wimvb

That's the one. That's what I meant too. The guidescope/camera and imaging scope/camera should move together, so the image in the target (bulls eye) view taken over 5 minutes, should be similar to the star shape of a 5 minute exposure, not taking into account focus, diffraction, etc. What's more important is that if you see an elongated pattern in the target view, you can expect elongated stars in your subs.

I have found the bulls eye view in phd usefull as an estimate of what star shape to expect. The dots or crosses hopping around reflect the stars ”hopping around” on the sensor. Unfortunately, round stars are not an indicator for good guiding. If the RA and DEC steps are random, large steps will give you round but also fat stars. With a 1000 mm fl reflector you should probably consider an oag or a ST80 as guidescope. Binning your guide camera if you already have 6”/pixel (again, according to your screen capture), is counterproductive.

I put the led panel directly on the scope. The secondary mirror holder caused shadows and possibly very weak reflections. Normally I put the panel on the dew shield, but for some reason not this time. Live & learn.

A rework of my original image. It turned out that my flats weren't working properly, causing colour gradients which were hard to remove. I recalibrated the subs without flats and used DBE to remove most of the vignetting. This version was a bit easier to process.

That's a good start, I think; you have a guiding rms of 0.5 pixels. Just two remarks: 1. the guide star snr is very low, and it almost looks like you're guiding on noise. Try to find a better star to guide on. If you move the slider next to the exposure time, you can darken the live capture image and maybe see better guide stars. 2. You are fighting an uphill battle, because your guide scope gives you 6"/pixel according to the stats in the screen dump, and you have the minimum movement (MinMo) set to 0.18 (pixels) which is more than 1". Imo, you should try to get a longer fl guide scope, so that the guide pixel scale comes closer to the image pixel scale. Good luck

A 7 nm Ha filter in urban skies under a bright moon is a very good recipe for noise generation. And I don’t expect budget ZWO filter to block so well off band either. I think that differences in both gear used and sky conditions, make direct comparisons very difficult. That being said, I also found the original image pushed a bit too far.

That depends on how well you succeeded with the first part, is my experience. 😀

In a dark, rural area, and with some money to spend, if you really get bitten by the AP bug, you’ll be looking for a permanent setup within a few years. But to get your feet wet, the heq5 with a medium size scope is a good way to get started. For a scope, stay clear from long focal length (more than a meter) to begin with, unless you want to specialize on planets allready. A newtonian such as the 130pds or the 150pds, or a refractor such as a 80ed or 100ed (dare I mention an esprit 80?), will give you a lot of fun and good quality images. Newtonians need collimation, but for the two models mentioned, that’s not a problem. And all these items are popular, so should be easy to sell if you want something beefier later on. btw, make this your first investment https://www.firstlightoptics.com/books/making-every-photon-count-steve-richards.html

I think that this depends on your budget and personal situation. How much can you spend? where do you live (small apartment in a city or large property away from neighbours)? Do you have to travel to a dark site? How much time can you spend on this hobby? Once these questions are answered, you’ll be in a better position to choose the best gear.

No worries. I’m becoming all too familiar with those moments myself, lately.

double post.

T’wasn’t me, sir. Honestly. 😁 I do agree with your message to the OP. If your main interest is larger nebulae, a mono setup is the wiser choice. Osc + nb filters seems like trying to fit a square peg into a round hole. But a mono camera is incompatible with the Hyperstar configuration, because the camera is in front of the scope, and a filter wheel would block the view. I also question the whole hyperstar idea; the equivalent RASA (or even the smaller 8” RASA) is much easier because the optics is already aligned at the factory. I think that other gentleman from my neck of the woods, ( @gorann) has proven that quite convincingly this autumn.

Very nice, especially the hires with all those distant galaxies. Have you tried to identify them? I would have expected more blue in the outer regions of the galaxy, seems a bit red as it is now.

Your master dark shows amp glow. What does a proper master flat dark look like?

I had a go at the data. As already noted, the banding starts to become visible after DBE, or, in my case after colour calibration. I check the "normalize" box in DBE correction, which maintains the median background (including colour imbalance). Here's my result. I couldn't completely remove the vignetting, and had to resort to scissors (crop). Flats are a must, in my opinion. I also kept the saturation down. Following my own advice, I increased the colour saturation in the galaxy with the help of a mask, and reduced the saturation in the background with the same mask inverted.

This pattern reminds me of newton rings. And since newton rings are caused by thickness variations in a thin film, it may very well be that there is a natural thickness variation somewhere in the light path. lThis can be a cover glass that is not perfectly flat, or a deposited film on the sensor itself. Maybe even thickness variations in the microlens layer. Since it also shows in the flats, and because flats can remove it, it must be optical in origin, not electrical. I'm certain that you can adjust your workflow to minimise the banding, but that will be limiting your process and your final results. As always: try to eliminate unwanted artefacts as early in the workflow as possible, i.e. by using flats. To lessen the impact of the bands during processing: use a mask when you saturate the colours in the galaxy. Or in PS speak: use layers. (Did I just mention PS? the horror 😬)

@kirkster501: A shameless plug returned 😁 @AndyThilo: the second image in this post labels the more prominent galaxies:

Nice catch! Of course, more of those rare clear nights would be beneficial.

Too many holiday comedies atm, I’m afraid. Thanks Having a permanent setup helps a lot. I considered that camera, but I also like mono. And as I already have a filter wheel, the choice was easy enough.

By all means, be shameless. 😀 I don’t mind.

Can I make it a bit tougher then? Add the ASI294MM to the list. Unfortunately no package deals yet, so about 200 £ more expensive than the ASI1600MM. Same sensor size as the 1600, but larger pixels, 14 bit ADC, and higher dynamic range, so those 14 bit are put to good use.

(Integer) resample in Pixinsight should do it

If the combination of 60 and 90 s exposures causes this, then just drizzle integrate each separately. Then combine using pixelmath. (integration _60 + integration_90)/2 (Or something similar)

Thanks, Martin. I use Ekos for imaging, and I have no setting for the dew heater in my current indi driver. I may need to update the driver to have access. If ZWO have added this to their software development kit, that is. If/when ZWO have added it, it will turn up in ekos automatically.

The haloes are processing and atmospheric condition artefacts, and not filter related. The only bright stars visible during the coming week will be on netflix and hbo. I will be clouded/fogged in for the foreseeable future.