Nigel G

That looks smoother, the dark dust is showing better, a slight loss of bright gasses, overall better I think. Nige

Thanks Neil that's a busy bit of sky. Plenty there. Maybe a little over developed ? Love the gold and blue star colours Mind you bad seeing doesn't help. I have been messing around with past stacks, processing and developing quite a bit less than normal with great results, less noise more depth and better colour overall. Here a little less exposure and a touch more vibrance. Hope you don't mind. Nige.

Art, I just found out its part of the Lobster claw ( my Bubble image ) Better late than never

Ahh TVM Nige

Forgive my lack of knowledge, What is OSC ? Nige.

Mikey, what a lovely trunk image, I love the star colours, good detail, well captured especially with an unmodified camera. Neil, your Bubble nebula is fine, definitely not embarrassing, better than mine and I like mine ☺ Your doing well, learning new equipment takes time. Everyone posting in this thread shows great images and all move forward, whether it be fast or steady doesn't matter. Keep them coming. Nige.

I know its not using an EQ3 but this is what turned up just after my whinge about NLC It pays to whinge now and again The problem is after NLC normally comes a weather change, heavy clouds or clear sky, heavy cloud is what came shortly after, followed by an all night downpoor. Nige.

Thats loads less noise with a bit less Ha showing, What exposure times was this ? Do you or have you thought about dithering after each sub, I found it works well with both Canon banding and camera noise, although I dither about every 4 or 5 subs. Nige.

I did trial PixInsight for 40 days. I got about the same final image as with StarTools, BUT I know StarTools tricks and processes whereas I do not know PI. Startools was quicker with processing but thats not what its about. Imagers that know PI well would not use ST over PI, I can't say the same for the other way round. I think PI has more tricks and can produce some top images, I have not seen a top quallity narrowband or mono LRGB processed with ST yet ( top imagers prefer PI or other software). I know people who use PI prefer to stack there data using PI too. StarTools was designed for the imager with shallow pockets, I would say PI has the potential to produce a better final image. Hope this helps. Nige.

Great image, nice colour and good detail, Well done. Practice makes perfect, after 18 months with StarTools I find new tricks all the time Not bad at all Neil, your picking up a lot of Ha and tidy stars, time will sort the noise out Nige.

I'm a little disappointed to see that the EQ3 images didn't get a mention in the 30s challenge winners, but when there's large scopes, big mounts, dark sky's, mono CCD's and such to compete with. The 3 winners are awesome images. Nevertheless we shall keep trying, maybe something will come up, as for the NLC challenge, still not seen anything around here that passes as NLC, guess you got to be lucky or live in the right location. EDIT: Tonight is my lucky night they are here now, whinge and you will receive Whinge of the day out of the way Looks like its going to be clear here again tonight, no work tomorrow either Nige.

I have been messing around with StarTools and M16. A vast improvement to detail and better colour I think by using "Artistic detail aware" in the colour module. and a little less developing. I'm surprised how much difference it made. Might have to reprocess a few more again Click on image for full size. 2nd is reprocessed. Nige.

I had a pretty good session last night with no cloud to mess things up, PHD guiding was good enough to leave the kit doing its stuff with a check from time to time, although I did have to do a meridian flip as I noticed the camera very close to one of the tripod legs. PHD had a few wild spikes and I also noticed a regular quiet clicking on the mount about 1click per 2 seconds, might need to strip down and investigate. I kept 40 of 45 subs, 5 had slight stretched stars. I dithered after every 5 or so subs to try and reduce the Canon banding, with the meridian flip it did help. Sadr ( Gamma Cygni ) & Cygnus, 40x240s ISO800 2H 40m, darks, flats & bias. Modified 1200D, Equinox 80 & EQ3. PHD2, DSS, StarTools & PS. Cheers. Nige.

Thanks Neil, I have a 750mm FL which would be a better frame, the only trouble is on the EQ3 it ends up at very odd orientations with the camera hanging off the bottom, it has a fixed dovetail and its not a very stable scope at all but I think its worth a go. Nige.

A clear spell last night so I tried my luck on M16. Unfortunately the clear spell only lasted a short while as cloud started to roll in, I then switched to Cygnus and managed to get 2 x 4 minute subs before that also hid behind clouds. M16 17x120s ISO 800 with dark, flat & bias. Modified 1200D, Equinox 80, EQ3. As the Eagle neb is low in the sky above heavy LP, @800 ISO 120s is max exposure for me, still managed to capture some detail though. Nige.

Very nice, I found it very hard and failed to get the complete Bubble, Well done Nige.

I'm not sure, must check that out. Nige.

I noticed last night that the mount was tracking good by itself and PHD was making things worse, so I changed the guide cam exposure from 0.2s to 1s ( less input from PHD ) which seemed to work well. At 0.2 seconds PHD was going mental trying to guide, after I changed the exp to 1s it smoothed out a lot. So after all the drop outs and fiddeling around I got 22x240s @ ISO800, dithered after each sub with flats and bias. Modified 1200d, Equinox 80ED & guided EQ3. NGC 7023 The Iris Nebula. good position atm, darkest part of my sky but seeing was quite poor with haze and a rising moon. Looking forward to some good seeing for this to pick out the dark dust clouds. Nige.

Its the position of the DSO once it had passed the meridian everything worked fine Curse lifted Nige.

Would you belive it, PHD has droped out at least 5 times tonight. I have cursed myself dec everytime, D'oh

I have balanced the scope camera end heavy by a fraction. My way to get guiding: Place pod on marks ( patio ) check and adjust legs to line up Polaris, mount scope and 2 star align and focus, change finder to guide scope. slew to target, PHD2 connected via ST4, manual guide N & W 3 clicks each, PHD2, click guide tab to calibrate which removes or compensates the backlash, Start imaging. That's it. On a rare occasion PHD2 will drop out, probably due to backlash, once in 3 nights I'd say. PHD will adjust the mount in all 4 directions while guiding. Nige.

Having not seen the stars for a week, I have been playing around with a WF Cygnus Crescent area I took on the monthly clear night early August. I got about 1 hour of 2 minute subs, it wasn't that good at all, so I stacked a few different amounts. 100% looked very messy, so I tried 80% with a slight improvement, then I stacked 40% with a bit better image after processing. But still not totally happy with it. Looking through the subs, they all look ok so not quite sure what's going on there. There was a moon around which didn't help. I'm tempted to try just 20% to see the result. So this is around 24 minutes or so of 120s ISO 800. 135mm lens, modified 1200d, EQ3. With darks, flats & bias. The colour was very difficult to process, I'm sure the moon is responsible for that. Cheers Nige.

Thanks, very nice images, very fine detail, it seems a very popular camera, to be honest I haven't heard a poor report. A few more months of saving penny's I'm looking at getting the cooled mono with RGB and narrow band filter bundle. I want to upgrade my camera before the mount, I want to see the full potential of the EQ3. I have the Equinox 80 ED Hopefully it will be a good match. Thanks again Nige.