patraip1

the sculptor galaxy 

43 subs 15 sec iso400, flats, bias

DSS, ST, Snapseed

the coccon nebula 

264 subs 15 sec iso400, flats, bias

DSS, ST, Snapseed

ok here goes my setup

I have a Nikon D5500. I bought it 2nd hand. I tried to find a dslr with as little weight as possible and the D5500 has an awesome sensor for AP!!! Extremely low noise and isoless. The only negative it has is that it does not capture red Ha very well. 

I removed the camera stock lens and have attached these two items on the camera body

I simply then slip the camera with the T adapter into the focuser just like any other 1,25" eyepiece... 

the blue cable wires you see is just an extra strengthening step but not really necessay, the focuser handles the weight of my nikon (420gr) easily.... 

You can also see the brown thin electrical tape (more on that later) 

A light shroud is absolutely necassary. I also have fabricated a dew shield about 30cm long (from the same black paper I used for the light shroud) which I put in the front end of the OTA just before taking the pictures after I have framed my target and checked my tracking and taken my test frames. This is very important in keeping stray light from nearby sources to a minimum. I also take my flats with the dew/straylight shield on at the end of my imaging session pointing the entire rig to a laptop sceen playing a youtube video named :"24 hours of pure white" from a distance of about 1,5 meters in a completely dark room. Flats taken with a tablet on top the end of the telescope covered with a white t shirt were a huge problem for me at the beggining, because light found its way directky from the secondary to the camera......

I have the heritage mounted on an Skywatcher AZGTI alt az mount

I also put a counterweight on the bar of 1kg.You can also see the distance that the trusses are retrieved in order to achieve prime focus with my dslr. 

I have a layer of thin electrical tape in the focuser threads which makes the focuser very hard to screw and unscrew but once I find focus I never have to move the focuser again for many imaging session. I have the focuser almost completely screwd in. (You will have to try moving the trusses inwards while focusing on a star) The shorter the length of the telescope the shorter the F becomes, so you can capture more light!! When I had the trusses adjusted I was just shy of perfect focus. I then used 1/8 to 1/4 of a turn of the focuset to achieve perfect focus. It was actually very easy. Just make sure the focuser threads are covered with the tape and it is very very tight, because otherwise it is very easy to lose focus if the camera twists even a little and twists the focuser along with it. Screw the 2 screws that hold the tring adapter to the focuser evenly. If you want a different frame rotate just the camera! The focuser must be tight!! 

I focus on Jupiters moons with the camera in live view and maximum zoom until I see the smaller possible moons. I asked a friend with a 3d printer to make me a bahtinov mask which I found in this link

https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:2493073

I have only used it once since it comfirmed my already focused camera was spot on!

Cheers and clear skies!!

works fine in my browser..... 

maybr because it is an answer to a pm it is not visible to everybody? 

Don't know how to copy a post with lots of photos and repost here.... 

Here is a link to a post with my complete setup for anyone interested

https://stargazerslounge.com/messenger/331615/?tab=comments#comment-733149

more data on the rosette... 

153subs 15sec iso400

and the horsehead with 215 subs 15sec....

124 subs 10sec iso400, flats, bias DSS, ST, Snapseed

M45 Pleiades

63 subs 15 sec, iso400, flats, biases, nikonD5500 skywatcher heritage 130p, azgti. DSS, Startools, Snapseed

The rosette nebula

iso400 15sec times 140, flats, biases DSS, ST

The fireworks galaxy

well there have been occasional clear nights.... Unfortunately the old data from m42 are in another laptop to which I currently do not have access. Do you think iso 400 or iso 200 looks better? I still have not decided what my goto ISO will be. I think 400 brings out nebulosity better even if slightly, but is bloating the stars a little.... 

Opinions are very much welcome! 

some more pictures I took 2 nights ago together with the flame and horsehead nebula.... 

180 frames of NGC 891 and 87 from an older session for a total of 267 subs of 15sec, flats and bias DSS ST Snapseed taken with my heritage 130p and Nikon D5500 on a azgti mount

180 light frames 15 sec of M42. same setup as above (before my tracking issues) 

and here is my previous attempt at m42 @iso200 100subs of 15sec for comparison

Horsehead and flame

just 73 lights 15sec iso400, flats and bias. 

Skywatcher 130p azgti, nikon D5500 prime focus, DSS, ST, Snapseed

my mount is having issues.... I will open it up to service it. My azimuth axis is not tracking well. I had to discard 209 frames with obvious tracking issues

NGC 891

118 subs @15sec iso400

28 flats and master bias 

Skywatcher heritage 130p, AZGti, NikonD5500 prime focus, 

DSS, ST, snapseed

brand new target

NGC 6960-western veil nebula

170 subs 20 sec, flats and bias ISO400

DSS, startools

As the clouds are up I am restacking old data. Here is a mix of ISO200 and 400, exposure times and even 200 subs of M31 setting (180 rotated with regard to the rest!!!), total subs 562 , total integration time 1:45, corresponding flats and biases. 

Stacked in groups in DSS with average mode and all the rest of the settings as per startools. 

Heavy crop and process in Startools

Thanks happy-kat! I think so too. It seems that DSS is capable of combining different ISO and exposures. Apart from using average instead of intersection stacking all the rest of DSS settings were as per Startools suggestions. 

I stacked all the available data on M33 in groups. I had subs at ISO 400 13sec,ISO 400 10sec,ISO 200 10sec and ISO 200 15 sec. I threw everything in DSS in groups (the main group with one (1) completely irrelavant frame unchecked plus 4 other groups) with their corresponding flats and biases, chose one frame as reference and then did an average stack of 1182 frames. 46 hours later and processed in Startools and snapseed....... 

New attempt at M33

I tried iso 400 this time. Unfortunately I did not recheck my focus before starting to image and it turned out my camera had moved.... Anyway I stacked 400 subs 13 sec, together with 30 flats and 30 bias. Processed in Startools

m27 

125 lights 15 sec@iso200

25 flats, 30 bias

Nikon D5500 prime focus

Skywatcher 130p AZGTI

DSS, Startools, Snapseed 

Thank you!! 

Here is a quick attempt at m13

40 25sec subs@iso200

25 flats, 30 bias

Nikon D5500 prime focus

Skywatcher 130p AZGTI

DSS, Startools, Snapseed 

I think focus is not 100% but still looks decent

m42 

100 subs 15sec@iso200, 25 flats, 30 bias

Nikon D5500 prime focus

Skywatcher 130p AZGTI

DSS, Startools, Snapseed 

I managed to capture more subs of M33. I added to the 197 for a total of 407 10sec light frames, together with 36 flats and 36 bias frames (skipped adding the dark flats as my flats where 1/200 sec as an experiment...) 

Stacked in DSS with no white balance and black point set to 0 in the raw settings and no RGB background color calibration in the lights tab in stacking settings (as instructed per Startools site). 

Processed in Starools 

Bare in mind that the moon was almost full and at 60 degrees from the target for half the lights and 45 for the rest on two different nights which produced a massive light gradient in my stacked picture which startools handled quite well with an agressive wipe.  

and here is the same with some touches in Snapseed

I will try again next week without the moon (clouds permitting....) 

I found a window through the clouds.... 

197*10 sec subs @ iso 200

26 dark flats, 36 flats, 36 bias

Nikon D5500 prime focus, Skywatcher heritage 130p f/5 on an AZ GTI altaz

bortle 5, bad seeing 75% moon at 90deg from target

DSS, startools, snapseed

M33

since it is still raining here is another try at m31 in startools. I think I am getting the hang of the wipe module.... 

I did some reading in the startools site and watched some of the video you mentioned, thanks for the link.... 

Unfortunatelly the moon is out and M31 is way up now so I will have to try a new target when I get a chance

no luck.... still raining

here is another go at m31 with startools