scitmon

How common are these?

Jupiter & Ganymede on 24th November, my first ever attempt at planetary lucky imaging.

So I had my first planetary imaging run on the 24th and here is my result: https://www.astrobin.com/ed1uex/ 

I am pretty pleased with the result and a few things occurred to me on reflection:

• Getting the target in the fov was a big challenge.  I was hoping I could attempt plate solving but quickly realised that was a non starter with the skymax's very narrow fov.  My finder wasn't aligned so I had to rely on polar aligning, slewing to target and then doing a spiral search.  This was still not straight forward, and it just took time and perseverance to get it.  Other than aligning the finder in daytime before hand, any one have any tips with this?
• I did 10ms exposures for 90 seconds, based on a youtube video guide I was following, I defo want to try even shorter next time.  Any recommendations on settings welcome.
• I encountered a meridian limits mid session and could not find any options to flip with stellerium and/or EQMOD, I ended up disabling limits, is there any danger in doing this other than cable tangling?
• Will there be any benefit in using my 2x barlow next time?

the 662 looks like the leading candidate then, thank you for the advice!

Ok... so am I better off trying to match a camera to my scope, or matching my F Ratio to the best camera?

For example ZWO say their best planetary camera is a the 678MC with a pixel size of 2μm, am I better using this with a reducer? or x2 bin? 

Or go for something like ASI662MC which is a much closer match at 2.9μm?

Thanks for the responses @vlaiv

I was also wondering what the limiting factor tends to be when adding more focal length such as a barlow... I presume its the seeing conditions?  If so am I likely to be pushing it too far with 5400mm FL?  

As the title says, I'm thinking of getting into planetary/lunar imaging.  I have a severely underused Skymax 180 which I want to use, and I'm wondering if anyone can recommend any resource to get me started? Or perhaps answer some questions:

- what is best to capture videos to?  an onboard minipc or the asair? or just use a laptop? Which software is best?

- Is an autofocuser worth the money or can I get good focus manually?

- do I capture in EQ or AZ mode?

On 03/08/2023 at 21:12, ollypenrice said:

I know that lots of words are devoted to glass type but I would rather see them devoted to collimation, field curvature and... the focuser.

This!  In a world of narrowband imaging and post processing, glass is less important than build quality imo.  The reason I upgraded my doublet was 90% to get a sturdier focuser.

take a look at https://www.lightvortexastronomy.com/tutorial-preparing-images-for-publication.html 

Hello All,

I'm looking into buying my Dad a pair of binoculars for general use (not astro necessarily, things like bird watching, sight seeing, etc.) and I'm not really clued up what kind of objective size and magnification would be most appropriate?  Also which brands are the best?

I would welcome advice please!

2 hours ago, AstroMuni said:

What software did you use to get this tilt map?

Pixinsight's FWHMEccentricity script

I suppose the test for that would be to rotate the camera and see if the tilt moves on the image?

I've done a couple of imaging runs with my new setup now, and have noticed they have funny stars, especially in the bottom left corner.  I'm guessing it's camera tilt but can someone confirm?  Might get the ZWO tilt plate if so.

OK I had a quick go with your stacked files and here is my result:

I don't know if those artifacts are hidden in my image or don't exist.  I can't explain how you got them.  

My workflow was:

- ran AutomaticBackgroundExtractor on both ha and rgb (subtraction)

- extracted red from ha, and g and b from rgb

- staraligned ha_r to rgb_g

- ran LinearFit with rgb_g as reference on ha_r and rgb_b

- ChannelCombined them

- did a STF stretch via HistogramTransferFunction

Perhaps someone else can shed light on the mystery.

Image14.xisf

By uncooked do you mean the non cooled one?  If so I would rethink that, save a little longer for the pro version, or shop around for a second hand one.

As for CA on the Startravel... not sure on broadband images, but if you go down the narrowband route you can certainly get decent results.  Example: https://www.astrobin.com/dlrjp8/0/ 

I think the big question mark is your mount, have you experimented already on how long an exposure you can get before star trailing starts?  

Might help to post your stacked individual channels here for us to look at.

I find it hard to believe that channel combination would introduce these artefacts.  Try LinearFit before channel combination?

Despite my EAF malfunction, got a result I am happy with!

Well I've been testing it on the bench today.  Didn't work on first try, so took it off to check in isolation.  It worked under no load, so reinstalled it and works perfectly.  Perhaps  a grub screw came loose? No idea but will keep an eye on it.  Thanks for all the input.

I'm having issues with my ZWO EAF tonight... It refuses to pull the draw tube back in altogether.  I can hear it attempting but its not budging.  It also seems to give up at random points pushing out too, but far less frequently.

I presume it should be able to handle a 294MC pro, filterwheel and the stellamira reducer, so any ideas?  I'm not using the draw tube locking screw so its not that.

Here is my resulting image from first night out with this scope:

Considering it was a night of trouble shooting with new equipment, and what I think was poor seeing with intermittent cloud coverage, I'm very pleased with the outcome.  Looking forward to getting some more integration time on some targets this season.

Oh and a big shoutout to the deepskydad flats panel for this scope, made flats so much easier with my L-extreme filter

Currently have my SM90 out for the first time with a ASI 294MC pro.  Here is a single 2 min frame of the Wizard Nebula... does my spacing look out?

1 hour ago, Ouroboros said:

Hi.  Yes, I’ve been reading about that scope.  How well have you found it to perform?  

I've not had a chance to test it out yet, its exclusively a imaging scope for me and i'm still putting the rig all together.  The build quality is night and day compared to the ed80 though.  This thread has some images others have taken with it: 

Would the StellaMira 90mm triplet be too small to consider?  That's what I have just replaced my 80ed with.

7 hours ago, Anthonyexmouth said:

Here you go

Thank you.  I'm presuming that 1) the draw tube friction adjustment screw you've replaced is not needed to hold it in position? and 2) you don't remove the grub screw on the right one, just used the remaining thread above it?

Upon discovering that my Sesto Senso requires a rather expensive adapter to fit my new SM90, I've decided to just replace it with a ZWO EAF.  I notice at least a couple on here have installed one... can someone advise which screws you used to fix the bracket with?  I don't want to touch any that effect the tension of the focusser.