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As the post title suggests, these are the results from the first clear night I have had with the Evoguide 50ed with the Starizona EvoFF V2 field Flattener. I just did an hour's worth of data on Andromeda and Pleiades. I forgot to use my new light pollution filter with the Andromeda photos and it meant I had to refocus for the Pleiades which also meant my flats I took the next day could only be used with the Pleiades but I think it came out okay anyway. Andromeda - ISO 800, 40 x 90secs, 20 darks and bias frames, stacked in DSS, processed in GIMP. Pleiades - ISO 800, 40 x 90secs, 20 dark, flat and bias frames, Svbony UHC clip in filter, stacked in DSS, processed in GIMP. I don't think my Skyguider unguided at 242mm focal length can really manage 90 secs with my alignment anyway. I think in future I'll go back to 60 second photos, as I did get some oval shape stars in these. But I do think it shows how the Evoguide 50ed with the EvoFF field Flattener is a capable little budget setup.
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Hi, does anyone know what these faint red blue and green 'L' shaped lines in the attached image are? And more importantly how to get rid of them. They are a uniform shape and size and all across the frame. I don't seem to get these lines on single images, at least I can't see them. I have tried stacking through both Deep Sky Stacker and Sequator, and even used a different laptop but with the same result. The pictures were taken on a Canon EOS 450D through a Skywatcher 200P mounted on a EQ5 Pro. The mirrors seem ok and I don't have any issues when visually observing. Any help and advise gratefully received. Thanks
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From the album: CCD venture
A h-alpha and OIII shot of the Wall section of NGC7000 aka north america nebula. Processed to resemble the hubble palette colour scheme. ED80 - ATK16HR - Ha clip filter - EQ6 - finderguider 9x50mm PhD2 - photoshop - DSS. -
From the album: CCD venture
A h-alpha shot of the pelican nebula in Cygnus. 2 x panel mosaic. 10 min subs. 9 x 10m + 9x10m stacks stitched together in ms ICE. ED80 - ATK16HR - Ha clip filter - EQ6 - finderguider 9x50mm PhD2 - photoshop - DSS. -
From the album: 2012
California Nebula October 2012 - Unmodified Canon 7D, Lights 23x200 + 40x100, Darks 10x200 + 8x100. Stacked in DSS. Histogram stretched in PI© Tim Corso
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From the album: Pix pix
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I have a huge problem with DSS. About a week ago, I took 300, 2 second long exposures of Andromeda with my skywatcher 90/900. But when DSS started scanning the stars in the images, it only registered about 5 stars at 40%. And only 7 stars at 20%. I tried to stack them and selected stack 100% of frames, but it only stacked around 29. I even tried it at 4% where it registered around 40 stars, but DSS crashed mid process due to the immense amount of stars being scanned (60 000 per image at least). I tried it sooooo many times, but I don't get it to work. It somehow stacked 131 images I took of the lagune nebula (1 second lang exposure). You couldn't see the actual nebula, but some bright stars were there and DSS was able to stack. In the Andromeda pics, there were like 5 times more stars, but it didn't work. If anyone knows what's wrong, pls help me!!! I'm slowly loosing it on that nonsense. -
I'm trying to stack 240 light frames of Milky Way taken from quite a light polluted area. I tried to stack them in DSS. The Milky Way seems to have been stacked okay, but the surrounding stars look like they've been deliberately dimmed or brushed over. I thought there was something wrong with my frames but when I used the same frames in Sequator, it's working fine. I've attached both the images below, and I have exaggerated them a lot on Lightroom just to see how much details I could pull out. Sequator one seems to have too many weird light bands(?) but I think I can fix them using an adjustment brush. But look at how many stars Sequator is able to show compared to DSS. DSS image: The settings I've tried on DSS and yet nothing changed: 1) Tried in Standard, Mosaic both 2) Tried both Sigma Clipping, and Auto Adaptive Average(These two were recommended by DSS) 3) Hot pixel detection and removal (tried it with enabled and disabled) 4) Nothing enabled in the cosmetics tab 5) Tried with and without Flat frames 6) Star Detection Threshold: Tried from a range of 50 stars to 300 stars. Even manually checked to see if DSS was picking any noise as star(it wasn't). If I try with less than 30 light frames, DSS does an okayish job and the stars in the rest of the image still look like stars, but then the Milky Way has no details to pull out, unless I stack a lot more shots. Can anyone please tell me what am I doing wrong in the case of DSS that it's doing such a poor job for the surrounding stars? If you guys need me to upload some Raw light frames I will do so as well. Any advice and suggestions are welcome. Thank you EXIF info: Camera: Nikon D3100, with 18-55mm kit lens Exposure Settings: F/3.5, ISO 3200, 15s x 240 frames, 18mm focal length, no tracker 50 Darks, 50 Bias and 50 Flat frames. DSS version: 4.2.3 -
Hi all! It's been a while since I wrote here, also because this year I've been less active in the field, unfortunately... Anyway, I've now started to do autoguiding, with mixed results. I bought myself a laptop and guidescope, with CCD. I'm able to do 10 minute exposures that come out fairly well most of the time. Guiding is mostly good. I tried PHD as well as Maxim, but lately Maxim seems to be doing better, or I just found the sweet spot for my setup. The last 2 or 3 times however, I'm having difficulty in obtaining decent images. Even with no moon, the images I get are quite bright, with stars barely visible, and the stack is terrible: it's a light shade of grey, hiding all stars (let alone a nebula), and the histogram shows the peaks (in DSS) far to the right, so adjusting that is a nightmare, so much so that the last two times the result was not worth showing to anyone.... The site I go to is always the same, and I already obtained quite nice images, also with 10 minute exposures and the same ISO... Apart from this, I'm having a very hard time getting my flats right... I've got a "flatbox" (EL panel with two sheets of white paper, 8 sec exposures at 800 ISO, the same ISO I use for the Light exposures) that I tried at home in the dark with the scope and camera, to get the right histogram, as I gather looking online: the peak should be at about a third of the histogram. Problem is, which I discovered only last week, the histogram changes with the same setup, for the various "receivers" of the flat image: the camera, Maxim, or DSS. As shown in the photos below (the camera is a RAW picture, taken with the same settings as the FIT picture I used for the DSS and Maxim screen caps): camera: DSS: MAxim: Apart from the histograms, I also always get those very ugly red hue photos in Maxim.. Is this something of Maxim, or am I getting something wrong?? The image obviously is not red, but the grey shade of the DSS photo (the photo of the camera screen shows only white, but that's because of the phone cam)... This means I can never check in a decent way if the exposures are coming out right while I'm taking them with Maxim... So, recapping, problems getting the flats right, and headscratching about the bright exposures I'm getting lately from a setup that already proved it doesn't have to be that way... At the moment I don't have examples of the latter problem to attach (because I didn't finish any stack, seeing as they came out so horribly), but I can attach some, if needed. Any suggestions? Somebody had the same problems? I'm getting a bit frustrated, I must say... Clear skies!! Gerhard.
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Hi, I would really appreciate some feedback/advice on the following. A few nights ago I took 45 x 300s subs of the Rosette Nebula at ISO800 with a modded 700d Canon DSLR through a Altair Wave ED80. I've stacked the image with 30 darks, 30 bias, no flats (I have a plano which, apart from the extreme edges seems to handle any vignetting) and had a go at processing in photoshop. I live between Leeds & Wakefield so skies are very light polluted but tried to reduce the effects by using a Hutech IDAS LP filter. I started image capture about 9pm so the Rosette Nebula was relatively low in the sky although some captures were taken much later when it has well above the horizon. After stacking I had some data but a lot less than I was expecting and really struggled to bring out any detail on Photoshop. The questions I have are: 1) Is the level of data I have (see screenshot of DSS) typical for this amount of subs? (I have spread the channels out so you can see the data for each. I've aligned each before processing. 2) Should I have used a higher ISO say 1600? 3) Would changing DSS settings make any difference. I use standard mode, Average for Lights & Darks, median for Bias. 4) Is the fact that I'm in a high LP area significantly affecting the quality of the images. There are some fantastic DSLR images of the Rosette nebula on this forum, so I think I should probably be getting better results. I am relatively new to AP so apologies in advance for all the questions. Thanks Dec. -
I've recently started DSO imaging: Canon EOS 550D (modded), Celestron 9.25 SCT, AVX mount. I use BYE, save RAW + JPEG to laptop, then process in DSS. When I go into Register checked images: advanced: compute number of detected stars; I get a decent number (approx 250) if I am registering JPEG images at 2%, but very few, often zero, with RAW images of the same object, no matter where I put the slider. Am I getting the settings wrong, or is there another answer. Thank you.
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Hi! I did an imaging run on the Flame/Horsehead Nebulae last night, and I got about 2 hours of data. About 20 minutes worth are with my hydrogen alpha filter. To my dismay, when I went in to stack my subframes on DSS, I get a message saying that only one out of my 52 frames will be stacked. I've been tinkering with the settings today, but I'm not sure if the problem lies with my DSS settings or with the frames. These were the first i've taken at ISO 800, so I'm worried that my stars may be a little too big/burnt out for DSS to actually recognize them as stars. Perhaps I haven't focused well enough? I think that's a distinct possibility with my hydrogen alpha frames. I did use my trusty Bahtinov mask, so I hope I didn't goof on that! Anyway, I'm including some representative subframes if you'd like to take a look. I'm taking the average for the subframes and calibration frames) -
Hi! I have about 4 hours worth of data from M51. I captured my subframes with my 8" Orion Newtonian Astrograph and my Nikon D3200. About two hours of data are from 30 second exposures (some at ISO800 and others at ISO100). The rest are 4 minute exposures at ISO800 (these were captured after I bought my Orion Starshoot SSAG). In order for DSS to align these frames, I need to have different star detection thresholds for the 30 second subs and the 4minute subs. I tried doing this by using batch Stacking, but it still uses the same detection threshold for all the file lists (or so I think, since at 20% it stacks almost all the 4 minutes, but at 6-7% it only stacks one of the 30 second frames). And fyi, when stacking only the 30 second frames, there is no problem making an image. Stacking only the 4 minute subs also shows no problems. Let me know any ways you can think of to resolve this. I appreciate it!
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Hi All To date I have been using DSS to stack and (dare I say it) to also perform some image processing. The final, resultant TIFF file has been further processed using such applications as PaintShop Pro, GIMP or even Windows Photo Gallery. I have read that DSS is good for stacking but, ideally, should not be used for any processing. I have downloaded a trial version of StarTools but am having a few issues getting to grips with it or getting any results that are anywhere near as good as those so far obtained with just DSS, PSP etc. I appreciate that learning how to use StarTools will involve a steep curve (I was, in a previous life, a Microsoft Office Specialist Master Trainer so have first hand experience of the difficulties of mastering new software!) but it's starting off on the right foot that is throwing me, namely; I understand that no processing should be performed in DSS, so, what stacking settings/options should be set here? Does anyone know of a definitive list of the best options to use? StarTools likes the FITS image format. Do I use the Autosave FITS file DSS can produce or do I use the "Save picture to file...." option in DSS? If the latter, which option 16/32bit, integer/rational, apply adjustments/do not apply adjustments to saved image? I have asked a lot of questions here and any advice/guidance will be greatly appreciated so thanks for taking the time to read and, if you do, replying to my post. Once I know I am on the right track with a starting image for StarTools, I feel I will have a fighting chance of learning how to use StarTools itself, however, I am sure that will be another story altogether.......
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Hi all This is more of a cry for help than a showcase but I seem to have produced a situation where a single sub is giving me a better result than a DSS stacked image! The long and short of it is last night (16/01/2015) was the first clear night for ages so I spent some time outside trying to get as much data as possible in varying formats (ISO800, 1600 and 800 with Powermate). The examples below are ones taken at native FL at ISO1600 with a non-modded Canon 1100D with Astronomik LP filter through the WO GTF81. Subs are 120 seconds, 24 of them (a few more lost to star trails probably caused by the wind). At first I saw the subs coming through looking reasonably good, albeit bluish thanks to the LP filter. I could see a bit of a tail and was encouraged that I might get a good result after stacking with DSS. An example of one of the subs (in JPG format, the CR2's are even better but of course I can't upload them here to view) is below: After all subs were taken I took another 25 bias. Started to take darks but then had snow so had to bring everything in - I used darks from the library so not ideal. Flats also from the library. Stacked them in DSS using the 'stars and comets' option (option 3 for those who know DSS) but the result that came out the other side has sadly given me very little. I've stretched it beyond reason in PS CS5 and there simply isn't much there (see PNG output below): If you fancy a stab at the data feel free to grab the 16-bit TIF here or the 32-bit TIF here. So the question is, any ideas? What am I doing wrong or is there anything else I can get out of this? Or is the equipment simply not good enough to get the detail, especially with the LP filter? As always I value everyone's opinion so don't hesitate to throw anything at me! Cheers all Will -
After some trial and error I'm getting some very good guiding results with PHD2 now. 60mm guidescope and ASI290MM mini camera. The M42 image taken late March was 12 x 15 second exposures taken manually with my dslr / C8 and a stopwatch. Stacked in DSS and played with a bit in GIMP. On the night I couldn't get APT to register the camera - turned out to be the mini USB cable (although later trials point to the socket in the camera being a bit loose too). Bought an iOPTRON iPOLAR that arrived on Friday and had a play with that which has resulted in near perfect polar alignment. 2 star alignment and an additional 2 calibration stars on my Advanced GT mount means I'm getting very accurate GOTOs now and PHD2 (through the ST4 port on the ASI camera) seems to be guiding very well. Last night after more cable faffing I managed to get everything working together to the point where I felt confident enough to leave it running by itself for an hour and a half (45 minutes of 180 second exposures plus 3 minutes each exposure to save the file - I've since found out I shouldn't have noise reduction switched on in the camera - DOH!) so M51 is 15 x 180 second @ ISO 800 lights and 5 x 180 second darks. A little manipulation in GIMP and I think it's come out very well. Obviously still have a lot to learn and I'm going to have to start taking much longer exposures but I'm quite pleased with these 2 pictures. Graeme.
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I've just been trying to stack a series of lights, darks, flats and bias frames in Deep Sky Stacker. The lights, darks and flats were all taken on the same night. The bias frames are older, but have been used on many pictures before (with no issues). However, on this occasion when I ran the whole lot through Deep Sky Stacker the whole left hand side of the resulting image was faded and blurred. A process of elimination narrowed it down to a problem with the bias frames. I took a fresh set of bias frames, but got exactly the same problem. Has anyone any idea what the problem might be? -
Hello guys! I have some free time now so i decided to finally try my first attempt at drift alignment with a DSLR (Canon 1000D, prime focus). I know that my setup is lame for DSO pics, but i'm up for the challenge of trying the best i can with what i have for now, so yesterday i started this little quest (and i realized how long i have to go.. hehe.. but that's part of the fun). The set-up: sky-watcher 130mm F=900mm, EQ2 (lol), 4x speed R.A. motor and Canon 1000D. To make things short: After i tried the best out of the polar alignemnt i could, I aimed at m57 and took 120x20 seconds subs, 40 dark and 40 bias. I got from those 120, around 45 without serious startrails (eq2 and polar precision, i guess is gonna be a struggle.. also, i think everytime the wind would hit the scope, would ruin one shot). In DSS i loaded all this info and left everything in default... at the threshold menu for detecting stars, i got what i predicted was a problematic number: 9 stars at 2%. So the problem is: in DSS, he tells me he can only register one of 45 shots... "you should check the threshold, etc..". My questions are a lot, but i'll make a few for now: - wouldn't 20 seconds be enough for it to detect more than 9 stars in every pic? I leave you the example of the processing of DSS with only one light photoframe (in attachment)... I can see more than 8 stars (which i was tols was the minimum for registing the frame). -Could it be because i was using a baader filter for moon and skyglow in front of the 25x lenses that might have darkened the image to the point of no star recognition? Could it be the light pollution, me being in the center of a city? -Is there any way i can go around this problem of no star recognition and use the info i have in the 44 pics left ans stack them somehow? I'm sorry for making it "heavy", please bear with me as i am very new to this! Thanks in advance! Cheers, Rui -
I see this question appears fairly regularly so I have been reading through a lot of old threads before posting however none seem to answer my question directly, hence this post. I have been using DSS for a while now and in general I have been stacking and then choosing ‘Do not apply adjustments’ and saving as a TIFF format. I suspect these steps are detrimental to the outputted file in that precious data is being lost. From what I have read I should always use the ‘Autosave’ file and save as a FIT file (32bit?)? Then go into FITS Liberator and save as a 32Bit TIFF or 16Bit Tiff? Lastly go into Photoshop and open either the 16bit as normal or open the 32bit and convert to 16bit (using Exposure & Gamma method) on the drop down? Now I have compared the FITS file which I have saved in DSS with both the Autosave and the ‘Do not apply adjustments’ type and then followed the stages through FITS and then PS. What I am seeing on either FITS file is that after they have gone FITS Liberator they appear to be being stretched by FITS Liberator. If I compare the images in PS it is clear to see the differences against my current method. The Autosave 32bit version definitely gets stretched more but the 16bit is also stretched but less so. Whereas using my 'normal' method in PS it displays a darker starting image. In the alternative method these images are clearly showing DSO is clearly visible. Ideally I want to control this myself so I do not want them to appear stretched before I can begin working on them. e.g. Protecting against Stars being saturated from the outset. I tried to see if I could just switch off Auto Stretching in FITS Liberator (initially I thought this was a non-permanent change but it appears not) but I could not find a way. Am I missing something here? The default Stretch function in FITS Lib is ‘Linear’ but having tried all of the others none see to allow no stretching? I understand Maxim DL and Astro Art other alternatives but surely FITS Liberator is sufficient for this purpose? Are my steps correct? Do I need to worry about saving as a FIT from DSS or is this all extra work for nothing? Thanks -
Hi is anyone using Regim to stack using a dslr modded , currently trying to work out the settings in regim , im using a modified canon 1000D , do i need to set up libraw within regim ? if anyone has good success in using regim i would be interested in hearing what settings you are using .
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Hi, I have taken mono LRGB images of M51 with my new ASI1600mm-PRO. I have a mix of 30s, 60s, 120s subs. 100 darks, and 100 flats for each filter. About 4 hours total. I Used DSS for alignment and stacking, then Pixinsight for LRGB combination. My issue is that i'm not happy with the colours, the stars all appear white and the background is strange. I have attached the Aligned LRGB images. Can anyone point me in the right direction? Thanks! Green.TIF red.TIF Lum.TIF B.TIF- 18 replies
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I am having lots of trouble processing some widefield Milky Way shots in DSS. At the end of the stacking process I get the usual screen for R G B wlignment but the image is white/blank without any RGB curves. I am using a canon 100D and the latests versions of DSS. Has anyone encountered this problem before? I have run out of ideas as to how to solve it. Thank you all for your help.
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Hi, can anyone help with star detection in DSS. I have been getting some good images using my Star Discovery 150p and nikon d5100. I'm using a 2xbarlow as I know I can't gain prime focus on this OTA and keeping my exposures down to 25secs due to field rotation with it being a Altazimuth mount and this can also be corrected in processing. The problem I'm having is that when I put everything in to DSS and register the images, it detects hundreds of stars but when I stack them it tells me there's not enough stars and to change the threshold so it can stack more of the images! The threshold is already set all the way to the left at 2% I'm using 100 x 25sec exposures iso 1600, 25 x dark @ 25secs iso 1600 and 25 x bias @ 1/4000secs iso 1600 No matter what I do it will only stack the dark, the bias and 1x25secs exposure! Is there anyone out there that has had similar issues and can shed some light on this please.
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I had a successful session the night before last - my first with guiding using the ASi120MM on my ST80, atop my ED80 through which I imaged with my unmodified Canon 1100D and focal reducer. I was pleased with this image using 13 x 300 second lights with darks and flat frames: Then last night I thought I would try M51 and things have not gone so well. However I only took 6 x 400 second lights, 3 darks and used the previous flats as still ISO800. This was my first image out of DSS with a star detection of 50 stars: There appears to be a distinct lack of colour, I did moved the right hand RGB/K pointers for blue and green to the left a bit as I am sure someone once said make the peaks a bit fatter but I think that now a BAD idea. So I tried again without flats and the colour came back(?): But very noisy - but there is the colour! And I tried a third time this time including flats but set at "average" not "median", star detection 47 stars and got another dull image: This is my image from last year which was an unguided attempt using 30 x 70 second lights: Now I guess my questions are as follows: 1. Please confirm I should take a LOT more lights? 2. Should I reduce exposure down a lot from 400 seconds to reduce noise on a fairly moonlit night? 3. Where did the colour go? 4. Why did the image look better when I DIDNT use flats? 5. Any other advice please! ps - already saving up for a weeks training at Olly's place hopefully next year! -
Hi guys Just bought a modded Canon 500D to replace my beaten up Nikon D70 which, although it's served me well for 3 years, I am sick to death of! I've only had one short opportunity to give the Canon a test run, and it all seems fine until I stack in DSS. If I use lights and darks only I get a reasonable result, but when I add flats and bias the finished tif has no colour. I'm using the same settings in DSS as I used for the Nikon, but of course that's probably no good for the Canon. Anyone else out there using a 500D and DSS to stack? If so, what settings are you using in DSS for lights, darks, flats and bias etc? Thanks guys
