Jerry Barnes

James has also created some macros to help processing, referenced in the youtube description of the video I linked. You choose what you want to pay for them, $1 to ...... The only one of the set I've used much does an auto stretch of the image so its very useful to get a first look at your stack and see what you have to work with.

This should be a start. James has done several astrophotography videos.

I had the same choice to make some months ago. I eventually decided to go for the OSC then with an L-enhance filter I could do a pseudo hubble like image if I wanted to. I've had limited success doing that but neither have I had many opportunities to try. Another consideration was cost, circa 3k for mono and 2K for OSC very roughly depending on final choices (I went for the 2600MC Pro which wasnt cheap - lots of flowers!) Either should give you good results at the end of the day.

Thanks everybody, you are confirming what I thought. I'll work on my technique and investigate dithering. Its not so long till the astronomy show in March so I'll keep the credit card locked up till then at least.

To get the surface brightness you can use the calculator and provide magnitude and size from stellarium or similar. Alternatively you can add 8.9 to the surface brightness. Telescopius has that and probably other sources too. Easy to make a mistake though. I'm not familiar with Cartes du Ciel. I've not tried to dither yet, Thats the next thing to try out I think.

Keep us posted on how it performs for you once there are clear nights.

There is a thread in mounts asking for opinions on the EQM35 Pro. I was interested as I have one and then started thinking about how important a mount is if your equipment is relatively light (like mine). Do I really need a mount that will give me 20 minute exposures? The difference in signal to noise ratio between 10 minute subs and 1 minute subs is minimal. What does make a big difference is light pollution. If I travel 30 mins to get from bortle 6 to bortle 4 the signal to noise ratio almost doubles. If I can work with 1 minute subs do I even need to worry much about guiding in Dec? (The weakness in the EQM35 apparently) The subs will still stack wont they? I’m thinking I might do better with a light mount that’s portable and spend money on power packs and controlling using a Raspberry Pi rather than a laptop instead of upgrading to an EQ6 Pro say. Am I missing something here? Granted I’m limited on the scope I can use. Signal to noise calculations using https://snrcalc.vercel.app/home Vlav has also produced a spreadsheet to do the calculations. Heart nebula Bortle 6, 5 hrs of 1 min subs, snr = 5.8 Bortle 6, 5 hrs of 2 min subs, snr = 5.9 Bortle 6, 5 hrs of 10 min subs, snr = 5.9 Bortle 4, 5 hrs of 1 min subs, snr = 10.9

I have a EQM-35 Pro. I originally wanted a Star Adventurer but nobody had any stock and I picked the EQM 35 up second hand. I'm glad I've got goto capability and with plate solving finding targets is great. However the guiding results are variable, 1.94" RMS (0.5px) for the last session. Unguided I can get two minutes exposures and guided three. Probably being conservative there, or possibly not being critical enough. I've tried to tune but I'm rubbish at that sort of thing. Its moving more smoothly now but every so often I get big jumps (in the guiding graph), especially in Dec. I decided to get somebody to do some tuning so I'll see what that produces. I'm new to all this really so don't claim to have solid answers. The GEM28 seems to have bearings for the axis rather than the sliding surfaces the EQM35 has. Just for that reason I'd be tempted by it if I were buying new now.

Looks good, I like it. I have one similar in total time with a 2600MC and an L-Enhance but at 360mm focal length. You have got much better colour and less noise than I have. I'm inspired to have another go at processing.

I was debating between a zenitstar or a sigma/tamron 150-600 zoom, especially as I could use the zoom for wildlife as well. What pushed me towards the scope rather than a lens was seeing a comparison of image quality with the scope being better. I cant remember where it was but there is lots of choice on youtube. So I think its an upgrade to your lens but one you can take your time over. Getting a mount that can do goto and linking to a PC for automating positioning made things much simpler for me. A cooled camera will improve your images as well. So much gear we have to have!

I like that (and the cropped version as well). Stars add to the image without overpowering.

I quite like fewer stars, even if its less realistic and its your image after all.

Thanks both, plenty of cloudy nights to update my flats!

I’ve read one of the advantages of a cooled camera is having a library of calibration frames instead of taking darks once the clouds come over of it starts getting light. But I wondered if that’s true for flat frames as well? Or perhaps only true if there isn’t any dust on filter or sensor and also that the camera doesn’t move in relation its orientation with the light frames. After reading a recent post about missing flats I’ve started to think I should take them each time and before I disturb anything. Maybe even buy a light box.

well I like it, better than my heart taken with a cooled camera. I must retry my processing to see if I can get the same sort of "pop".

I think if you pull the mid point of the histogram down first (move it left) you will start to see space on the left of the histogram to allow you to move the left point upwards. Is that what you meant? Jerry

I'm fairly new to all this and have Photoshop, Affinity and Pixinsight. I use PS for ordinary photography and PI for Astro. I'll probably not renew my PS subscription when the time comes as it quite expensive and Affinity can do all I need. Before I got PI I found Affinity plus James Ritson's macros (after using DSS to stack) very good to see an image very quickly, then work on it either in Affinity of PS. I think if you learn Affinity its better than Elements and for many folk just as useful as PS. (I bought Affinity to do focus stacking for macro photography before they added astro support). Sorry, probably too much advice...

Good, I'd be very happy with that.

yes it does thank you. Looking at the manual again I need to adjust the flattener to 12.9 to get the total of 67.9. Thats what I had before with my Nikon - duh!

I have whats in the diagram, ie WO flattener for the ZS61 (adjustable, set to about 0.7 in this case, 1/3 of the filter width) + M42-M48F-16.5L + ZWO Filter drawer + ASI 2600MC thats 16.5 + 21 + 17.5 = 55mm plus the 0.7

Like several others I took advantage of the first clear sky for ages. This is 3 hrs of data on M31, 120s subs. The stars at the edges are elongated and look terrible but the ones in the centre are ok by comparison. I have some issues with guiding to sort out and I'm struggling to get the focus working reliably but first things first, any ideas what my issue with the stars is? Could it be something to do with where the filter is? Before I got the ASI2600 I was using a Nikon Z6 and the filter was mounted in the flattener, about as far away from the sensor as it could be. Now its in the filter drawer set up like the attached image. I seem to remember reading something which might be relevant but I cant find it now. EQM-35 Pro ZenithStar61 plus flattener Optolong CLS filter ASI 2600MC pro Guiding with and ASI120mm mini and William Optics 50mm Slide-base Uniguide scope ZWO focuser

I like that, really good. I have an L_enhance and the ASI2600MC has just arrived, if I get results as good as yours I'll be pleased.

Forecast is for clear sky at the weekend so looking forward to giving this a try. Its going to cost me so much in flowers!

Nice, I'm going to have to get one of those myself. Not sure flowers will do it though!

Just arrived, focuser, guide scope and camera. I've got a little time to get them working before dark nights start again.