Han Solo

Thank you for the link Rob. I’ll throw the manual filter wheel in for free, so if you are interested, a cooled mono cmos camera and filter wheel for £750. thanks, James

Hi Roger, Thanks for for the information, I wasn’t aware of the gain level being so low. I’ll have a read of the linked post. Thanks.

Hey there, R,G,L Subs were 2mins at gain 400. I decided to shoot the Blue at 1min at gain400 due to intermittent cloud cover. I don’t know if that was a good idea or not really.

Hi, this is my first proper attempt at an LRGB image. I chose the North America Nebula and framed the shot to capture the Cygnus Wall. What do you guys think? Do the colours look good? I think my focus was off slightly for the red channel as the stars look a little bloated? 120mins integration time 1x1 binning. WO Z73 + Altair 183m Pro Tec + Baader LRGB filters Thoughts, comments welcome as I really want to learn and improve! Thanks

Hi Olly, Thanks for your insight. I did wonder if I could save the positioning using the User Defined Object feature, but to be honest I haven't really explored the Synscan controller other than the basics to get me aligned and on to a target. Funny, I din't think to just note down the RA and Dec values, I guess I was expecting the need for a more sophisticated solution, but I really like the simplicity of this! So far I have only been using the bahtinov mask to focus, but maybe next time I will try using the FWHM focusing assist more!

Thank you for your message. Oh right, so do you choose the brightest star in the field of view and use a bahtinov mask to set focus? Or Sharpcap’s FWHM focus assist? Or some other method?

This may be an obvious question, please forgive me, I am new to all of this! It became very apparent to me very quickly that I need to refocus every time I change to a new filter. I am currently using a mono camera with a manual filter wheel and Baader LRGB filters. The issue I am having is I have no idea how to refocus without slewing to a bright star and using a B. Mask. To me, this makes sense, but how to I then subsequently slew back to my original target and get the framing to match the original subs taken with the first filter especially if I have manually framed up the image how I want using the Synscan controller? Is there a better way of focusing? Can I save my imaging asc. and dec. position to allow me to slew back to the target? this may be useful if imaging over multiple evenings too? Thanks, James

Great image ??

Great image and great detail. Something for me to aspire to, thanks for sharing. James

Hi and welcome

Hi Anvil Basher, I am new to astrophotography as well and I will share with you the process I went through in selecting my camera and other equipment. My main starting point was budget. What was I willing to spend on a whole set up and where would I need to make compromises to make sure I stuck to it. Firstly I took a look around at mounts. From reading the forum I soon realised that without a decent mount and tripod I might as well give up before I started and just stick to holding my phone up to my flimsy department store reflector and flakey EQ mount. Now, this department store set up was actually very useful and I learnt a lot from it regarding approximate polar alignment and how to find objects in the sky and what objects I was particularly interested in. I discovered easy to find objects such as Pleiades and M42 and took some crude images of these objects with my phone and It also allowed me to get 'buy-in' from my wife to invest in some better equipment once she saw what may be possible! I watched some Youtube vlogs, notably Astrobackyard which was very useful and entertaining and with a pinch of salt I scrutinised his equipment and the results he was getting from some pretty modest equipment at the time of viewing. (now he is higher profile and I'm sure he receives 'sponsored' equipment for 'review'. ) His older videos come across more genuine and like an astrophotographer trying to make his way through the hobby. So, my takeaways so far were. 1. Invest in a decent mount, I couldn’t afford a decent brand new mount so I put an advert on SGL and acquired a second hand SW HEQ5 which freed up some budget for the scope and camera. 2. Widefield double refractor over lower quality triplet. Similar price but I heard a higher quality doublet would be better for me. I don’t know if this is true, but it is what I went with. 3. TEC cooled camera. I am lazy and the thought of having to take calibration frames every time I wanted to image would have put me off the hobby for life. That’s just me. Since this post is about cameras I won't talk about points 1 and 2, only 3. So. TEC cooled camera was my way to go, this narrowed down the selection somewhat. I then used astronomy tools and literally selected every sensor combination with my telescope to see which gave me a good balance between field of view and megapixels on my favorite DSOs. I also looked at the pixel ratio part of that website too. I knew I shouldn’t select a camera purely on this but it gave me a starting point. Since I purchased a widefield refractor I wanted a camera which gave a good balance of widefield and also the crop factor to get some data on smaller objects, I also thought that if I had a camera with a higher pixel count that maybe I could crop my images to make objects look bigger in my photos. Cheating I know, but hey ho. So I wanted good field of view with my scope and lots of megapixels to allow me to crop if I wanted. CCDs were therefore out as this combination in CCD was ridiculously expensive. CMOS it was then. I cross referenced sensors with cameras and prices and selected a particular model based on price and what was included. Adaptors, hardcase etc.. Anything to differentiate. I knew that with my prior research I couldn’t really go wrong as there are really no duff asto-specific cameras out there and that I was going to be the limiting factor way before the camera was going to be. Colour vs Mono. Again I'm lazy and like to see results quickly. I also know that my small refractor was not going to allow me to photograph faint objects as easily as a massive reflector. I therefore went with a more sensitive Mono camera knowing that my images for the time being were going to be black and white. I didn’t mind that as I wanted a simple rig to start with knowing that I could add on a filter wheel and filters when I was ready. So to summarise, my main drivers were: 1. Field of view with my telescope. 2. My laziness (TEC cooled and Mono) 3. Budget. I saved where I could and spent where I need to and spend what I could afford. 4. Buy quality and buy once. (my mantra) 5. That I was going to be the performance limiting factor not my choice in camera. I hope this helps, sorry it is so long! James

Francis, That is a really impressive model, I cant wait to see the full size version!! James

Hi Franck, Yes I agree, these were just quick processes and I think there is more detail in the data, however I'm not very proficient yet Thank you for your feedback, its things like this which will help me to improve. James

Hi Francis, You have a really cool looking set up. I wonder if you will be able to clarify something for me. I have this scope and the adjustable field flattener. Am I correct in saying that the flattener is adjustable to suit different scopes and not to adjust for required camera sensor back focus? I'm struggling to find what size spacer I need between the back for the flattener and my 183m sensor. Thanks, James

Hi Adam J, i am using deep sky stacker at the moment and then processing in photoshop. When I took my Dark frames I didn’t take them in a dark room which I read may case issue with light leaking into the camera body. I’ll try again with a different set of darks. I will also look into the 183 amp glow code thing and see if deep sky stacker has it, otherwise I will look into APP as an option. Thank you for the info.

Sounds like an idea. Is it good practice to mount as much as possible on the scope. i.e dew heater controller and any excess cable lengths?

To me it looks like your focus is out on the ed80 / DSLR combo. An phone held up to an eye piece can correct for slightly out of focus telescope. Also the longer focal length of the telescope will accentuate and shake which is present, I.e. DSLR mirror slap if your mount isn’t rock solid. also shooting through a window doesn’t help focus

Here is my set up. Cables everywhere! And excuse the mess in the background! I still need to figure out the cable management. How do you guys do it with a rig which you strip down each evening? Skywatcher HEQ5 with belt mod William Optics Zenithstar 73 TS Optics 60mm Guidescope Altair 183M PRO TEC camera Altair GPCAM2 290M

I can’t see much on my mobile, but Field flatterer to sensor spacing?

Hi Bill from another noob, James

I’ve got this scope and I came across the same balancing issue as you did. I had a local machine shop make me a couple of aluminium stand-offs for use with a couple of longer M6 stainless steel machine screws. I can now push the dovetail plate as far back as I need to whilst providing clearance on the focus lock screw. Works a treat. Did cost me £30 though.

Firstly, this image is great and so much detail. Congratulations. Stacked short exposures seem to be the way to go with these CMOS cameras. I quite like you more purple version of your image, I wonder if there is a middle ground between you first version and this. I don’t know about the software you use, but in photoshop there is a selective colour tool which allows you to adjust individual colour ranges. Maybe adjust the purple / blue outer rim to be more blue? Obviously I don’t know much about how it realistically looks but may be worth a try. Something like this? I hope you don’t mind.

Hi tomato, thank you very much for you encouragement. I live in a Bortle 5 location. I haven’t used a light pollution filter yet, do you think that will help with the noise levels? James

Updated image processed with calibration frames. The background still has a bit of a gradient and amp glow which I’m struggling to get rid of. But it is much better with the calibration frames. thoughts?

Hi Rodd, I really like this image, If I had captured this image (which I couldn't) I wouldn't have been as brave as you are to push the saturation as far as you have. Congratulations on being brave enough to to this as the outcome is beautiful. James