Rustang

3 minutes ago, Space Cowboy said:

Welcome to mainstream planetary imaging 🙂 You can use an extension tube to give more fl the body of another Barlow works well or simply pull the cam nose further out from your Barlow or a combination of both.

I looked at getting a 3x barlow to bring it up to f15 but when I put my set up details into astronomy tools sample calculator it was even more damaging to the sample rate so I cant really up the focal length

1 hour ago, Kon said:

Great you made it working. Now you need some decent seeing to get more details out.

Sadly my sample rate is way out due to my camera/scope set up, with the x2 barlow I'm only at f10 so not great so I might not be able to get anymore details showing but worth ago.

19 minutes ago, Nik271 said:

Looks that the collimation is fine!

In planetary imging aperture rules above all, so between an 8 inch relectror and 4 inch refractor there is no contest. You don't even need a heavy duty mount because each exposure is so short. Some form of basic tracking to keep the target on the sensor is enough.

Yeah the mount handled the scope fine, and considering the scope has sat around for over a year un-used it performed well to. I'm really excited to capture jupiter now 🙂

So I started my planetary imaging journey this year with a 100mm refractor, it went ok. This week I started to wonder if I could use my old Orion 8inch reflector instead. I thought it would be to big and heavy for my HEQ5 Pro but today I dug it out and realised it felt lighter than I thought. So long story short I gave it ago! It focused without issue with the standard 1.25 R&P focuser which was fine to use so off I went with no idea if it was in collimation or not!

Orion 8 inch reflector, SW HEQ5 Pro

ZWO 224mc with Celestron 2x barlow

Firecapture, Autostakkert and Registax

3 min SER, 20% stacked of 18251 frames

Really pleased with the result.

2 minutes ago, CraigT82 said:

I’d probably try restacking with different alignment points. Also tick RGB align box in AS3 that might help 

Is the restacking with different alignment points for the Mars issue?

Thanks guys, at least we have found the issue, anything I can do about it to help the colour? 

Any ideas what's causing the offset ring on mars ?

This is only the second time Ive imaged Jupiter, I had colour issues first time round but captured debayered in Firecapture. Tonight I believe I captured in raw (debayer un ticked) and de bayered in Autostakkert forced to RGGB. I then processed with auto RGB balance in Registax but the colour is still off, any ideas?

ZWO 224mc, UV IR cut filter and 2x barlow. Tal 100mm refractor

Mars seems to get this offset light ring,  any ideas?

6 minutes ago, scotty38 said:

Sorry if I misled you as I have no idea on the software or video capture, just that it's the same principle in NINA for DSO imaging so was just an idea 🙂

Not at all, your probably right, the log file says it was captured with out so should be good 👍

6 minutes ago, scotty38 said:

Is it just the preview being debayered for viewing? What is the actual saved file like?

Good point, I haven't checked, I guess I assumed the preview software wouldnt debayer so my file is in colour! I'm still new to this type of imaging so will it be clear in the file as to whether or not it's captured in mono? It's say in the log file - Debayer (data) =no (raw) 

I've turned off the de Bayering option in firecapture but my preview video is showing in colour and I'm not sure why. I would like to shoot in mono and de Bayer in Autostakkert later. Camera is the 224mc.

Just now, vlaiv said:

No guiding is needed for planetary and in fact - it is going to interfere with normal imaging.

Just simple tracking should be enough to keep the planet in the FOV for duration of 5 minutes.

 

Perfect, nice a simple to set up still which is what I want 🙂

10 minutes ago, vlaiv said:

You can comfortably go with longer videos. AS!3 will compensate for any rotation that happens in that time frame as any rotation that can be resolved with 4" scope will be smaller than seeing induced distortion - and AS!3 can deal with those with alignment points.

I'd say - shoot 5 minute video and don't worry about derotation. It is useful when you have longer videos (for example 5 minute on C11 or C14 might already be too much as they resolve much more than 4" scope - at least x2.5 more) - or videos that are spaced apart.

You won't need smaller ROI either if you use 8bit capture and 5ms as camera is capable 200+ FPS on 8bit and 800x600, but for sake of storage, unless you want to also capture moons - use 640x480 (4-5 minute video at those speeds can easily reach 20GB or more).

5ms is good exposure time for most nights and I don't think you need shorter than that.

Thanks vlaiv, I appreciate your help again. I'm not guiding while planetary imaging like I do with DSO imaging because I can't be bothered to set it up, I'm just side rail tracking via my HEQ5 Pro. I'm guessing 5ms exposures over a 5min video I don't have to worry about things like star travel because I'm not tracking and as long as jupiter is still in frame I'm good to go without tracking!? I ask because I used to get travel over 2min exposures without tracking but as I hope its different because I'm taking ms exposures and not long exposures. 

22 minutes ago, Nigella Bryant said:

I'm new to this planetary imaging too. I've use ROI and several two minute stacked image's and used WinJupos to de-rotate them. Try taking several and de-rotate. This is my best image so far albeit with a C11. I'm far, far from an expert, lol. 

Lovely, your doing well! Not sure il be able to resolve that much detail with my little 100mm but one day il get a set up to suit. For now I'm happy to improve with what I've got. 

8 minutes ago, vlaiv said:

If you are doing 5ms exposure - you will be limited to 200fps by exposure. You can do smaller ROI to save on file size - but you can't get higher FPS because 1000ms / 5ms = 200fps.

You can push FPS further only by reducing exposure time - and I'm not sure you'd want to do that.

Whole point of planetary imaging (lucky type) is to find that sweet spot exposure - one that freezes the seeing - and not to go lower than that as SNR suffers.

Just to confirm what reducing exposure time is, it's choosing a quicker 'shutter' so 4 or 3ms? So shall I stay with having a small ROI, 5ms and a 3min video? 

Also I was devayering while capturing in firecapture but I've read its best to turn debayer off and capture in mono then debayer in Autostakkert later. I have read though that some people seem to struggle with getting the colour back later. 

6 minutes ago, vlaiv said:

Check to see if you are doping 12bit capture (16 bit) instead of 10bit (8bit format), or maybe switch to 320x240 roi.

Jupiter is small with that scope and you won't need large ROI anyway (unless trying to capture moons as well).

Above says you should be able to even do 800x600 at 240fps - so it might be down to USB and your computer (SSD?) if everything is setup ok and you still can't get high fps.

Its on 16 bit, so its on 640 x 480 so my FPS seem right if averaging at 127, Ive just done a test 3min video and not frame limited like before and got 22970 frames so I will do that next time plus going down to 300 x 300 ROI does boost the FPS to over 200

11 minutes ago, vlaiv said:

As long as you don't saturate - raising gain won't do anything to the SNR - in fact, it can be beneficial.

Raising gain has benefit of lowering the read noise (almost always, but there are few fringe cases where this is not true). Other than that - it has no effect on SNR (unless you saturate of course).

What was our FPS?

That is also important metric. Use ROI and USB3.0 connection. Make sure you have usb turbo thingy turned on in sharp cap. With ~5ms - you should be able to get 200fps.

In 4-5 minute capture that will amount to 5 x 60 x 200 = ~60000 frames. Stacking only fraction of that (like 5-6% top frames) will give you stack of ~3600 - which will give you x60 SNR improvement.

You say you stacked 35% of 2000 subs, right?

What was your FPS and how long did you record for? With proper settings, in even one minute you should get ~10000 frames. 2000 is too low count.

I think my limit was set to 3000 not 2000, the average FPS was 127. Ive got the camera plugged in at the moment, with gain at 375, shutter 5ms and high speed on its only getting up to around 138 FPS, ROI is 640 x 480. I think Ive been doing it wrong by setting a frame limit not a time limit!

4 minutes ago, vlaiv said:

I would not invest in a new barlow in that case - just keep using the one you have as is.

Ok cool. Iin regards to gain and shutter, I had a look at the log at the gain was at 350, shutter 5.066ms so about right, it was a pretty noisy video, well looked noisy so would going any higher on the gain add to more noise losing the little detail that I managed to capture?

4 minutes ago, Ags said:

Yes, I may have misremembered the name of the feature.

No problem, that's what Ive been using but the colour is still off, maybe its something in fire capture I need to look at

21 minutes ago, Ags said:

In AutoStakkert you place alignment points on regions of detail to guide the stacking. AutoStakkert can compensate for some rotation with the alignment points (and you have a smaller scope with less resolution) so three minutes is fine in my limited experience.  

Thanks for the tip, I will give that ago, so a 3 min video would be ok then and not show any rotation with my setup? when you mentioned 'auto white balance' in Registax, did you mean auto RGB balance?

12 minutes ago, vlaiv said:

With scope of this size - you can comfortably go to 4-5 minutes.

You might be slightly over sampled here - but you can change that if you have a way to change barlow to camera distance. Shortening that distance will reduce barlow magnification factor - to say x1.5-1.8 instead of x2.

Try to use higher gain and shorter exposures. Set exposures to 5ms

Maybe add yellow #8 filter next to UV/IR cut filter, or something like Baader contrast booster.

It will help with color, but it will also remove out of focus light that is lowering contrast and possibly causing issues with stacking.

As far as alignment point on the moon goes - that is good advice and to be clear - in AS!3 - click once on the Jupiter's moon to add alignment point to it. That will make it round and nice instead of smeared all over.

Also - try experimenting with different alignment point sizes, and with number of stacked subs.

Now that I look at list of our software - I don't see autostakkert in it? Did you stack with registax? Switch to autostakkert for stacking - you'll get better results. Do wavelet sharpening in registax but stacking itself in AS!3

Thanks Vlaiv, sorry yes I used Autostakkert to stack, I will add it to the list! I dont think i can change the barlow to sensor distance so would a x1.5 or x1.8 barlow be better for sampling then?

4 minutes ago, Ags said:

That's really very good, better than I ever got using a 102 mm Maksutov. My suggestions: put an alignment point on the moon (assuming you can, I use AutoStakkert for stacking), shoot a 3 minute sequence so you get more than 2000 frames, and use auto white balance in Registax.

Thanks What do you mean by alignment point on the moon? I forgot I could capture more frames, I believe as long as I can keep it under two minuets there shouldn't be any rotation?

No award winning image here but I had fun!

I brought a 100mm f10 refractor earlier this year which I used for Solar white light imaging. Since I'm now doing Ha Solar with a different scope, Ive been contemplating selling the scope but before I do I thought I would have a bash at Jupiter. 100mm obviously is on the small side but its not a bad image I guess for my first go. Captured last night through high thin cloud and the bright moon not to far away. It was almost impossible to see if I was in focus, I'm used to at least seeing if what I'm capturing is at least pretty much there but planetary is a different ball game! so not sure if I'm 100% focused. Captured using a 224mc, and celestron x2 barlow, UV/IR cut filter through an f10 100mm refractor

Software: Firecapture, Autostakkert, Registax and Photoshop. 35 percent of 2000 frames

Any thoughts on how I could get a better result or am I flogging a dead horse with this set up? There's obviously not alot of detail, would it be possible to bring out anymore with 100mm? Am I under or over sampling to much?

1 minute ago, paul mc c said:

Nice one,I am not familiar with fire capture but in sharp cap you can choose rggb.

Il see how I get on, thanks for your help 👍

10 minutes ago, paul mc c said:

The 224  patern is rggb,but don't know if that's the issue.

The issue has gone now since clicking on the debayer icon but it looks I can only choose RG, GB, GR or BG!? But RG looks normal colour to me! 

24 minutes ago, paul mc c said:

What Bayer pattern are you using.

I'm still fairly new to Firecapture and I've been using a mono camera before so I'm still learning. I've just googled, it, I've ticked the Bayer tab and it's sorted it, just need to find out what the correct pattern is, it's currently on RG