Nigel G

I have requested a new topic in forum suggestions, Alt-AZ and low budget, to be in imaging.section. It would be better to be able to organise the jumble of info in this thread. Cheers Nige

Good point Neil, short exposures or imaging on a low budget could cover more area, even then it can be split within if necessary. Nige.

We could possibly do with a Alt-AZ imaging section, bit's I want to re read for information are difficult to find with 60 pages and 1500 posts. I wonder if Admin would agree to a request?

Steve, If I have enough time to do 2 sets then yes, Once my other camera is back in action, then I could do a side by side set up and have both clicking away with lenses on. Then though I'd have to do 4 sets to see what the unmodded is like with and without and same for the modded. Hopefully your sky's will be clear this weekend for a trial. Cheers Nige.

Its the Astronomik CLS CCD deep sky & Light pollution filter Canon clip fit. It will work better with the modded camera. I need to get a set of subs to see how it performs. The write up says, Good with un modded , very good with modded cameras which is the reason I chose this one. With un modded camera there will be added contrast, There is a loss of detail in the same exp time for sure. Hopefully not a waist of money! Nige.

Just about had time to snap a shot or 2 before clouds came. Difference between LP filter and no filter. 45s on M33. Nige

Thanks Ken, I have a lot to thank Ivo of StarTools for this image, he has given us some great info. More will be posted very soon. Cheers Nige.

Ken, that's looking real good for such short exposure time, its all there and crisp too, can't wait to see after more subs added. Nice, I think I need to start saving £'s Nige

Last nights results. 4x120s plus 10x60s plus 20x45 plus 60x30s, Matching darks, flat and bias. DSS and new found methods with StarTools. 150p Canon 1300D I need to re stack without the 120's to see a difference, I think I will do a couple of different stacks to get an idea how effective the longer subs are. My clip in LP filter arrived today Cheers Nige.

Good luck chaps. keep at it. I have been experimenting with exposure times on M33, so far managed to get 10 x 60s, 4 x 120s, 20 x 45s and now bulking up on 30s. All the kept subs are good subs, no trails in the 120's and they only took 20 minutes to get. It will be interesting to see the final image when its finished. Cheers Nige.

With the last few nights being cloudy, I have been thinking and reprocessing and thinking, A dangerous past time is thinking! My thoughts. With exposure lengths in mind, Quoting back to NGC 7000, around 1.5 hours of 45 second exposures and the added 4 or 5 90 second exposures. The 90's made a big difference to the final image, more colour, detail and easier processing. collecting the normal data, in this case the 45s was easy with around 90 % keep rate, but the 90s were not so easy, approx 1 hour to collect the 4 or 5 frames. One question is, is it worth the wasted time gathering the few long subs. My experience with adding just a handful of longer subs to the same stack has been positive every time, adding just a few long as possible subs makes a big difference, more than if you stacked the same amount of exposure time with the shorter subs. 5 x 90s is better than 10 x 45 but takes much longer to get the good frames. But is possible. The down side is, with the British weather. The few nights we get the chance normally cloud will spoil the session so time wasted trying to get the extended subs is data lost. It takes 1 hour to get 5x90s, so in the same time 60x45s could have been collected. Is 60x45s better than 5x90s ? If you persist with getting a handful of longer subs they do eventually come. Maybe only 1 in 8 or 10 though. I don't think its so important on a target like M42 and M31 though where a huge amount of data can be gathered with just the shorter exp's. Any thoughts ? Nige.

Correction, as Steve has said, you need 1 tube ring and no dove tail bar, the camera screw comes with the ring not the bar, alternatively a dovetail bar. FLO sell the Skywatcher 130 tube rings and dovetail separate. This is a 200mm ring with the camera screw and a dovetail bar with slight addition to be able to turn the camera 90 degrees. Nige.

You need tube rings and a dovetail bar, which will add a couple of pounds to the weight. Another alternative is to get a dovetail bar and connect the camera direct to the mount, shown in the photo. The bar will cost around £15 and I think you get the correct screw to attach the camera with it..The 210mm lens in this photo was £30 on ebay, Nige. Nige

Ideally the 2 chosen stars would be within 100 degrees of each other and a similar altitude but its not that critical As your image was taken through a x2 barlow star trails would happen much sooner so your alignment might not be that bad at all. Nige