Craney

This lens is really something else. Always seems to produce a reasonable image no matter what !! Here are two for the 'Continuing Projects' Folder. Both LUM only. Atik 414ex mono. About an hour total integration on both. M31: 7.5 sec exposures ( lots of them !!) Shark Nebula: 3mins subs with lots of passing cloud and a 3/4 Moon. Taken Thursday night.

So.... the question is..... what wonderful scope is going to glide around atop the EQ-8 ?? If you don't have one yet, surely that can occupy a few hours / days of your time here and there ..... then, which camera / eyepiece are you going to plug into it ...... ?? then, what will the first light be ?? then , what type of objects... ??, then a list of them will be generated........ and then increase ..... You will suddenly discover that you need a good 5 years to answer all these questions. Then you will want a new mount...

California, Elephant's Trunk, Heart, Cygnus Loop and North American. All taken with the Samyang 135mm F2 with an Atik 414 mono in Ha,O3,S2, with subs totaling between about 40mins for the Cygnus Loop and 3 hours for the others. I have been considering a wider FOV mono camera, but I am happy getting these on the few nights we have had clear these past 4 weeks or so. Not many other objects that are so iconic and cover a bigger area. Bring on that Spaghetti thing in Taurus, I can feel a mosaic coming on !!! Hope all is well with everybody. SEan.

Got the soap bubble as well... and that one is not easy. Nice job.

What shape is the Tak that it was attached to in ??

That sounds like a Corona-matic Aberration.

Hello, A good resource in terms of suitability is to look on www.astrobin.com . Select a medium small planetary ( like the Eskimo nebula) and check out the results from imagers all around the World. You will see what telescope / camera combinations give the better results. Take note of the camera. Mono ( narrow band filters) tend to yield more detail and structure, but the newer CMOS OSC paired with L-Extreme type filters are pushing them close. Also note the 'integration' time. Long exposures or many short ones combined are going to test the tracking / accuracy of your set up .... especially with such a long focal length. In terms of my own experience. Good tracking capabilities are very important as well as matching the right pixel size to this focal length. Also consider the FOV. Trying to get any detail on some of these little devils requires a very narrow FOV. That could mean a lack of suitable guide stars if you are using an OAG, and your stacking program might need more stars in the frame to register before it works its magic. (With narrow-band you are also cutting the light levels from the stars in the FOV as well.) I have failed on the Crab Nebula several times when trying to get that impressive landscape format, margin to margin image...... only to have most of my subs rejected. It certainly is a challenge, but very fascinating especially when you see the variety and beauty of objects available Sean.

Amazing capture. It has a 3D quality about it. That gas is heading straight down the barrel.

That squid is a tough beast to get a grip on. 36 hours of integration...... <gulp> Tremendous. Well done.

Excellent, looking forward to watching this. Have enjoyed your previous videos as well. Winjupos has always scared me off, in the same way PixInsite does as well !!

Well, in terms of equal bias an' all..... there are a few professional astronomers and astro-physicists out there who would not know what a planet looks like in the sky, where to find it and what a telescope would show. Research fields are so narrow and specific these days I imagine that the good ol' amateur stargazers, especially here on SGL have a much wider and interrelated knowledge than they do.

..and you can combine Alpine mountaineering with astrophotography..... This is taken under the Pigne D'Arolla in Switzerland.

Another naked eye comet, so soon after the Great Neowise..... Should be called Comet Ferrero-Rocher. oh! you are spoiling us....

Great piece of work. Not only the clarity of the result... you managed to get Io in there as well, my C8 stacks so far have yet to reveal the little volcanic moon... but also the fact you shot in mono. That is a serious amount of faffing with the files. I had intermittent cloud and RGB would have driven me nuts with frustration. I need to check out Winjupos if I want to raise my game. Any good tutorials on it ? or is it intuitive ?? Sean.

I thought it was a head-banging James May wearing a combat jacket........ Been a long day....

Indeed, after many an imaging session looking at a hyperactive technicolour jellyfish on the screen thinking to myself, all that clever processing software will sort this out into a NASA quality image and it never actually does... tonight I'm genuinely excited that I might get a half decent picture out of it. There it was, Io's shadow, skimming along a cloud belt. Great stuff. Time for bed now. Didn't see very many late arriving Perseids tonight ?? That maximum peak must be quite flat this year.

Let's hope so.... I had 4 cameras going last night ( none of them really wide enough by themselves ).. all in different directions, and did not catch very many. It is like the lottery, waiting for the big one.... and then maybe one bigger !!

That's very nice. 24 hours is about 6 months worth of evenings over here in the UK !! How do you find the 294mm ?? I'm tempted by one ( and I have a SW10" Quattro as well, so your photo is very encouraging). I read a lot about "banding" issues which is putting me off. Sean.

I've never imaged this one before and I was keen to do so after seeing a version online. It is medium sized as far as nebulae go and is on the faint side, so quite hard to frame. I do like a gas cloud that looks like something and this one, once orientated is quite striking... Known as the "Phantom of the Opera Nebula" or Sh2-173. Equinox 80 with Atik 414ex mono. Narrowband Ha,O3,S2 75mins each channel with 3 min exposures. Slightly cropped. Whilst setting up the image, I was amazed at the number of stars in the FOV, normally i'm after small planetary nebula with the 8"SCT and APP has trouble stacking. Anyway, I hope it doesn't scare you away from your dark sites !! Sean.

I will call this one " Perseid-verance " ... as the 10th /11th August was a murky, high cloud infested evening and early hours here in Harrogate and it was a struggle to see stars visually. Saying that, modd-ed Canon 600 with 20 sec exposures at 800iso, I managed to bag one at about 3:45am !! EDIT: forgot to say Samyang 14mm Hedge needs a trim....

This is my attempt from last night. Samyang 14mm on Canon 600 (modded). I did 20 sec non-tracking exposures iso 1600 , and racked up 400 separate exposures. Only 1 definite perseid in all them shots. I am not really an expert to give advice, but I would say be careful at centering Perseus in your FOV, although an 18mm may be wide enough. A lot of brighter ones will not start at the radiant and you want to get the full glory, so maybe keep Perseus to one side of your frame..... but knowing sods law, all the fireballs will be on the other side. Another personal choice , I always like a land based reference point in the frame, like a house or a tree. It gives the event a connection with Earth and our human existence. Have a few goes before Thursday night. Good luck. Sean

Another vote for the C90 .... Alas, that Maksutov design did create a few artifacts at totality.

Thanks Paul, For such filamentary things, they seem to be quite stable, especially when compared to proms which seem to pop up and down and dance around. I imagine it is a perspective thing and there is a lot of dynamism if viewed from the side. It would be interesting to be observing / imaging when one of these does decide to change. sean.

Thanks. Do these things move appreciably in say.. a few hours ?? They look quite dynamic. Is it worth setting an imaging sequence on them ?? Sean.

I'll kick off with No1: Your definition looks right. Remember it is focus from an object at infinity ie. stars, planet Moon etc Don't set everything up to be all beautifully focused on your neighbours apple tree !! 55mm comes from a typical backfocus with a DSLR and T-mount . I think a lot of optical design came from the fact customers mostly owned DSLRS back in the day. Then CCDs came along, now CMOS. You will need to take the backfocus of your FF/FR and then start planning a cunning use of spacers to recreate this value behind the FF/FR. Remember your camera (294) will have its own set distance between outer casing and chip surface...( usually a lot less than 55mm ) that needs taking away from your FF/FR back focus above. eg. if the casing-chip distance is 6.5mm, and the FF/FR did have for example, 55mm, then you need to fashion 48.5mm. This whole procedure screams of precision and accuracy, but people get good results without going silly and fussing over hundredths of a mm. Get yourself a digital vernier. I think really fast systems ( F4 and less) tend to be more critical of this dialled in distance. Good luck with it all. It is worth the effort to get it right. Sean.