Swoop1

Astronaut Bowman was correct! If I had taken that image, my first thought would be that my sensor was borked!

Whatever you do DO NOT look at the little light......

I get a subscription to The Sky At Night and each month features an observing pull out section based on observing from the UK. This includes a Steve Tonkin binocular tour, a deep sky session, lunar, planetary, comets and asteroids. Not a huge number of pages/ targets but it is keyed to the coming month.

When you consider the distances trvelled and the time scales, they landed the capsule very clos to a road. Chapeau!

😀 Chanelling the inner Marvin 👍

Not used them myself but I have heard good reports about this type of resin/ epoxy capsule

Not me but a member of my society responded to an e mail from someone wanting to get rid of a scope and mount for free. He came away with a C11 SCT and a pier. I think the cost of setting up the pier somewhat offset the free light bucket.

1st Law of Astrophotography- if you have a full head of lustrously natural hair- don't start.

I think it is a bit harsh to paint the whole of humanity with the same brush. Teenagers however...... 😉

Images of stars don't really do a lot for me but, this image is very pretty. I like the colour defraction in the spikes.

A tad noisy it may be but scrap it aint!

I think it is probably the car’s auto light switch being fooled into thinking it is not dark enough. Lots of drivers rely on their car to do the thinking for them….

As long as the Klingons remain visible off the starboard bow I’m confident we’ll be ok.

Best episode in ages. Right up my street.

I like the colour of the image and, for me, the diffraction spikes really add to it.

That is exactly the kind of information that I can use to improve my output so, no problems at all vlaiv- thanks for taking the time to explain in such detail!

Thanks @vlaiv. So, your examples illustrate how my glass behaves with different light wavelegths and demonstrates that 'perfect' focus may not be achieveable? I am never going to be a high quality astrophotographer so, as long as I can achieve results that please me, I will be happy 👍

I don’t understand the significance of this information @vlaiv . Would you mind expanding for me? Thanks

No filters used. I have a light pollution filter and will include that in the imaging train later, just taking one step at a time at the moment.

@ollypenrice- transparency wasn't perfect and, later in the evening, when I switched to lunar, there was a definite softness to the sky.

@Mandy D We are on a similar journey- I jus started a little before you! My first suggestion- get your Polar Alignment right (or at least as close as you can) first. This will help prevent one of the causes of star trails. There are lots of videos and tutorials for polar alignment. Do you have a polar scope in your mount? I was lucky in that my polar scope was perfectly collimated to my mount out of the factory. My second suggestion- play with your mount in visual mode to get used to how it operates/ moves. I still get caught out when framing by moving the scope in the opposite direction to that intended! My third suggestion- consider an RDF such as a TELRAD as I find this invaluable on my larger scopes for ensuring the scope is pointing ath the right general sky area. With my RVO Horizon 72ED the short dovetail on top of the tube rings acts almost as accurately as a rifle sight- crouch down behind the scope and squint along the groves in the dovetail and my target is often somewhere within the FOV. Re SIRIL, Sky at Night magazine had an article a couple of months ago about using SIRIL on saved TIFF files from stacks to start drawing out detail- https://www.skyatnightmagazine.com/advice/siril-software-processing-dslr-astro-images This is how I got my first jump for joy moment when processing the first light deep sky from my above scope. Finally- don't get dispirited. I regulalry have Doh! moments when going toprocess data and finding I forgot to set exposure speeds etc. so I'm trying to process a whole host of 0 secon exposures.... Meatware problems rule😀

@astrolulu that is a fantastic shot- I wonder who took it? 😉

Most finder scopes focus by unscrewing the knurled ring behind the objective and then screwing the objective cell in or out to achieve focus, locking it back in with the knured ring again. Image courtesy of FLO!

Thanks Clarkey

Now I have my deep sky/ wide field scope (RVO Horizon 72ED with flattener), I will soon be starting the hunt for the right camera for deep sky/ wide field. My circumstances are- a) Still have to earn a crust so am limited on most evenings to 1-2 hours from starting to set up to breaking down. b) Permanent pier but no obsy so, leaving kit set up, not really an option. c) Not had a lot of luck with guiding so probably limited to 1 min subs. d) Don't have an EFW or the time to triple my exposures on RGB though I understand that using a luminance filter can overcome this? I currently use an ASI290MC for planetary/ lunar and the occasional deep sky stuff and a Sony a6300 for wide field/ deep sky. Would a dedicated CMOS/ CCD colour camera, a mono camera and luminance filter or an astro modded Canon or similar be the route to go for now? If a dedicated CMOS/ CCD astro camera, what is a good option to suit my current circumstances? I know I have probably opened a proper can of worms with this question but, info is needed to assist me with the next step. Thanks, Matt