david_taurus83

Will it be for image pre and post processing? If only for imaging capture and mount control then it doesnt need to be special.

A lower ISO flat will produce better SNR. Just remember if your using bias or a dark flat you will need a master bias or dark flat of the same ISO or gain to match the flat only. The lights need their own matching dark/bias frames.

I hope these new mounts perform well. More choice on the market with these types of mount that are clearly aimed at us amateurs can only be a good thing.

You can still use the data. Can stack the subs of the individual channels and them align them in post processing.

Yep!

The gain is substantially different in those 2 as well. Looks like your correct dark frame is set at unity but the incorrect blue is much lower, I'm guessing 0 gain?

Could you have selected a region of interest by mistake with the 1600?

Have you opened a blue frame and seen how many pixels width and height it actually is?

I've been monitoring PHD closely since getting the new mount (CEM25P). The best guiding I have achieved so far is around 0.8" RMS and a usual average of 1.2" RMS. I've noticed when PHD auto selects a brighter star with good SNR that guiding seems to be smoother. More often than not however, it seems to auto select a star with SNR of around 20 and looking at the profile the star is sometimes barely distinguishable above the background noise with the appearance of a very faint blob. I'm using an ASI120 mini on a small 32mm guide scope with 128mm focal length. This may sound very small but there are always plenty of stars to choose from. I'm starting to wonder if these very faint stars are more affected by seeing conditions as they do appear to move around the profile a bit more. Is there a way to configure PHD so it auto selects a brighter star with better SNR? I can adjust the minimum HFD setting but it tends to pick a saturated star? Guiding improves but I'm aware this is likely to not detect mechanical errors and not issue correct guide commands.

Another issue which I'm not sure is related to the above but when looping exposures the background contrast changes with each exposure. Gets brighter and dimmer randomly. I thought this was normal as the change in contrast is usually subtle with 2/3 second exposures but last night I tried 4 and 5 second exposures and the difference also increased dramatically. At 5 seconds it also became evident that it wasnt just the sky background that was changing, it was also the star brightness as I got multiple lost star notifications. It would go almost completely black for an exposure, lost star ping, then next exposure would be back to normal again.

Using PHD 2.6.7 dev 1 and ZWO drivers.

Any ideas?

We wont have it that easy lol

Same as my Leo Triplet, the 70mm quad at 344mm isn't a galaxy killer but the itch needed scratching. A quick process in Pixinsight.

Canon 6D, Starwave 70EDQ-R

180 x 120s subs at ISO 1600

Bortle 6 Birmingham

3 minutes ago, bottletopburly said:

@david_taurus83 i got a tracer panel though not impressed with quality of it they illuminate from one edge so this week i will make my own light box , but i do like the nina flat wizard though

Yeah I bought one of those when i started. Wasnt convinced either so I ended up splurging on an Artesky panel. Expensive but worth it! That said, I had forgotten how hard it was to get good flats with a DSLR since I had a 600D. When I moved to an ASI1600 mono it was soo easy to do darks, flat darks and flats.

On 14/04/2020 at 11:21, michael8554 said:

Yes, the psuedo JPGs that camera LCD's and PC's display have no real relationship to the actual Raw.

Out of interest could you post one of your 2.5K Flats please ?

Michael

I've yet to process the 102mm data but I processed the last project I done on the 70mm quad. I experimented with various flats ranging from 2k to 9k ADU. In all circumstances the master flats cleared the individual subs of pretty bad dust bunnies on inspection. However, after stacking 180 subs there were still evidence of the worst dust bunnies on the data calibrated with 4k flats. So I redone everything again with 9k flats and they cleared everything.

With the 102mm though, I have a feeling I messed up the settings in NINA. I was using my laptop, not my usual imaging mini PC and looking at the settings used I have 16bit for the camera profile. So unsure if NINA scaled the ADU value for those flats. Might end up dumping 3.5 hours of data!!

I did look at the TSFlat2 but a bit put off by the amount of spacers you need. I've looked at loads and I've gone ahead and ordered the StellaMira 1.0 generic flattener. Given the price, I've also ordered the 0.8 one as well. Best of both worlds. They seem to be the only ones that will fit nicely between the roatator/tilt adapter and camera.

Looks pretty good to me!

I had that as well with my AZEQ6. I'm pretty sure when I first setup the scheduler it worked first time. But after that it didnt and I never worked out why?

As titled, not looking for a reducer, I want to image at the native focal length. Scope is a 102mm doublet at F7 (714mm) and camera is the Canon 6D. I would ideally like to keep the rotator on the end of the drawtube. This leaves an M48 thread on the rotator to connect to. @FLO  have the new Stellarmira 1.0 flatteners and they have M48 female/male threads. One more expensive than the other. Would one of these work?

Im open to other suggestions also. Just to point out, I'm not looking for perfect round pin point stars in the corners with this setup. I want to image smaller targets like galaxies and maybe close ups on some nebula areas. I'm expecting to do large central crops so happy enough with decent correction over a chip area similar to an ASI1600.

Thanks

Canon 6D. The ADU value if I use the 70mm quad f4.9 and NINA to shoot flats is around 8k usually. With the 102mm F7 NINA flats are around 2.5k ADU. The odd thing is the CR2 thumbnails look virtually the same if opened in windows picture Viewer. The difference between both scopes is the quad produces no vignetting at all as it does correct for a full frame chip whereas I'm using the 102mm with no flattener so there is pretty severe vignetting so I'm wondering if the light fall off in the corners has an affect on the overall mean value. Guess I'll just have to trust NINA to produce successful flats and I'm going the 5 it produced on my first night on M51 ste enough to salvage 3.5 hours of data!

Well I have to hold my hands up to this and eat humble pie. I took some flats a couple of nights ago and ran NINA's flats sequence. It gave me a very low ADU result so I cancelled after 5 flats and then done a manual set with my target ADU around 8/9k as described above. I tried stacking the 3 hours of data I have of M51 in DSS and my manual flats did nothing apart from enhance the vignetting and dust bunnies. So I created a master flat out of the 5 NINA flats and they work? Guess you cant trust the numbers all the time?! I've changed scopes for M51 and not using a flattener on the 102 f7. So maybe the numbers the flats need to work aren't the same as on the 70mm quad.

13 minutes ago, adyj1 said:

This is the misleading bit, I think...Venus is currently very much visible in the night sky. I wonder what they meant? 

Correct. Can also see Mercury as long as its behind the sun and trailing on the left as viewed from the northern hemisphere. In fact, 22nd of May after 9pm, both Mercury and Venus will be close together from our perspective here in the UK. Approx 10° above horizon so good western view needed.

Moving the mirror up will only shift the focal point further out on your focuser. I understand what you are suggesting but if you move the mirror and leave the camera in the same spot, you wont be focused and will have to move the camera out the same distance as the mirror. So the coma will still be present.

Before splashing out £££ on a Polemaster how about a look at Sharpcap for polar aligning? £10 a year for the Pro licence and it has an excellent routine for polar aligning?

Go into ASPS. Is the image you solved still in the file path? If so, click on it and select a different file but dont try and solve it. Then try again in APT. I ran into a similar problem like you describe and that was the fix.

Well....I've spoke too soon. I've managed to drop my new CEM25P. All still works after initial testing but I've cracked the Ra motor plastic cover and broke the GPS module off the motherboard. 😓😞😣

To me an EQDir cable is one that completely bypasses the hand controller. Something like this

When I dabbled with a dual rig last year, I had used a guitar pick to shim the side of the dovetail on the 102EDR to help align the 2 scopes. Laptop was setup inside by the back door where I was sat and I watched in horror as the 102 pointed straight up with the 6D on the back slid straight down the saddle and luckily caught grip again at the last moment! If the scope survived, the camera wouldn't have! I promptly ditched the guitar pick idea and invested in a better clamp!