teoria_del_big_bang

1 minute ago, gorann said:

 While many astro images are quite dramatic this one have a nice and calming feeling. I bet watching even lowers my blood pressure.

I do not have high blood pressure but yes that is a lovely image that does seem to make you feel relaxed and inspires me to try and achieve myr best in my images, even though at this stage my images are maybe not so difficult or impressive still makes me strive for better.

That is really fantastic Martin and well worth the hours of processing (or Re-Processing) 🙂 

Steve

29 minutes ago, david_taurus83 said:

APT is the best astro software for the beginner. Even advanced users still use it. And as you say, cheaper than BYE.

A little bit of a learning curve but once you get the hang of its excellent.

When you get a bit more confident you can set up for platesolving:

https://stargazerslounge.com/topic/334568-setting-up-platesolving-in-astrophotography-tool-apt/

I absolutely agree.

Actually I am not too sure there is much of a learning curve, I am no computer guru but seemed to pick it up pretty quickly, if not there is a good help file that comes with it and lots of folk on this forum that use it to help you out if you get stuck.

As for the plate solving this revolutionised my imaging. It makes it so easy to make sure you have the perfect framing of your target.

From what I remember there is a free version and the paid version you get a few extras, actually not a lot extra as unlike most software all the essential tools are available in the free version, BUT the cost is so little (around £16 first year then around £5 a year) I felt it rude not to pay for the full version as it is updated and imroved several times a year and seems so little for a magnificent piece of software.

As you can tell I cannot recommend it more.

Steve

On 06/02/2020 at 10:54, Adam J said:

Did you sort this? How is it guiding now? 

Hi,

Well sort of, I did get the weight down and used it once or twice with reasonable guiding (can't remember exactly what I achieved though) but then I bought a new CEM60 mount with more payload capacity. Due to weather I have only had one session with this new mount so not really sure how good I can get this to guide but should know soon if the cloud clears.

It may well be when I get a few more sessions under my belt with the new mount I will be asking for help again, but will try to get it the best I can first.

Steve

Very nice images, I particularly like the horsehead 🙂 

Steve

Welcome to the forum and what a wonderful present to get 🙂

Are these links any help ?

azgti_manual

Synscan_V4_Hand_Control_Manual

Sky-Watcher Skymax 127 OTA Manual

I am pretty new to all this and found this forum brilliant, so informative and very friendly.

Enjoy your present (if the skies ever clear again up here 🙂 )

Steve

Sorry to repeat previous replies but that is awesome, I to would be having a professional print made of that for my wall If it was mine. 👍

Steve

Very nice images.  I still think the star-less images look odd but actually that does make a very beautiful image and you can see so much more detail of the nebula, so maybe my opinion is changing.

Steve

I have wondered the same and tempted to try one.

Steve

4 hours ago, Ishan Mair said:

How did you check for  the "90  degree" movement  for axis-shaft mentioned by @teoria_del_big_bang in this sketch in topic earlier ?

Really I did this just by feel. If you try to move the axis in the direction shown you can feel if there is any movement. 

As you screw the nut up to the bearing you start to pull all the mechanical bits together (bearings, spindles etc). Even by hand it is very easy to do this, once they are all snugged up any extra pressure then puts preload on those taper bearings (you essentially start to wedge them in between the inner and outer races).

We require very little pre-load as the axis really does no work as such we just need enough to stop any slop in that direction, also enough to stop the nut loosening itself, and no more. The more preload we put on the tighter that axis will become and as these are not really precision machined we will start to see tight spots as it rotates, and we risk the stepper motor stalling or at least losing steps. Although if you do put everything back together and you have issues with motors stalling it is more likely to be the worm assemblies causing it as these also have cyclic tight spots.

So I think personally it is quite easy to tighten these enough only by hand. I think most tutorials show tightening with a C spanner or with some implement which is fine but lightly does it.

Steve

M10, just checked mine and definitely M10.

Steve

Signed Petition, I hope it has an effect but I will not hold my breath, authorities still seem to ignore light pollution as a concern.

Steve

You could take the cowards way out and just get a gift voucher.

first-light-optics-gift-vouchers

Also available at other retailers:

RVO Gift Vouchers

I know it is nicer to give something yo have thought of yourself but at least that way your friend gets exactly what they need and can also contact the retailer to check they are getting the right item for their scope. 

Steve

I tried something similar a week or two ago for first time but just as a training exercise for myself to see how to combine frames of different exposures so maybe a lot simpler than what you are trying to do.  

I used two methods both taken from a website by Jerry Lodriguss, not sure if you have looked at these or not, oe whether there is anything useful to you or not regarding the colour.

Compositing 2 Different Exposures with Layer Masks

Compositing 2 Different Exposures with Selection Masks

Steve

Well I like it, great image 🙂 

Steve

An absolutely wonderful image beautifully framed. Mosaics are something I hope to try this year at some stage but I should not run before I can walk.

Steve

4 hours ago, James said:

I am a fan of PixInsight but my problem is that I so rarely get round to processing I've forgotten everything I learned the last time round so I do find the learning (or re-learning) curve a tough one.

I've relied very heavily on tutorails from Harry Page here http://harrysastroshed.com/pixinsight/pixinsight video html/Pixinsighthome.html  and Kayron Mercia here: https://www.lightvortexastronomy.com/tutorials.html

The developers strike me as real hardcore maths/stats types - as processing is maths/stats that's got to be a good thing...

James

James,

I know exactly what you mean and have the same issue with not doing it often enough for it to become natural to me.

I also have used various tutorials form https://www.lightvortexastronomy.com/ but I have found it really helps if I use these to begin with,  then make my own tutorial in Word, taking my own screen shots as I go. This way it reduces the size of the tutorial because I can either leave bits out I know what to do, or just add a small reminder to do something, with the bits I am "au fait" with, then maybe enhance somethings I struggle with. Also just doing this seems to help with things going into my aging brain and understanding better.

Then as I am old school and like a manual to look at I can print these shortened tutorials out and keep in a binder for reference anytime.

Steve

3 hours ago, Viktiste said:

As another newbie agree completely. And yes it is pricey, but at least it is a one off cost, and not subscription based like the trend seems to be these days. Well worth the money imho.

The price was what initially stopped me getting it as I thought it was too costly.

But then I used the trial and was pretty much blown away with what it can do and thought that we think nothing of spending hundreds on a new scope, camera or other equipment yet many of us tend to shy off spending anywhere near that on software. Yet, without decent software getting a decent image from our data relatively easily then the equipment is useless.

So I bought it and am so happy I did 🙂

Steve

Just watched the launch and the return of the booster and yes it is amazing how it all works but the thought of another trail of satellites to contend with is not a nice thought.

Steve

Richard, 

Those are just exceptional images, you must be so happy with those, thanks for sharing 🙂 

Steve

Nice start. 👍  It's great just to get an image when starting off and it is an achievement to be proud of.

I am a relative newbie and still so much to learn, so there are loads of members better to give you advice than myself.

My first images were not good at all but slowly things did progress but after less than 2 years I am achieving some reasonable images (nothing like some of the wonderful images that so appear on this forum but for me I am happy).

I think the main things I have learnt is to be patient, use this forum for advice (often there is more than one way to crack the proverbial egg so sometimes the advice does differ and you may have to try more than one solution to see what works for you but generally great advice) and concentrate on one aspect at a time to improve on. You cannot cure all issues in one go but as your images improve, albeit bit by bit, you will feel a real sense of satisfaction.

Oh and I guess most important of all enjoy it, this can be a very frustrating hobby obsession at times but if it all seems too much then stop and slow down, everything can be cured but maybe not in that particular session, there will always be another night.

I look forward to seeing your future images. 🙂 

Steve

I don't know that looks like a good system and hopefully is as I am hoping my similar system will work so I would stick to it if you can otherwise I found it a nightmare if I changed how I stored all this data nearly every time I obtained new data. 

Steve

1 minute ago, dannybgoode said:

I am starting to develop a reasonable solution to file structure.  The subs for a session are stored in a file with is yyyymmdd - [target] and an L, R, G and B sub folders.  I then create further sub folders for each step in the calibration and integration process.  In here I will also store the master flats that I used to calibrate.

I then have further folders for Darks, Bias and Flats with sub folders for the subs but will generally clear out the subs once I have created a master of each.  I may keep the dark subs just becuase of the length of time it takes to create a good library of them.

I have an 8Tb NAS drive as well where I store my lights from each session as an archive but probably won't keep all the calibration subs etc as these can be reproduced pretty easily - particularly as I will easily be able to locate the master flats for any given target.

Amazing, but that is not too dissimilar to how I have ended up. I just recently moved everything into similarly structured directories and really is almost same you you have done.

Steve

I too keep everything stored on a small server (so everything is backed up as it automatically goes onto two separate drives in the server) I bought off Ebay for about £80.

Issue I have is getting some sort of order to the directories so everything is in a logical order and easily found.

Steve 

2 minutes ago, Rodd said:

I agree--Bicolored images are definitely not my forte. 

Well you could have fooled me.

But I am still at the start of a big learning curve regarding processing anyway and learning Pixinsight and PhotoShop. but slowly I am getting there. I am beginning to love PI as I now kind of understand the logic behind it and find it really well written and now fairly easy to follow, in parallel I am also trying to learn PS but still not got to grips with that yet. When I started this I was amazed to see how some people can get so much out of so little with good processing and realised that getting the data was probably not even half the story and there was a lot more to this before you get some of these wonderful images seen on this forum.

I look forward to seeing what the SII does for the image 🙂 

Steve

Yes I think that is actually better for me, I prefer more subtle colouring (so much of this processing is down to personal preference) but still has all the detail.

Steve