Rustang

Cheers guys 👍

Also to confirm that when you say DEC 0, from this screen grab, do you mean the area in the Sky where it says +0? Just below where Mars is? Aplogies, I'm still very much learning at an embarrassing level!

So do this just the once then each new session just press guide, or calibrate at that position still, every night? Also, once it's calibrated it starts guiding so how does it work when you calibrate in a different area then slew to target!?

So every session, every new target I press Shift as I press guide and it asks if I would like to force calibration to which I press yes, I've never had any issues with this, but I'm guessing this is wrong though!? I'm connected to the laptop via a direct cable.

My mount is the HEQ5 Pro which is connected to the laptop via a EQ DIR cable. Your probably right, I forgot to right down what exactly the error message said. So I was pointing fairly high up around North East at the Soul nebula, the message came up when I tried forcing the calibration at target. I would say my guide issue was due to ignoring that message and calibrating in that area. If it's best not to calibrate if that message is given, where do I calibrat then!?

Ditched tonights session of imaging, too many issues right from the start! Part of the issue tonight was star calibration in PHD2. I was going to image the Soul nebula tonight even with the bright moon as it is a clear night so why not! . When I pressed calibrate, it came up with something to do with possible errors due to calibrating near the equator!? So whats this all about? Also when pressing shift click on the green target it always says do you won't to 'force' calibration which led me to think am I do it all wrong? Why 'force' calibration!? Its been working how I've been doing it but it's made me think. My process each session is to chose a star, shift click to force calibration when at target then it does what it needs to. Do you always re calibrate every single session and if so where, at the target? Because if tonight has thrown up that warning in regards to the equator, what am I supposed to do!? I ended up giving up because the guiding was crap so need to understand what the correct process is or why I'm going wrong/miss understanding.

It's a feature in light room, you can turn it on to show both over and under exposed areas of your image, blue being under exposed. So the red in the middle of the stars is over exposure! It's a very useful feature so I always leave it on.

Kit is SW80 ED DS pro, SW HEQ5 Pro mount guided through PHD2, camera (a weak link! ) Canon 600D modified. I was hoping for more nebulosity as well considering its better but not that much better than my first attempt when I first started which is posted above. Bortel rating 5/6. I'm always happy to see where I stand with my gear and if I'm getting the best of it and taking into consideration the light poluted sky.

Thanks for having a crack at it, great result. I had flats but again they Haven't worked even though they had before, it seems a continuous issue so need to look into it again. How did you find the data besides that? You managed to keep the stars down a little, do you use photoshop?

There's some good processing there, I definitely need to continue with learning some more processing techniques. Thanks everyone 👍

I guess if I'm honest I'm a little disappointed in my data, here's my first ever M45 attempt when I first started. This was from memory an hours worth of 1min subs. Compare that to 3hrs worth of 5min subs, I'm a little disappointed not to see more nebulosity. I had some strange coloured anomalies in that image too!

Looking good, those stars are very difficult to tame arnt they!

No probs 👍

I can re post a 16 bit file later. I save a 32 bit and then change to 16 bit in PS, I remember reading somewhere that's what's best to do but please correct me if I'm wrong and should just be saving and editing a 16bit file!

Sorry guys, not sure what's going on here then. Its a 32 bit tiff, could that be the problem?

Thanks alacant, what did you make of the data, any issues you found!? You have controlled the stars better than me, what was your method?

Thanks for having a stab, yeah the dust bunny seems a regular thing now I can't shift, might be flats not working. The green annomerly I'm not sure about either. The blue/green background haze (not the little green spot we know about!) is that supposed to be there? It came through very strong on my edit which I was concerned was another issue!?

If any one fancies a stretch it would really help me out. Ive been struggling with this data all night, I have never done a star mask before to help tame the stars but I just cant seem to get a good result. I'm not sure once again if my flats have worked either! On the plus side, the guiding went really well after doing some cable adjustments and some setting tweek's so I'm really pleased about that. The data contains no Dark's as I'm hoping the dithering has worked this time! It's only 3hrs worth so not expecting miracles but hopefully something nice TheSevenSisters2.TIF

I just wrap one of the amazon ones around my guide, works well and keeps it nice and warm.

Just to say I continue to be impressed with these, last night had the worst dew I've worked with, things got damp all over the shot but both scopes, absolutely fine! 😊

I would say its the other way round in regards to the 'LX200' I would say that maybe that scope that was put together for someone, its got the same looking focuser as the Schmidt but the rest is the same as mine, Ive not seen that finder scope before either but its bracket is matching the same green paint finish as the rest of trim. Its an interesting one!

Not one of these unfortunately I don't think as its got the same standard secondary mirror that mine has!

Difficult because if that is the case they have done it really well!

I dont think so, the secondary mirror looks exactly the same as mine! I would have thought that would be different if it was a Schmidt Newtonian - looking on google, I have found the Schmidt Newts, doesnt appear to be one of them, its a strange one!

Managed to get a picture!