Hughsie

The tilt adapter would sit between the camera and diagonal. Typically the camera screws into one side of the tilt adapter and a 1.25” nose piece would screw into the other. The nose piece is then inserted into the diagonal. You have two potential issues. 1) the asi120 is prone to newton rings. Even with a tilt adapter there are comments on other forums where even the maximum tilt in the adapter wasn’t enough to remove them. 2) I haven’t seen a tilt adapter that fits a mini version of the asi cameras. That’s not to say there isn’t one, I just haven’t seen one. Like Elp, I am of the opinion that flats will not calibrate out Newton Rings this is because they appear in the flats too. To capture flats I would point the Lunt towards the centre of the Sun, remain in focus and put an opaque plastic bag over the front of the scope secured by an elastic band. Something like a crumpled sandwich or freezer bag works but it needs to be clear/whiteish. Pull the bag tight. Then adjust your exposure time so that the histogram peaks around the 50% mark and capture your frames, say 100 in SER format. In Autostakkert you can create a master flat and open the SER file. Autostakkert will then stack and produce a master flat in tiff format which you can then load into Autostakkert to calibrate your images. Hope that helps. John

A great resource for research is Astrobin. If you haven’t heard of it it's a community of photographers who post their images/have forum discussions. It is free to join. You can search by location, say New York, and view images posted by individuals near you. In the main they will list the equipment used and exposure times. You can also search by equipment such as your camera and view images and see what camera settings have been used. It’s a great way to see first hand what combination of equipment/exposure times will produce and to look for potential targets. Worth a look if you haven’t already.

Resolved. Updated to build 1605.

I get the following error in PixInsight using MacOS (Intel) platform. I have reset all the repositories and updated them again but still get this error for GraXpert and GraXpertDenoise. Processing script file: /Applications/PixInsight/src/scripts/Toolbox/Graxpert.js *** Error: Signature verification failed for 'GraXpert': Invalid code signature: /Applications/PixInsight/src/scripts/Toolbox/Graxpert.js

Hi Vinny. You are correct regarding darks. These can be captured in advance and are not affected by changes to the image train. What you do need to remember is that your darks need to be captured using the same exposure time, Gain, Offset and Temperature as your light frames. I have a 'Dark' Library for my ASI1600mm and ASI294mc all at a temperature of -10c. For each camera I have exposure times for 60s, 120s, 180s and 300s. The Gain and Offsets for the 1600mm are based on whether I am doing narrowband or broadband imaging. For the 294mc I tend to use a Gain of 121 and offset of 30. I refresh mine every 12 months. It's best practice to take flats after every session to ensure the best calibration outcome. You can use flats from previous sessions only if your image train has not changed and assuming you keep your optics free from dust. As you mention, changing the image train between capturing your lights and taking your flats will result in poor calibration so don't touch anything. In regard to the filter wheel, as you take your flats for each filter the wheel will rotate round and your filters will be in the same orientation as they were when you captured your light frames so this doesn't impact the image train. The only way this will not be the case is if you alter your image train by moving the filter wheel or unscrew the filters and put them back in again. As to the rotation of the wheel moving dust, you would have to be pretty unlucky for this to happen, however, it does no harm to periodically inspect your optics to ensure no dust or other particles have snuck their way in. Hope this helps. John

Full details and RGB version can be found on Asstrobin https://www.astrobin.com/users/hughsie/collections/2342/ Solar disc. Lots of Active Regions. AR13639

AR13639 AR13643 AR13644 Prominences on the southern limb Prominences on the south east limb

Abell 1656 - Coma Galaxy Cluster and Quasar Hunt With all the poor weather in the UK so far I had a rare clear night on 9th April 2024 and a New Moon as well. Here is Abell 1656 in Coma Berenices. There are some 100 quasars (green label), a planetary nebula (red label) and too many PGC galaxies to count in this image. Nice to see that I managed to capture some bright pixels for the Quasars as well. Equipment & Data William Optics Z103 refractor. ZWO ASI294mc Pro with Chroma Lum filter. Sky-Watcher EQR6-Pro mount. 161 x 120" subs, Gain 121, Offset 30, Sensor temp -10 c, Bin 1x1

Thank you Paul. I ran the same in PixInsight using the TypeCat script and pulled out a lot of quasars. Currently, calculating the distances on a few to see if I’ve beaten my most distant object captured.

With galaxy season upon us and the weather in the UK being so poor I had a rare clear night during a New Moon on 9th April 2024. With more poor weather being forecast I decided to get my 'galaxy fix' by photographing Abell 1656. This region of space contains over 1,000 identified galaxies so that ought to scratch that galaxy itch! Equipment William Optics Z103 refractor. Main camera - ZWO ASI294MC Pro; Guide Camera ZWO ASI290mm mini. Chroma Luminance filter. Sky-Watcher EQ6-R Pro mount. Primaluce Lab Sesto Senso motor focuser. Pegasus Astro Ultimate Powerbox V2. Pegasus Astro FlatMaster 150. Software N.I.N.A. PHD2 PixInsight. Data Chroma Lum 161 x 120" (Gain 121, Temp. -10c, Bin 1x1) Darks 50 Flats 30 Dark Flats 30

AR13639 (Class EAI) Located N30E12, this region contains 16 sunspots and has reduced in size over the last 24 hours to approx. 880 million square kilometres. It released no flares today, however, it did produce an M4.02 class flare on 15th April 2024. AR13644 (Class DSO) Positioned just off the eastern limb at N13E49, this small region is made up of two sunspots and has increased in size to 364 million square kilometres. It has not produced any flares to date. AR13646 (Class CRO) Finally, we have a small grouping of eight sunspots just north of AR13644 at N22E47. Like AR13644, this region has increased in size in the last 24 hours to some 210 million square kilometres. At this time it has not produced any flares. Equipment William Optics Z61 refractor. Tilt adapter. ZWO ASI174mm camera. Sky-Watcher EQ6R Pro mount. DayStar Quark Chromosphere. Data 110 images from 1,000 stacked. Exposure time 18ms, Gain 0. Software SharpCap Pro. Autostakkert4! PixInsight Solar Tool Box.

I originally captured the data from this image in Sii, Ha and Oiii across three nights in 2021 using scope T14 at iTelescope. The data was automatically calibrated and downloaded from iTelescope but other than initial stacking I never posted the image as the camera had line defects. Whilst PixInsight did its best to remove most of the lines there were some persistent offenders and so I binned the project. Today, with a bit more time on my hands I decided to have another go and feel I have something presentable to share this time around. There remain some red and green blotches from the camera which you can see zoomed up close but as Mother used to say, "A blind man would be pleased to see them". Here is the Seagull.

Cheers Rob. 2022 must have been my "blurry period" lol

Thank you Patrick, I appreciate your comment. I just muck around with the data, throw it together and keep going backwards and forwards until I get where I want to be.

Given the clouds I am in the process of reviewing all my old data and reprocessing it. Here is Messier 100 using the data from 2022.

Well, here we are with another reprocessed job this time of NGC 2403. As before I am using the same data just different tools and workflow in PixInsight.

For those who haven't seen any of my recent posts, I am during these cloudy days revisiting data from previous imaging sessions armed with RC Astro BlurXterminator, NoiseXterminator and StarXterminator along with GraXpert and new approaches to processing in PixInsight. Amazing tools. So, that being said, here is the same data above rerun today using these tools.

I have been revisiting some of my old data and reprocessing it using the new tools such as BlurXterminator and StarXterminator in PixInsight. So, here we go with IC 342 revisited. Amazing how much detail I left on the table the first time around.

I have been reviewing my PixInsight workflow after purchasing the tools available from RC Astro and have revisited a few of my old images. Here is a rework of the Cocoon nebula using the original data from 2021.

I downloaded the RC Astro tools, BlurXterminator, NoiseXterminator and StarXterminator for PixInsight. Removing the stars enabled me to draw out more nebulosity using GeneralisedHyperbolicStretch tool. Colour masks were created to focus on the red, yellow and cyan channels and range masks used to add more contrast in the nebulosity targeting the large and small scale features.

A few days ago I revisited this data to see what I could do a second time around armed with new PixInsight tools.

Coming off a full Moon, the evening of 26th January 2024 didn't present many broadband opportunities. Ideally, I wanted to use the ZWO ASI294MC camera for a single night project and so as I like star clusters I chose NGC 1528. Some of my other favourite targets are those contained in the Sharpless Catalogue and having reviewed NGC 1528 in Astrobin I became aware that Sh2-209 would fall into the frame. Even though Sh2-209 is a small target, I wanted to include as much of this in the image and so added my Optolong L-Extreme filter to the filter wheel. I then split my time imaging between the Chroma UV/IR filter and the Optolong L-Extreme. Using the WBPP script in PixInsight I generated the separate R, G and B channels for the star field. Running the script again with the L-Extreme data I was able to create a narrowband image of the star field and Sh2-209. It was then a case of processing the RGB star field, then the narrowband version, removing the stars from the latter and adding Sh2-209 into the RGB version using Pixelmath. Data UV/IR 100 x 180 s L-Extreme 29 x 300 s Flats x 30; Dark Flats x 30; Darks x 50. Total integration time 5h 45' Equipment William Optics Z103 refractor ZWO ASI294MC camera. Sky-Watcher EQ6R Pro mount. Sesto Senso motor focuser. William Optics Angle Rotator. ZWO filter wheel. Software N.I.N.A with Hocus Focus plug-in ( Hocus Focus really help reduce the HFR of the image. Typically I am at 2.2 ish HFR but this went as low as 1.9). PHD 2. PixInsight.

ISSUE RESOLVED - USER ERROR Whilst I had downloaded the latest Release Version of N.I.N.A. this was in face the 32-bit programme as somewhere in the recesses of my brain I believed my motor focuser only operated on 32-bit software. Reviewing the Primaluce Lab website, I now understand that my Sesto Sense V1 comes with both 32 and 64 bit drivers. With this in mind I copied my equipment profiles across to a USB memory stick, uninstalled N.I.N.A. and installed the 64-bit Release version. Hocus Focus now loads and I also now have access to the Offline Sky Survey with images (something else the 32-bit version did not support). Thank you to everyone who responded, but this one is down to user error. Incidentally, on the N.I.N.A. download page it describes the 32-bit download as 'Deprecated'. When I looked up what this word means in IT parlance Google replied 'DO NOT USE' which begs the question why it's even there or maybe I am an idiot just trying to safe face I suspect the latter! John

Many thanks for letting me know. Hopefully the text is visible now.

VdB 14 & 15 The VdB catalogue was published in 1966 by Sidney van den Bergh and contains 159 reflection nebula. It details information for all BD and CD stars north of -33 degrees which are surrounded by reflection nebulosity visible on the blue and red prints of the Palomar Sky Survey. Here we can view VdB 14 (top) and VdB 15 (bottom) in the constellation Camelopardalis. Data The data for this image was captured across the nights of the 18th and 19th January 2024 as follows; Light frames 350 x 120 s Flat frames 30 Darks for Flats 30 Dark frames 25 Total integration time 11h 40 mins Equipment William Optics Z193 refractor with 0.8x reducer. ZWO ASI194MC Pro Cooled camera. Sesto Senso motor focuser. Chroma 1.25" Luminance filter. SkyWatcher EQ6R-Pro mount. Pegasus Ultimate Power box V2. Pegasus 150 Flatmaster. Software N.I.N.A. All data was squeezed, crushed and smeared in PixInsight.