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Mandel Wilson 2 is just a part of a much wider region of Integrated Flux Nebulae in northern skies and as another challenge/test to myself i decided to see if i could see any never mind get even come close to the lovely image @Barry-Wilson produced nearly a couple of years ago, except mine was taken between two towns in Shropshire 😉 I could really do with some help/advice on the granular nature of some this (and some others) image. It was imaged at 1.67"/p with a Tak100DF and an Atik16200 assisted by an FSQ85/QSI683 yet to my eye it appears granular and I cannot yet work out what process I am over or under-doing. As with all the recent weeks, clear skies have been at a premium and those that are have carried haze or high cloud. There are 125 x 300" L, and 30 x 180" each of RGB. Thanks for looking and especially anyone who can offer suggestions.

Good result, especially given the state of the recent Shropshire skies. Everything seems like a fight at the moment so hope your dual kit piles in the data. That’s what it’s all about, 😁, and enjoying it.

Thanks for the comments. Alan, it is a lovely object and my image doesn’t even come close to doing it justice. I underestimated the RGB importance and have lost out with the surrounding dust. Maybe I will get a chance to add some more, maybe not, but this one I would like to get in close. Carole, thank you, those large stars gave me a lot of trouble and in the end I just stuck with them as I lost more than I gained.

I decided on one last challenge before my POD goes and for some unknown reason i went with NGC2170 the Angel Nebula. Its too low which when combined with persistent high cloud made life challenging. I have tried to stick to fairly neutral processing but that's not for me to judge. Taken from my triple rig over a couple of evenings in late January, this is 147 x 300" L, 19 x 300" R, 24 x 300" G, 26 x 300" B. I really could have done with more RGB but work and moon conspired against me. thanks for looking

For sheer ease i went with two computers - cheap NUC-type boxes - as i got too many conflicts with trying to run two rigs from the same box. I know it is possible and some do it very well, but i couldn't. I have one of those HDMI blanks in each which apparently tricks the computer into thinking it has a screen attached and then I just link through by Anydesk. If you are on the same network, which presumably you would be, it is very quick. I've never bothered with dithering though i do tend to shoot L/H through both scopes before tasking the slave to RGB. If a nb target, i would shoot HOS equally through both scopes. If Cosmetic Correction doesn't pull out the hot pixels, stacking does, and using data from two scopes does seem to improve the background noise significantly. Definitely worth thinking about with identical cameras.

👍🏼 Faint. My daughter says it’s witchcraft.

Lots of variety and quality there 👍🏼 How did you get on with SH2-114 Dragon? I found that a nightmare to acquire and process.

I know next to nothing about PS so couldn’t even begin to offer anything there but otherwise I will say that I am always surprised about how much additional RGB aids an image. Rightly or wrongly, and depending on the target, I usually try to shoot for a similar length of time of RGB and L/Ha. In any event i always try to get an hour of each RGB channel often in 3-5’ frames. Then you can get into sky quality and chip well depth and all sorts of technicals but I often just use my eye and judgement for what looks right. All a bit subjective but I like the final image the best.

Another excellent image. I see you’ve been off finding obscure objects again 👍🏼. Do you have any single sub 30 minute 2x2 frames to view as I would like to see where you started from on this.

Thanks for the positive comments. It’s such an iconic object and apart from rotating cameras, for once everything seemed to work in that there was a cloudless moonless winter sky.

I was never happy with my previous M42 from a couple of years ago so I had another go on a rare clear night just before NY. This is around 7 hours of L made up of 4", 10", 30", 60", 120", 240" and a few 900", plus approx an hour each of RGB, all 120". This was taken on my mulit-widefield rig but has been cropped quite savagely due to one of the cameras rotating 🙄 Thanks for looking

https://www.google.com/search?rlz=1C9BKJA_enGB842GB842&hl=en-GB&sxsrf=ACYBGNS-fUgoGDcHw9QwmTutBhpJhX1wJA%3A1577901262039&ei=ztwMXsyHAsnhgAamkYqwAg&q=dual+tec140+australia&oq=dual+tec140+australia&gs_l=mobile-gws-wiz-serp.3..30i10.51680.54487..56112...0.1..0.127.999.5j5......0....1.........0i71j33i160j33i21j33i10i160.TwsDH3wczaE This is the link from the google search, sixth link. Below is the original link renewed. Sorry I have no idea why it didn’t work. https://astronomytechnologytoday.com/2017/05/29/a-practical-automated-multi-camera-astro-imaging-system-design-one-mount-one-computer-two-imaging-cameras/

Found the Australian who went down this road - Peter Rejto. A couple of links that might be of interest, and I was mistaken, it wasn’t a twin TEC140 system, but a TEC140 and a TEC180 https://astronomytechnologytoday.com/2017/05/29/a-practical-automated-multi-camera-astro-imaging-system-design-one-mount-one-computer-two-imaging-cameras/ https://pbase.com/prejto/equipment

Lee, you might want to take a look at this software if you are using Maxim - http://astro.neutral.org/software/astronomy-software.html I used it when i was Maxim but I am an SGP convert now and it was very simple and very reliable. I tend not to use dithering now as I usually try and get L or H channels on both scopes and the integration of both datasets works wonders, usually.

Believe me, I’m all ears for a better solution, this is just what was tried and as said, is wip. 😁. The problem we had was that the df was obvious and the solutions tried were all along the lines of firming everything up in a solid binocular-type approach. There were many attempts and it is very easy just to bolt two scopes together but the fundamental issue of lack of alignment was that without a Cassady (spelling duly changed - I think Apple intervened there) the commercial dual saddle i used (ADM) didn’t even get close to having the same image on each ccd to start with. I tried shims to sort the alignment (and I know Pete did as well) but that wasn’t great. In the end when alignment was solved to be close enough, then the df issue became the next biggest issue. I think ideally having the scope rings as far apart as possible will go a long way to reduce this but having heavy glass at one end and heavy imagining gear at the other meant there was some overhang. The additional rings were an attempt to reduce the influence of this. I know Pete has tried something else on his rig which involved tightening bolts against each other but he is far better placed to talk about that. @tomato and @Tomatobro you have a fabulous setup there and I hope it works well for you 👍🏼

Both @Petergoodhew and I set up similar dual scopes using TMB1200/152 scopes. His is in Spain and mine is in bits as I am building a new obs however we both had very steep learning curves along the lines of one scope gives you problems and two scopes gives you five time a the problems but when it works 😁😁😁. And halving acquisition time becomes my “weather beater”. A couple of initial thoughts on setup such as I saw them. As has been said already, you definitely need to drop the height of your pier head, ideally to zero, and allow the alt/az adjustments of the mount balance out any alignment. On my home-made pier I welded the mount base (removable) to the pier but on the basis that this is a one time deal for me and it is replaceable I didn’t see any issues with that. To maintain a height I welded another pipe onto the top of the old one and filled it with concrete. Tapping this gives a lovely dull thud. Balance is more tricky than you think with these big long scopes but eminently doable. Gaining alignment and removing rotation is also tricky, but again doable. I think @ollypenrice has a Cassady adjustable plate which is heavy enough to carry the weight and align perfectly (as there is nothing else out there, max weight carrying plate I found was 12kg). THE biggest issue that both PG and I had was differential flexure whilst tracking. Everything would be balanced and aligned, and scope 1 would produce the expected good subs whereas scope 2 wouldn’t and show trailing stars. We both worked out our own methods for reducing this and amongst other methods we both used an additional set of scope rings front and back on each scope and bolted them together, top and bottom. Trial and error got us both there eventually, Peter far sooner than I did as he has the skies to keep trialling (!) and it is quite amazing how much the slightest turn of a bolt moves and aligning star. I forget his name but someone in Australia did all this in a similar project with twin TEC140s and he also ended up using AO active optics to finally solve his issues. I have attached a wip shot of my system showing the additional rings. We aren’t too far from each other by the look of things. I would be more than happy to let you see how I have done things - just as soon as I get a roof. Good luck 😉

I’m not IT savvy enough to go for wake-up-on-lan but I leave my shed computer on which keeps any damp at bay and subsequently allows me to dial in via AnyDesk. I have found AnyDesk to be far superior to TeamViewer in that basic access is the same but you can just drag and drop files to be transferred (unlike using the specific download approach) and also it doesn’t nag me continually as TV thinks I am a commercial user. I have been stopped twice now despite having to prove my personal use to TV is gone now. Just load AD to both computers. You will be given a 9 figure number for each which allows direct dial in, and this can be password protected (and saved). Then it’s just like using the machine as if you are there.

Don't know how long it will take me, but top priority is to complete the new obs build, tidy the garden (which apparently should be my top priority) and make as much use of the kit/skies i have through automation; zero plans for new purchases but i do need to sell the POD and get rid of equipment I no longer use

Thanks Bob.

vlav, I drizzle integrated the Lum in PI as to my eye it gave a better Lum base (better stars and galaxy) on which to work. I obviously forgot to re-adjust the image back to normal size and a crop of the edges will account for any pixel discrepancy. I tend to go with eye rather than the theory but I do hear what you are saying. I think I still have the original integrations (normal and drizzled) so will compare the snr and see how that comes out. Thanks.

Thanks for your comments Alan. I managed to make a mask in PI that allowed me to draw out some of the outer ring, and of course the dark skies helped. However on a single sub it is barely visible.

Another dataset from 18m ago using @Petergoodhew 's rig when it was at ICA. This is 52x600s luminance and 20x300s for each of the RGB channels. The outer ring was barely above the noise level in single L subs, hence the volume. which definitely helped in processing. Taken with a 1200/152 TMB and QSI6120. Thanks for looking.

image looks really washed on on my work computer so before the day goes south I have altered the contrast slightly; ymmv of course 😉

Like most, I have had scrappy skies recently but I did manage to acquire some time on the nights of 20/21st, and 24th December. This ended up being approx 10 hours Lum and approx 4.5 hours each of RGB; all taken on my wide-field multi-rig before it gets dismantled in a couple of weeks. I've always liked this reflection nebula and its dusty surrounds so I hope i haven't totally hashed it. thanks for looking.

Poor weather has made me look at a couple of processing opportunities. First is SH2-112 a complete reprocess from my last attempt after taking this in August. SH2-112 lies approx 5600 LY away in Cygnus, not far from NAN from our perspective but around twice as far away. This is a standard SHO, at least as far standard as I can make them Second is M97 Owl Nebula. This was actually taken over a couple of years ago from ICA using @Petergoodhew ‘s kit. Somehow I had missed to process it so my first attempt. There are LRGB, H and O channels in here. I think a very pretty planetary nebula located approx 2300 LY in Ursa Major. Thanks for looking.