Adam1234

I'm in Southampton and noticed this too. If anything I'm convinced the sky has got lighter.

Thanks!

Here's my entry, the Leo Triplet. Imaged between 2nd April and 5th May. 3hrs each of R, G and B. Captured using SkyWatcher ED80, ZWO ASI1600mm Pro, EQ-R Pro. Processed in PixInsight. Adam

My take on the Leo Triplet, consisting of the galaxies M65, M66 and NGC 3628, 35 million light-years away in the constellation Leo. I was hoping to capture luminance data, but as usual clouds and the moon got in the way, and now it's getting too low. 3 hr each of R, G, B. SkyWatcher ED80, 0.85x ff/fr, ZWO ASI1600mm Pro. Process in PixInsight. Adam

Here are the exported results of subframe selector if it let's me upload, if that helps SFS_B.csv

I'm processing my latest image (Leo Triplet), running subframe selector in PI using a custom weighting algorithm to select my best frames (formula 4 from this site). Red and Green channels were ok, but with my Blue data I've got 18 frames (out of 243) with a weight of over 100% (100.1 - 103%). That can't be right surely? Am I missing something? What could cause a weight of over 100%?

I think you've probably over exposed your stars then. You could try taking a few shorter subs just for the stars

Cracking image

What were your sub exposure times?

I think it seems to happen when I change the number of images I want to dither on, for example I usually dither every 1 frame for R, G and G and every 5 for L to save some time due to shooting more subs.

I use APT for my imaging plans and phd2 for guiding, I have APT to set to dither every 3 images tonight, but for some reason at the start if the imaging plan it decidee to ignore that and dither every image. Has anyone had this? I stopped the plan and restarted it, and it looks like that done the trick.

Looks like slightly too much noise reduction on the background in my opinion, but still a nice image

Thanks, I'll try longer exposures on my next target, with some short ones to replace the stars and see how that goes

So I am better off taking luminance subs and increasing the exposure time then? I'm just worried about overexposing the stars, as even at 60s alot of my stars start becoming saturated and I lose colour, and also worried about the level of noise from LP in longer subs, as again at 60s the mean background adu is quite high

Well tonights imaging session got cut short before it started due to hazy clouds, so I've resorted to thinking about astronomy rather than practicing it. What I'm thinking tonight is, because I live in quite light polluted skies (CO says Bortle 7, but I'd probably say Bortle 8, what with the streetlights), is there any point to shooting luminance frames or am I better off just getting in as many hours of R,G and B as I can? The reason I ask is because of the LP, obviously I am limited in exposure time, I can get away with 45 - 60s seconds in R, G and B, and 30s max in luminance, which means a helluva lot of subs, many hours of imaging time and lots of processing power. Am I better off utilising my imaging time getting the hours in on the R, G and B and making a synthetic lum rather than shooting additional lum subs?

Impressive

Incredible images

Thanks! - yes it was with the ED80. With galaxies i imagine you would probably struggle to get them to right with with SHO.

Here's a reprocess of M81 & M82 from last year. I've managed to add in the Ha data to highlight the Ha regions this time. It was difficult to do without adding in the noise from the Ha, but I managed it with use of some masks. L = 435 x 40s (4.83hr), R = 112 x 60s (1.87hr), G = 117 x 60s (1.95hr), B = 120 x 60s (2hr), Ha = ~3hr of 300s

Fantastic image

Very nice effect

Thank you! I probably won't complete it until December now as it's getting closer to the roof of my flat each night

Good luck for your next attempt

Very nice

Thanks mate! I'd go a step further and say it would let me complete pane 3, let me get the Ha for pane 4, and then only half the Oiii