michael.h.f.wilkinson

Really nice

Really stunning images

I re-stacked the data with the 50-100 mm zoom with flats, bias and darks, and got a clearly better result, I feel I also stacked just 10 of the long sequence of images I took with the 200 mm F/2.8 (30s, F/2.8, ISO 200) Quite a bit of detail coming out. These were stacked in Astro Pixel Processor, with some tweaks with GIMP. Both show signs the ion tail has two different colours showing: blueish on the right and orange on the right. I don't think I can stack more images in APP without incurring motion blur of the comet, so will give DSS a spin. That may take a while, because of the need of manually labelling the comet location in a HUGE number of files.

Not quite happy with the background, will add flats and darks later, but very happy with the level of detail in this stack of 9 images taken with my Canon EOS 80D with Sigma 50-100mm F/1.8 ART zoom at 100mm on my EQ3-2 mount, each exposure 30 s at F/1.8, ISO 200. The tail is clearly longer than the FOV of my 200mm F/2.8. I am also very pleased at the performance of this Sigma zoom at full aperture. Clearly not just a perfect portrait zoom, but excellent at wide-field astro-imaging

It is huge, and I think I can make out the ion tail in the 100 mm shot. Let's see what post-processing reveals

I know that won't happen here, so drove to my favourite spot north of the city of Groningen

Comet C/2020 F3 NEOWISE at 50 mm: 100 mm and 200 mm Will see how my data stack tomorrow

Just finished a short animation showing clouds scudding beneath the comet. Taken with my Canon EOS 80D and Sigma 50-100 mm F/1.8.

This is as good as I can get it, stacking 30 images taken with the 200 mm F/2.8 at 1600 ISO, 1.3 s There seems to be a hint of an ion tail visible

Lovely set of images.

Superb images

Very nice indeed!

Did a quick stack of 10 images taken last night. Quite pleased with the result so far, especially compared to a single frame Might adjust colours a bit more

Managed to get a load of shots on NEOWISE again, this time remembering to set capture mode to RAW. Will see how the stack or make time lapses later. 200 mm F/2.8: Sigma 50-100 mm F/1.8 17-55 F/2.8 Rather pleased with these initial results

Welcome to SGL, Nice set-up you have got yourself. Regarding go-to: you can quite cheerfully ignore go-to on your controller, and just star hop. Even though my old Vixen Great Polaris mount now has a full synscan go-to system from an EQ-5, for visual I just do a simple polar alignment, and start up the controller, ignore multi-star alignment and just get cracking by anlocking the clutches, pointing the scope roughly to where i need to be, lock the clutches and use the controller to steer in RA and DEC. For imaging, go-to is quite a time saver.

These shots were in the order of a second or so (haven't got the files handy) at ISO 800. Next time I think I will set up the EQ3-2. I might also have a go with the Sigma 50-100 F/1.8 ART lens. That is a fabulous portait zoom that might be ideal for a long-tailed comet, or in general a wide-field shot to put it into context

I went for a 200 mm F/2.8 on NEOWISE, with an unmodded Canon 80D Full image crop of 37 stacked frames Note that this was taken a few days ago, the more recent images I have seen show a longer tail, against a darker sky. I think I will stick to the 200 F/2.8 for the next shot hopefully coming Saturday or Sunday night

The ZWO120MC is a safe bet. Yoiu might even get one second-hand, as many people upgrade to newer planetary cameras

Imaging has become easier in many ways. I remember manually guiding a both my own C8 and a 1.5 m infrared telescope of the Arcetri Observatory at Gornergrat. The latter I managed a maximum of 45 minutes for spectrography. Horrible work, leaves you with a splitting headache. Autoguiders and the like make life far easier, but at the same time standards have gone up as well, and more complicated kit also means more can go wrong. At the same time, if I compare my very first M42 effort on Fujichrome film (single 15 minute exposure) with my C8 and at F/6.3 to an effort with my APM 80mm F/6 with 0.8x reducer, stacking loads of short exposures taken with a modded Canon EOS 550D, there is simply no contest Except when imaging, I still preferstar-hopping to using goto for visual, I will admit. A big 14x70 RACI finder does help

Nasssty wicked cloudssessss!

I think someone may have misunderstood the term Lick Observatory

Very likely

I am very happy with my Lunt wedge (1.25"version). Provides great image quality in my 80mm refractor

Absolutely. I bet he will start calling the telescope "my preciousssss"soon

Should be a nice starter scope, I had a lot of fun imaging with the LS35 (before anybody told me it wasn't an imaging scope ). The added 5 mm aperture and better focuser should make this one really attractive.