mackiedlm

There will be plenty "in depth science" coming out of JWST in many different scientific forums (and by that I dont only mean "forums" in the sense of Bulletin Boards like SGL but the many scientific publications and conferences that will be held) in the coming weeks, months and years. This was a mainstream TV program intended to inform the general public of the technical complexity and importance of the JWST. It had to be engaging, interesting and provide the viewer with the "wow" factor. On that basis I think it was an excellent program, pitched perfectly. In fact, one of the best I've seen.

That is simply outstanding! Incredible image.

@Rob20236 Did all that work on the offest solve your problem with the intermittent "chequerboard" effect. Or have you found a different root cause? I'm interested to hear how it has been resolved.

I wanted to see that just to confirm that there was nothing going wrong with frames that initially seemed good. And it looks fine. So this is, as you said, an intermittent problem where some frames are showing this checkerboard. Its not light leak as one frame is good and the next can be bad. That suggests to me some sort of communication issue. I'd suggest the following, Confirm you have all the most recent drivers and update as necessary. thats both the drivers directly from Altair and then any updates/drivers in Nina. (With ASI and APT I need to ensure both driver sets are in place otherwise things go strange very quickly) Download and try captures with the Altair capture software (download from Altair website) This will remove Nina from the mix just to help diagnose. If that still shows the issue then go though a systematic check of all cables (dodgy USB's can have strange effects), remove any usb hubs, check that the power supply (I believe Altair provide one with the camera) is correct and functioning. I dont know Nina or Altair but in APT there is a way to adjust the speed of the USB connection, try adjusting that, try a USB2 connection if you are currently using USB3 as USB3 can sometimes be unstable with AP cameras. If none of that works then I think you need to get in touch with Altair support. Good luck and do get back to us here when you work it out.

Can you share one of the darks that dont show this pattern. And also one of your good darks at gain 100. Also, what capture software are you using?

I moved from DSLR to ASI2600mc just over a year ago and I am honest when I say that I am still blown away by the quality of the images the 2600mc produces. So my immediate advice would be to not write it off at this stage. I think that you will eventually be impressed with the camera. What gain and offset are the 26 c images above taken at. I have looked at all your the images in Pixinsight and compared them to a very recent single frame taken with my 2600mc, SW 80ED, L-enhance gain 100. - so similar coditions but slightly longer FL (I've attached that frame here so you can look at it). Now I'm not someone who can do the fancy anaytical stuff in pixinsight so i'm just eyeballing them and I note the following. 1. your 26 c does "look" noisier than your 183c - but you need to remember that there is a difference in pixel size and that could be part of what we are seeing. 2. your 26 c image looks similar to my 2600 mc image 3. your and my images were taken under less than perfect conditions - mines was only 2 weeks from longest day at 53N so hardly even dark I've also attached my final version from that imaging session which ended up as only 2 hours total integration. While its not an award winner, i think that considering its only 2 hours in astro twighlight, its an indication of what the IMX571 sensor can produce under difficult conditions. So I guess I'd be saying dont panic at this stage. Get some time on target, process it out and I will be very surprised if at the end you ar still not happy with it. Good luck PLANSHORT_L_IMGID_2329_OBJNAME_M16_GAIN_G100_EXP_180s_EXIF__-10C.fit

Arrived via "moonpig" from my only child/daughter who is in the middle of a 3 month Masters Ecology/Conservation project and is living on a beach in rural Mozambique. I touched my heart and made me realise just how modern communications through the internet etc have changed the world in ways we could not have imagined.

Heres a very quick try in Pixinsight, trying to bring out some of the Oiii- probably a bit too psychadelic but sometimes that happens🤣 good luck

Thats a wonderful image. great processing.

This of course is M16. more commonly known as the Eagle Nebula but I prefer the less common name of The Star Queen. Largely because I see the queen (particularly in the orientation below) more easily than the eagle. We are out of astrodark for several weeks but the L-enhance is coping pretty well I think. Again this is much shorter integration than i would like (clouds adding to the short night).it is only 2 hours (40 x 180s) but hopefully I'll be able to drip feed some more integration into it. ASI 2600mc, L-enhance, processed as HOO C&C welcome

Really nice image, good detaila nd nicely controlled colours

This was my first actual session with my new mini-pc. Some initial issues with set-ups in PHD2 and APT, due to my failure to transfer everything properly from the old PC meant I ended up with only 2 hours of data. Between that and the fact that I'll have no astro-dark now until August meant that I did not have high expectations. So, all that considered, I am pretty pleased with how this worked out. I'm particularly pleased with the way NGC 6914 has shown up. I framed it to get both the propellor and NGC6914 but did not expect to see much of the relection nebula because of the L-enhance. SW80 ED, ASI 2600mc, L-enhance 40 X180s C&C appreciated.

I think that looks great. A good lens to add. I suspect there is more to pulll out from that data.

looking good. I'm very interested to see how this camera performs.

For 2o mins integration that is excellent. Well done.

This will be my last widefield Galaxy image before I move the ASI 2600MC to the LX 200 to go "up close and personal" with some other galaxies. This is about 6 hours from last week-end combined with about 2 hours from last year. I have decide that I will try to not rotate my camera unless I have no option so these two sessions were about 90 degrees different in fov. Hence the rather severe crop. One of my main goals with this image was to try to capture the tidal tal coming from the Hamburger. Its there, perhaps not as clear as I'd like but it is there. So this is 160 X 180s, SW 80ED, ASI2600MC, L-pro.

Lovely image Jim. Nice detail and colour.

I decided to try one more widefield Galaxy before I move the ASI2600mc to the 8" LX200. This came out better - i.e. more detail in the little galaxies - than expected This was just short of 6 hours with the SW 80 ED, ASI2600mc, L-pro And again annotated to show the faint fuzzies - cause its cool!

Thats fantastic! I'm delighted it worked. Yes I dont understand why the sudden change - happened to me too. Anyway, I look forward to seeing the final image.

Yes I was exactly the same - 3 months into the 2600mc without an issue then suddenly ..... garbage! Mabula was never able to explain that to me but from the day I changed to 32bit masters all was good.. My own, totally ignorant and probably nonsense, idea is that something was different in the skys when it showed up. Too bright, more LP, lower down higher up????? but I never bothered to try to do the analysis to work it out as it was resolved. Thats a bummer, but if you have the raw flats you should be able to rebuilt working masters. Good luck and please do post back here on how you get on.

Now thats a bit special! The outer shell of the owl is really first rate.

A really nice really widefield Jim. I do like the colouration in your core and the sense of expanse the image gives. Nicely done.

I had a very similar issue when I started using my ASI2600mc and stacking in APP. Mabula fairly quickly worked out that it was because APP was saving the master flats as 16bit and for this camera it must be 32bit. Now I dont know anything about DSS but maybe check it out. The APP forum thread is here- https://www.astropixelprocessor.com/community/main-forum/integration-causing-nasty-rings/#post-16488 Take alook and you'll see that my flats looked very similar (infact i'd say identical) to yours with concentric rings and the stacked image looked very similar to yours too. Saving masters as 32bit files immediately resolved it and Mabula then made 32bit masters the default in the next APP uprev. Hope this helps.

😂 It can certainly be a money pit if you let it. But there are budget ways to get started that will not take the shirt from your back and can produce wonderful images. And allow you to decide if its really for you. But be warned, its one of these things that can be almost addictive! The annotations are really easy. Pixinsight is one of the most used programs for processing the images (another warning - taking the images is only half the story - processing is equally involved and can take a bit of learning). Anyway, in Pixinsight you first use a module (actually a script) which uses plate solving to identify the image field, i.e where is the camera pointing, than a second module which uses the plate solved co-ordinates to interrogate appropriate databases to identify the items visible in the image and stick the labels on. All in it took about 5 minutes. Now please dont ask me how blind platesolving can identify the co-ordinates of an image within a few seconds because it seems like black magic to me.🤯

M106 is a beautiful galaxy in close up. But in widefield there are just so many small, faint fuzzy galaxies it tends to stretch the mind a bit! I took great care during processing to try to preserve as many of these faint fuzzies as I could - noise reduction and star reduction can both affect the small galaxies. This is the result of around 8 hours with the SW 80ED, the ASI 2600mc and the L-pro filter. And this is an annotated version - all the blue labels are PGC galaxies visible in the image.does anyone know of an easy way to get PI to include distances in the annotation?