matthasboldlygone

This is a great topic, nice looking through where people started.. this was probably my second attempt that actually worked. At the time I wasn't very happy, but it's grown on me and see it's not as bad as I thought. Bresser AR 102/600 + Bresser HD camera + HEQ5 Pro

Damn, I almost got the neq6, but thought nah I'll never need that. Surprising how quickly you can rack up the weight of kit. Had a good run of clear sky lately, but expecting that to end soon. We'll see 👍

I think the sleep deprivation may have something to do with it, but I'm out here again in the dark. Good time to catch up with some podcasts. 😁

@vlaiv Thanks for your suggestions, lots to think about while I'm sitting in the dark garden. I did think about a reflector but thought it may introduce more hassles, mirrors, dew magnet and collimation. But I'll certainly consider it now. Maybe a good stepping stone on my way somewhere. Trying again now, increased the gain and adjusted the focus, but may not have that much difference after reading your post. We'll see what I get out of it later. 👍

Here is another attempt at the Pinwheel galaxy. Not much better than my first attempt which I knew I had made mistakes with. Bit of a let-down really, but I have photographed something 21 million light-years away so maybe I shouldn’t be upset. Messier would have been very excited with my image. I suspect spending too much time on forums looking at everyone else’s perfect images doesn’t help. You know the posts – this is my first dso, but that one pixel doesn’t look right, I look at it and think it’s amazing crystal clear image. Not enough noobs posting fuzzy dud images maybe. Show us your worse images. Bresser AR 102/600 achromatic refractor (£250 from Amazon with EQ3 mount) Bresser HD camera (£280, Sony IMX290 chip and same specs as ZWO ASI290 but I think only outputs 8 bit tiff or jpg, no raw?) HEQ5 Pro mount with Rowan belt (£900) Capture software – Mac OSX ToupLite Processed in Siril and stretched to near infinity with Photoshop. 45 x 2 minute exposures, 5 darks, Gain 5 (on a scale of 0-50 in ToupLite) 80 x 1 minute exposures, 5 darks, Gain 14 (taken on the previous night) 2 good sessions, 3 failed sessions due to clouds coming over. Total playtime 14 hours over 5 nights. Target was maybe 40 degrees above horizon. Bortle 4 on outskirts of Bortle 7 city and shooting towards the city glow. So now I’m thinking where do I go from here? Gain – ramp it up to capture more detail, but the noise increases rapidly if I try that. Focus – is probably slightly out but with the stiff rack and pinion focuser I’m not sure I can get any better. Maybe time for a Bahtinov mask and spend more than the scope cost buying the upgraded focuser? Camera and scope matching – seems quite good, 1 arc second per pixel, nice size in frame. Maybe the ASI 290 would give better results? Upgrade the scope - Sky-Watcher Evostar 80 DS-PRO ED maybe? Or spend another £3k on my flexible friend and upgrade everything? Copy someone else’s setup so I know what to expect. Where would you say my limitations are? Scope, camera, capture or processing? Or just general user error, keep with it all and the images will improve with experience? 🤔

For some reason I went with 1 min exposure instead of the 2 minutes that worked with M51, think I was trying to save time. But suspect it would have worked better with fewer at 2 minutes. Really had to pull this image about to get anything visible. Even after a good polar alignment and 3 star alignment the synscan goto still missed it, took 30 minutes of taking pics, plate solving and then trying to work out which way to move, eventually got it in frame. Bresser AR 102/600 - Bresser HD camera (imx290) - 95 x 1 minute - 4 darks - Stacked in Siril - Stretched in PS The moon rising at 11:30pm didn't really help, but it did look nice and the clouds kept away.

After a month or so I've collected a few things now, moon, jupiter, saturn, mars, M51 and M101. 😁

Pre-processed all the images to get rid of the blue background, tried some different stacking options. So many versions of it they all start to look the same. Think this is probably the best I'll get from the images. Tonights mission is to get another 2 hours and stack them all together..

Another night, managed to get 50 x 2 minutes, going in the right direction

Got some new images to play with tonight, thanks @JonCarleton for the tips, things are looking much better after just a quick stack and fiddle.

It was still daylight so nice not to be stumbling around in the dark. Managed about 10 minutes between the clouds and rain. But it was all very wobbly, atmosphere maybe? Bresser AR 102/600 Bresser HD Deep Sky Cam 30 second video (Over) Processed in Lynkeos + Photoshop Single snap shot adjusted in Photoshop, think I prefer this one.. I'll keep fiddling with various videos to see if something better appears.

Nice, I managed about 10 minutes before the clouds rolled in, I did wonder how many other people were out trying to get a quick one between the rain. I wasn't alone 🤗

That's great. I'll try out your recipe and lots of tips to try next time. Hoping for some clear sky tomorrow. Really useful, big thanks for putting the time in to help. 👍

They look ok in the FITS viewer. If you have a spare 5 minutes please feel free to play with my data to see if anything can be dragged out of it. Matt-M51.zip 👍

Hi from an East Norfolker, clear skies are coming 👍

I'll keep trying with it, but just getting black images. I think my fuzzy JPG 'data' just isn't good enough for it. It managed a good alignment of the images. Will have another look at the scripts and read up on the settings. Polishing a turd is never a good idea 😁

Spending the afternoon looking at some software, on a Mac so a bit limited without lots of fiddling. Trying Siril atm, don't seem to be getting much out of it, but will keep trying. 👍

Couple of days ago I managed to get nearly an hour of images, but realised later I had missed the target completely and just got some random stars. Last night I got out despite the clouds, Polaris cloud covered so dodgy polar alignment, and could only do a 1 star alignment. But did manage to get it in frame a got 10 x 30 second exposures before the clouds covered everything. Stacked / aligned manually in Photoshop and I can just make out a hazy swirl. 😁 Bresser AR 102/600 Bresser HD Deep Sky Camera HEQ5 Pro mount + Rowan Captured in ToupLite Processed manually in Photoshop One small step... 👣

Had a go at processing the video again, maybe slightly better results, better colour..

Scope : Bresser AR 102/600 with a 5 x Barlow Mount : HEQ5 Pro + rowan belt Camera : Bresser HD deep sky camera They're still low here, I get maybe 10 minutes of viewing between the trees. Neowise has a bit of a smudge, same setup and just a single shot, I think 10 second exposure with gain up full. May try that one again tonight.. 👍

On an old Panasonic Lumix, max 15 second exposure. The comet is there, honest

Did an accurate polar alignment and a one star alignment, working really well and keeping track. Managed a 5 minute exposure with no trailing. It's still a lump to move around but getting the hang of dismantling and managing it. It looks good in my garden

This is my first attempt at processing video in Lynkeos and a bit of photoshop. About 20 seconds of blurry video. A good polar alignment on HEQ5 Pro and it was rock solid tracking, no more chasing things off screen My best single shot of Saturn, hopefully got some video to process later.. And an attempt at Neowise Overall I think it turned out to be a good session, happy with the progress so far. Tips and comments welcome 👍

Thanks for the confirmation, really good to know it's all going in the right direction and things are working. 👍

I think I managed a Polar Alignment (of sorts) and a 2 star alignment (of sorts). It didn't place targets in the middle of the view but they seemed close. Trees and clouds in the way most of the night, but getting the hang of it I think. This is definitely not a click and go mount, still lots to do and think about. But I did have fun stumbling around in the garden. Dew stopped play again at about 1:00am. I think this is Andromeda galaxy, 20 second exposure, but it could just be a smudge on the lens, or something completely different.