powerlord

Just thought I'd do a 2 month in update. I've probably done around 100+ hours imaging so far. It's still holding up to weather - wind, rain, a bit of snow no bother. Last night it was 45mph and lashing rain, but cameras showed no movement of the roof at all - no false movement alerts from the cameras, and humidity stayed stable and dry all night. I moved the ventilation around, so there is now an exhuast fan at the top (unplugs to remove roof) - this is necessary as it does get very hot - even in March had some sunny days, and it was 30+ inside. I now have the automation set so that about 25, the exhuast fan goes on, pushing out all the hot air and it seems to work a treat. However I am also going to add a layer of white correx to the roof to reflect more of the sunlight before the summer. So automation here is >25 turn fan on, below 22, turn it off. Humidity wise, the automation there is to go on above 65, and off below 60. Again, that works well, with it not really going high very often - only during rain, etc. Roof still as easy to just lift off and on, and I leave it on the grass upside down during the night, pop it back on in the morning. I've found even the monster 300pds fits in there with another refractor no bother. The led light strip I had around the edge has fallen off when it got hot, so that needs a better fixing system. The camera security is working great still with two seperate systems, and allows me to remotely monitor mount movement and meridian flips too which has been really helpful, especially when it's the monster flipping. I've done a few moon capture sessions where I've been out there on my stool with the laptop and heated jacket - plenty room, and if it is a bit windy, the walls keep it stable inside. And being all networked in has been good - I can remotely power things up during the day, load up plans on the asiairs, download the previous night subs, etc then power it down till the night all reliably. So, so far so good really. Summer will probably need to modifications once I find how hot it gets with the white roof. i.e. maybe stronger fan, etc - we'll see. But other than that, it's been running like clockwork to be honest.

Some of that depends on personal preferences. For large galaxies where there are no others in the picture I'm happy to clip out all the background for example - replacing it with a 10/10/10 or so grey. For me, I like the look of a clean galaxy on a background of sharp stars. Even when I find startools works, usually what I find it gives me is a galaxy I like, but nothing else. So I take the galaxy out and pop it into a clean background, adding the stars from a startnet2++ starmask off a basic stretched image. That way you avoid all the 'startoolsy' weirdness it does with stars and backgrounds. It's one the pleasures of the hobby isn't it ? You are in charge of what you create. 👍 That's why I'm an advocate of having a few tools in your toolbox - mix and match.

First time for me was aged 20, travelling around the states. I camped out in White Sands, New Mexico (where first nuke detonated so miles from anywhere for a reason). At night it was truly amazing. Possibly more so having consumed the better part of a bottle of tequila. Talking of which - we woke up the next morning both saying we remember things crawling around our sleeping bags during the night (tent left open)... on exiting tent the ground around the tent was streaming with rattlesnake tracks.

Definately. Any tool can be used to overkill. Startools does have the unique quality that overkill renders a specific startoolsy effect which is unfortunate, but I've had results I love with it at times. My advice is, first don't expect to just run up and start using a tool - they are all esoteric. watch a few youtube tutorials before you try. try free trials and decided what works for you and don't just go with what someone else says works or worse someone else says 'most people use XYZ' - wrong. afaik there's no proper surveys to show what most folk use. when you decided what works for you, invest some time in learning it then, experimenting and yes..watching more tutorials. Pity polls are not supported natively here, but suppose could add one... be interesting to know if there was some agreement, though most of us I think use more than one tool so it would only tell some of the story anyway. my 2c: Much as PI would like to make you think processing astropics is rocket science it is actually no different from processing any other kind of photograph. Sure, there are some astro specific bits and bobs, but mostly its the same things - stretching, noise reduction, colour balance/saturation, masking and further tweaking. So it definately helps to have a tool like startools available to you (I purchased it), but mostly you'll do well if you understand the above stuff, how to work in layers, masking, blend modes, curves, levels, channels, what filters are useful (e.g. topaz), etc etc - all of that is bog standard photo editing 101. And applies to whatever you tool of choice is. PI just wraps a lot of it up in fancy names for ..reasons best know to the madness that created it... i.e. want to sharpen ? look for a sharpen filter in every single package out there.. oh expect PI, where you would use Deconvolution and MultiscaleLinearTransform. sigh. So for what it's worth, I'd suggest trying startools, and following a few tutorials. I'd suggest also trying Affinity Photo and following some of James Ritson's tutorials. Try Siril, which is totally free, but again don't attempt it without wathcing a tutorial - Luke's are great on youtube (search for siril osc). And it's a no-brainer to get startnet2++ and learn to use it (gui on windows available, command line for mac) as it's free and one that is nearly universally agreed is a good thing to use. My general workflow for galaxies is: - stack in APP (but DSS would be fine) - get rid of gradients, light pollution in APP (it's great at this, but Siril does it too easily) - save it as unstetched fit. - colour correct in Siril, with some saturation work, and stretch it and also save it as a 32bit floating tiff. - load fit into startools and see if it 'works' for the image. - if it does, bring result into affinity for tweaking - if it doesn't load the tiff through starnet2++ and save. - load both into affinity, create star mask layer. - work on in and stars in affinity using all the regular tools, and topaz. - save and publish.

https://astrobackyard.com/resources/

yeh sorry, thought that went without saying. I do it upstairs where I can focus on some trees in the distance. I know I only need a little bit more to get the stars from experience, so I know if I can focus on them I'll be close enough to see stars in the night and focus from there. Once I've done it once for a particular combination of kit, I write it down (e.g. asixxx, 43mm bf, 80ed with focuser out at position 5.4) then I know a start position for the night to save a lot of faffing.

usb bands pull 2.5a. even when on low they just go on and off. asiair won't cope. best fix is to make up a wee connnector that plugs in to the 12v and attach it to a car fag lighter adapter. get one that can do 2 * 2.5a if you want to run two of them. they will then run fine.

It will only be bloaty if you are out of focus. But yes, personally I always stop my SY down a stop or so. I actually mount a 2" L-extreme on the front of the lense which works well. stu

First, do it in daylight. You will then find it pretty straight forward, you'll see the image gradually coming into focus. If you run out of focuser, add some ext tube until you get there. don't try at night with stars, because until you are very close and start to see a large slightly brighter circle, you won't really know - and it gets annoying very quickly. in daylight - easy peasy - note down the ext tubes used for the ota and the rough focus position and at night, it will be plain sailing!

I use startools. I also use siril and affinity photo. Most of the time I find I get better results with siril and affinity photo. I think this is mainly down to the fact that in affinity photo it can all be non destructive and layered. I can use starnet2++ and work on the image, etc. If something isn't quite right, reduce it, etc. startools I find I just sort of go through the options in order, with limited success, and at the end either it works - great. or it doesn't.. in which case, tough.. nothing to do but start again. I also find startools denoise to be really bad compared to even affinity photo, but I use topaz which is light years ahead. affinity photo is available as a trial and is cheap anyway. topaz no so much, but they do do deals - I think I got the whole suite for 40 quid. I hate PI as a matter of principle - its licencing model, price, attitude of the company and its utterly aborrent UI design. Plus affinity photo isn't a one trick pony - it's great for all photography work. give it a go ? I really wish Stefan would add starnet2++ integration to startools. I think it would help a lot. As it is, it is just too downright weird most of the time how it processes my stacked image. stu

there is usually a week retaining thing with 2 nicks in it. that tool I linked to above is what you need to unscrew them. Once out, lens drops out. But for how tos generally - youtube is yer friend: https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=eyepeice++dismantling stu

have a look on here: https://gostargazing.co.uk/dark-sky-sites-across-uk/ there's a few a bit north of there - I was gonna maybe try one of them in the motorhome, what with Haw Farm being out of action

One option is to get something like these: https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B09F31VCT6/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o07_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1 and do it yourself ? Otherwise, Viking over this side of the country offer servicing of astro stuff, but you'd need to post it I suppose: https://www.vikingopticalcentres.co.uk/service-support/ stu

Hi chaps, just an update - I got some free samples of Polymaker Polymide PA6. The CF (carbon fibre) and GF (glass fibre) versions. Nylon is a bit of a pain to print usually but is about the strongest stuff you can make, but without something in it, prints are quite flexy. And warps like crazy usually. As I've said before, I'm printing on a dirt cheap Anycubic mega. ptfe head, brass extruder. nowt special. This is the limit (well tbh well beyond what is supposed to be the limit) of what you can print with it.. but it printed fine - and very very strong. Interestingly Polymaker themselves talk about just using brass extruders and replacing rather than using expensive tougher ones. They don't mention PTFE bit, but my view is much the same - get a foot of PTFE tube for a fiver and just replace the tube every now and again and avoid faffing with all metal hot ends. I designed some new knobs for the hex bolts I have on my EQ5 after replacing the old ones which were all bent. I had previously printed these with PETG or PC but one snapped and broke off. I printed a replacement in PA6-CF. It printed fine at 280, 45 bed and a bit of uhu stick on the table. No smell printing, and no warping. I will say, 283 is the absolute top temp the Mega will go to, which is the bottom of the temp range polymaker recommend for printing. Other than temp I changed nothing from my usually super fast .3mm settings I use for PC. It came out great, and is very very solid. I designed the hex inset to be a wee bit small, so just heated it a bit with heat gun, stuck a bit of gorrila glue in the hole and hammers the bolt into the end. I didn't bother anealing it (baking in over for an hour). Seems solid - and back in the EQ5. It's not cheap filament, but I do like polymaker stuff, and I'll be rationing these samples to use on thing I really need to be strong. It'd probably be good for stuff like threaded components too (though maybe use GF for those). I probably wouldn't try to use it on a part that required lots of supports as I think they'd be a right pain to get off (the docs say the same). And though my flashforge is dual extruder and I did experiment with disolveable supports and all that, but tbh it's a right PITA. I prefer to just design my parts to not need them if at all possible. stu

Another from last night - trying to get as many galaxies into a single frame as possible 😀 Annotated below, but I'm sure there are more faint ones that this - but it is all astrometry.net gives me:

Shot the last few nights in OSC with my asi533 and 80ED with no flattener/corrector (500mm). And annotated below:

I have the same decision to make. Also deciding if work going out to a dark site tonight. My thoughts so far are either M82, the Leo triplet or makarian chain. Nebula wise, could be a good time to try to capture the squid in sh2-129 ? Thinking as I speak I'm more thinking I'll use the 300pds on the bubble nebula, and the 80ed on the triplet or a makarian chain mosaic maybe. stu

Fair point, I'd not thought of that. It does appear to be an area which is still somewhat of a puzzle though. interesting area.

Well, except that experimentally photons have never been found afaik to suffer from a 'loss in energy level'. It's all or nothing - planck's constant. If what you say is true it would be very easily proven by interacting photons with said 'particles or subatomic particles'.

talking of which, you see they found a star 12.9B light years away? https://www.theguardian.com/science/2022/mar/30/hubble-space-telescope-captures-distant-star-earendel

today's PBS SpaceTime relevant here:

What issues do you have putting stars back ? All you need to do is create a star mask. With starnet2++ or whatever you use, get your starless image. then in your editor of choice (mine is affinity photo), put the bottom later as the pic with stars, and the starless one in a layer above. change the blend mode of the starless later to 'substract'. you will now see only stars (i.e. a star mask). choose 'merge visible' to create a new layer which is just this star mask. Now, change the starless layer blend mode back to normal, and change the star mask layer to 'add'. you will now be looking at your original pic with stars - however stars are now on a seperate layer. So you can process your stars and your image seperately and blend at the end. Easiest way is to blend, is to add a brightness/contrast layer to the stars, then you can adjust it as you feel fits the image, but of course you can process them in other ways - e.g. if they are colour, increase saturation. or maybe play with sharpness. Or even, if using @James Ritsons excellent scripts https://jamesritson.gumroad.com/l/jr_astrophotography_macros which has some great scripts for reducing the star numbers, sizes, etc. stu

Been collating and editing some of my pics for a while into square versions until I had enough to try these: https://www.my-picture.co.uk/mixpix/ I've used my-picture for years and tried their canvas, acrylic, aluminium prints - all great and cheap. But these seemed like they'd be great for small spaces or places to brighten a room up. Anyway, got 16 of them ! as only a fiver each. The idea is that you can move them around, maybe replace with other new ones later, give away the old ones, etc. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rbcwDkZ594g Anyway, they've really brightened up the kitchen and some spares left over to pop here and there. Definately thumbs-up from me. 👍

Well, here it is with full stars. I reckon I must be in the minority then - I prefer it with no stars.

keep an eye on ebay. I got a Lenova Yoga 460 i7 8gb memory, 256ssd for 179 quid in feb. these are rotatable to a tablet and have touchscreen. they also have a very decent 1080p IPS display, good keyboard, and a decent trackpad. I got it for obsy duty for planetary stuff where I don't care so much if something happens with it being out all night. I'd disagree that you need 16gb of memory for astro stuff tbh. usb3.0 and ssd are your main biggies. Nothing is too taxing on CPU with astro software. Or at least, the stuff that is (PI, etc) is so badly written that it rarely uses more than one CPU core. You can easily run to 500MB/sec write when doing planetary - so SSD is a must, but usb3.0 will do that fine with an external ssd so don't sweat it too big on having internal space. Once you've done your capture and stacked, etc you probably don't want to keep 20GB+ of video anyway, so you just need the space to last a session. The Lenova above does around 500MB/s - so is fine. this is the seller I used, but they have none of the above in stock. https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/283606063064 stu