critical eye has evoled in paralell with my skills. So what I thought looked great in the beginneing made me pleased back then and kept me encouraged. I hope that will be the same for most going into the astrophotography endavour and that they will feel they make progress, and I expect many will make progress faster than me, since I was 50+ when I started.

Nights are bright so I am reprocessing RASA 8 data from last season, focusing on those I collected before I got hold of Star Xterminator. That filter makes quite a difference as I can stretch the nebulosity more. With this image, I was impressed how well Star Xterminator takes away stars and leave even small galaxies, which made me realize how densely packed this image was with galaxies, some looking like grand design galaxies (so please zoom in). The prominent central structure is LBN438, which is catalogued in Lynds' Catalogue of Bright Nebulae, but it is quite dim and demands rather deep data and stretch. Its magnitude is 16 and the surface brightness only 23. It is 30 arc-minutes long. There are more LBNs in the image including 435 and 440. The nebulosity is part of the Lacerta Molecular Cloud. This is actually only 4 hours (2 x 2 hours) with my dual-RASA8 rig with ASI260MC, but it must have been quite dark on that September night in 2021. Processed in PI and mainly PS. Here is the image together with a "crude" plate solve from Astrobin and an annotated one with the galaxies done in PI. Cheers, Göran

Patience is the key. I rarely spend less than a day on processing an image, with many small steps.

Thanks a lot Fegato! Nothing special. I always stretch in several small iterations (7-10 usually) using an S-shaped curve. Then I made the starless version and stretched once more shaping the curve to increase dust and suppress the sky. Finally I Hi-Pass filtered the starless image to separate out the dust a bit more. Then I added back the stars as a layer and controlled their size with a curve. All in PS.

Impressive Steve, which empasises the natural brightness that somehow comes out of the RASA. Cheers, Göran

Thanks a lot Olly! For some reason it comes natural with the RASA data - never happened with my refractors. But then I also started using starless processing of the nebulosity which really helps to lift the nebulosity. Göran

I am fortunate enought to have my obsy at a dark site (SQM ca 21.5), but I get regularly light polluted by the moon 😄 and then I use an IDAS NBZ dual band (Ha Oiii) filter with the RASA8. Not very expensive. I assume it would work well with other light pollution too. Here is an example with 60% moon on 11 April. Even if you do not go for a RASA8, an IDAS NBZ may be worth trying. Cheers, Göran

Yes, maybe even +2👍 Its ability to hold focus is surprising. In my experience it holds focus as long as the temperature does not fall more than 3-4 °C. Many slower telescopes appear to be more temperature sensitive.

Yes I was also impressed by that one as it is exceptional and probably aquired under exceptionally good conditions.

I assume the ATIK has a HCG mode like the ZWO and QHY versions to bring down read noise and it must have a front window dew heater, but it is odd that I see nothing about any of this on the ATIK site or in the manual.

He he, why not get a RASA😉. Not very expensive (at least compared to the Tak alternatives) and the relatively low weight and short focal length means that it can sit on a rather affordable mount. Biggest challenge is the fiddeling with sensor distance

Thanks Rodd, but from I have seen coming from you, you are clearly not waisting your time!!!

Thank you both! CS Göran

I assume that the ATIK camera has a similar circuit to that of the ASI, which at a certain gain (100 for ASI2600) gives a magical drop in read out noise (making most users use gain 100). However, I could not see any details on this in the ATIK manual.

Now I can soon read a paper outside at midnight here, so I am processing and mixing old data. This is a mix of RASA8 with ASI2600MC from 2020 and 5" refractor data from 2016 (ES 127ED and Canon 60Da). Maybe inspired by the bright nights up here right now I made it quite bright. The full field is from the RASA while the refractor data was added to the area around the Iris nebula. Totally 13 hours processed in PI and PS. Cheers. Göran

Great point! For anyone that did not know it, investing in good USB3 cables and avoiding the flat ones supplied by ZWO can solve many problems.

Congratulations Tom for an amazing camera and welcome to the CMOS world! I assume it is the mono version and that you did not jump all the way to an OSC. Just curious, why did you spend the extra almost 2000 GBP compared to the ASI 6200MM (which I have)?

This has so far happened to two out of my three ASI2600MC. Both were bought from TS about a year earlier and they fixed them for free. I had them back within a week. TS have a clean room and I cannot see any dust on the sensor. Importantly, TS also removes the oil behind the sensor so it should not happen again. My first ASI2600MC was bought from FLO a year earlier than the other ones and it has not developed the oil issue, so it seems to be a batch problem.

Certainly looks quite powerful. Maybe like an AP version of Topaz NR that can produce quite a lot of artefacts since its intelligence is trained on earthly objects, while Noel says he trained his Noise Xterminator on astro images. Likely it is smart enough to reduce noise where it is needed, so not much on bright areas. In that case Olly @ollypenrice we PS users may not have to do much layer work if it is intelligent enough. I will cetrainly test it when a PS version is available and astrodarkness is back here. Just out of quriosity, the examples you show are colour images (as seen from the colour noise) but there is virtually no colour to be seen in the galaxies. What camera did you use? Are these single subs?

Hi I think you are on the right track when it comes to processing, and I see no major problem in the images you posted except one thing - your short total integration time. I suggest that you stick to the same target for at least 5 hours, preferentially 10 hours or more. That will give you data with a S/R ratio that is good enough to produce a great image. I have to admit that I made this misstake myself when I started with astrophotogrphy. It was very tempting to image half a dozen objects in one night. Now I virtually never spend less that 1 - 2 nights on one object, even with my very fast (f/2) RASA 8 scopes. By the way, your choice of equipment is great and will not limit the quality of your images.

That is great Richard! I see that you have collected more of the faint Ha from the SNR since you posted it for the dust-competition. Cheers, Göran

PS. could those two bright spots in the yet you caught correspond to those from the Chandra X-ray Observatory I see on Wikipeida?