Rustang

I wish I could leave it out all night un attended but I've experience it starting to rain when it shouldn't have done, thankfully I had just gone back out side so ended up standing over my setup for 10mins with an unbrella!. Now I don't really trust the weather, and to add to that, the weather is never 100% as predicted, taking last night as a classic example where it was "clear" till 4am, there ended up being alot of light cloud around so I kept an eye out and only captured data when clear. I also don't have an observatory so I'm pretty sure everything would be soaked by dew or frosted over by the morning? There are not normally to many other issues to deal with but I would prefer to be on top of an issue (had one last night) to not waste a precious night's imaging. So sadly Im up most of the night, even when out till 4:30am, it does get a bit tiring, especially having to set up then pack down each time I'm out. I'm hoping to put together a more permanent set up in the future which will only be if I can sort an observatory. 

I've seen a few small flashes before but tonight I just saw a really bright flash high up towards the North, I'm pretty sure I saw a much smaller one just below it a few seconds later. It was as if someone flicked on and off a torch really quickly. Anyone else seen any random flashes in the nights sky before!? 

And no it's not a plane! 😊

17 minutes ago, Stuf1978 said:

Looks great mate 👍

Cheers 👍

My first ever HaRGB. I really did fumble my way through the processing which had its fair share of issues, mostly the corners because sadly I cant get rid of the vignetting through my image train (suggestions welcome!) but i can live with it.

5hrs of Ha collected over 4 nights mostly under strong/full moon light.

RGB stars collected over two nights but the integration time is very little.

Stacked in DSS processed in PS

SWHEQ5 Pro, SW80- ED DS Pro, QHY9 mono, Baader filters.

I'm hoping to get some OIII to produce a different version but for now I'm happy with this one

An external USB port, thanks Jesper 👍 I've now fitted it to my homemade external power box 😊

7 minutes ago, Clarkey said:

Just checking as it would cause the graph to move slowly. You can change it on the left of the graph where there are options for the two axis.

This is a photo of my guiding screen from a few nights ago, I've checked tonight's and nothings different including the scale axis settings etc. 

2 minutes ago, Clarkey said:

Just checking as it would cause the graph to move slowly. You can change it on the left of the graph where there are options for the two axis.

I see, il take a look at see if somehow its changed by itself. Cheers. 

2 minutes ago, david_taurus83 said:

Take a picture and post it up. Sounds like the scale has been changes to me.

Scale!? I literally can't see anything that has changed!? I've stopped it at the moment because as per usual it's cloudy, il see what it does if I start it up again 

12 minutes ago, Clarkey said:

Have you increased the x axis value from the default 200 to 400?

I haven't, its not something I would know how to do, should I or are you just checking that I haven't!? 

39 minutes ago, Spongey said:

Have you changed your guide camera exposure time? Alternatively your guide camera / mount connection could be dodgy

I haven't changed the exposure, could be a cable/connection issue or something along those lines but it's guiding ok so not sure why it's slow! 

Everything else seems fine but the graph is moving really slowly across the screen tonight and I haven't changed anything, anyone had this before!? 

Not sure whats happened here and why the images have gone below but I thought I would have another go but using the longer integration Ha and SII data for the artistic rendition of an SHO California Nebula and also a better processed Bi colour version (Ha and SII) 

2 hours ago, old_eyes said:

It is a beautiful image. 
 

How did you create it from just the Ha data? Did you map brightness to colour, like a heat map?

Thank you. To start with I created 3 colour layers from the Ha data, one Yellow, one green and one blue. I then set about blending the layers and using and selective colour tool with mask's as I went. There were also the normal tweaks such as sharping, levels and curves applied at certain points. There was a lot of fumbling my way through it until happy.

Lovely images, beautiful colours. 

I managed to get some more HA last night so I'm currently at 4hrs 50 mins. I captured 1hr of SII also to throw in to the mix to make a Bi colour image. Still looks great in Ha red! I might try and get some RGB stars to add in.

2 hours ago, Knight of Clear Skies said:

I think this is because the nebula is lit up by a passing runaway star, Xi Persei, rather than stars embedded in the nebula. So there isn't the same concentration of oxygen around the ionizing source.

Thanks, Ive still enjoyed capturing this nebula, its not one ive really been interested in but its actually more beautiful than I first thought, even with the lack of OIII .

Well it appears this will stay as an artistic representation, a little more of a 'false colour image' than I was hoping because it appears there's next to no OIII in this Nebula 🤦‍♂️ and what is there is hard to capture. I should have done my research but it's all learning 😊. There does appear to be some SII in my first 10min SII exposure so will attempt a bi colour image instead. 

So this is only 3 hours of Ha mono data. While keeping my fingers tightly crossed to get some OIII and SII data before the end of the season, I thought I would create what I would like to finally create with full SHO data while I'm waiting. It has been created from coloured layers of the Ha data entirely in Photoshop. I'm hoping when Ive finally got the full SHO data that it will turn out as good!

Amazing, well done. It knocks the socks off mine! 😄

8 minutes ago, CraigT82 said:

Great shots! Where did you get the prints done?! Always on the lookout for decent printing places 

Thank you, I use Sim Imaging, I've been using them for about 3 years for all my wedding photography stuff. These are the standard Lustre prints, pretty cheap then about £5 postage, depending of when you place the order you will get them next day normally. Its through their Sim Lab website! 

7 minutes ago, Sunshine said:

Those are both stunning and inspiring! look at the contrast in those prints! simply breathtaking.

Thanks you, really appreciate that, it's been a long old journey but exciting times ahead. 

Some prints! 😊 I'm proud of all of my images because of the huge effort to get to where I am but it's taken until going into my 3rd year of astrophotography to finally like one of my images enough to put it in a frame! You can really see either how good or bad your processing is with prints as well! 😁

1 minute ago, Adreneline said:

Tell me about it! I find it frustrating all the differences between PCs, Macs, iDevices that I have.

I hope you don't mind but I took you image into Affinity and used the colour picker to sample around the background space and pretty well everywhere the G value was slightly in excess of R and B - not by much but enough to give the cast I could see on my screen - so I used SCNR in PI to remove it.

With or without the cast it's a great image. I love GC's but I'm rubbish at imaging them - or processing them - or both!

Thanks for sharing.

Adrian

Not a problem at all, it all helps! 👍

2 hours ago, Adreneline said:

Big improvement I would say.

On my screen there is a slight green cast which I just removed in PI and M13 pops out even more.

I've never managed a GC that I was pleased with - I think they are the hardest objects to image - you've got an excellent result.

Adrian

Thank you, it was worth staying out till 4:30am! It was a little tricky to process, I got there second time round. Colour wise, its difficult with screens being so different to notice color casts, it always looks better on my computer screen than on my phone!

Ive removed the green cast from the above image.