M57 - the accidental image

[antimorris]

Monday night I was just planning on playing with the setup for a few hours and then imaging M27 (Dumbbell Nebula) if all went well. I got a used Celestron Radial Guider so wanted to play with it and see how it worked in my setup and how long I could push the subs at 1280mm (I have the f/6.3 fr on the scope at the moment) ... After a little while (about an hour and a half) with no luck finding ANY stars in the OAG I realized that the prism was backwards ... flipped it around and bingo - tons of stars. I then slewed to a random target that was in my very limited FOV from the backyard (I normally set up out front, but since I wasn't planning on doing more than playing I set up out back) - which happened to be M57, the Ring Nebula.

I threw on my normal sub time of 20min and the Ha filter and did a test. Nice round stars so I bumped it up another 10 min ... with 30 min subs I was starting to see the faint outer halos of M57 so I kept it going while checking my ridiculous mess of cords (REALLY need to clean that up) and playing with PHD - some clouds came by off and on, but with 30min subs even 5 min of clouds didn't completely ruin a sub although did result in some star bloating. By the end of the night it began raining on me so I quickly threw the cover on and in I came to play with the data ... to my surprise I was able to pull out the halo fairly well so my "playing" was accidentally becoming an image (oops!) thanks to the rain I didn't get any flats, so made a false flat and saved the result. Never did get to my intended actual imaging target: M27, but oh well.

Last night I decided since I had half an image I would grab some more data as I played with an additional addition to the setup - my piggybacked Nikon D40. I just wanted to see if I could run it concurrent with my normal imaging for possible later widefields. I didn't spend as long as I normally do on focus, as I was planning on fine-tuning the focus after a few subs on the Nikon to see if tracking was going ok with the additional weight. Unfortunately I nodded off and never got around to fine-tuning the focus on the Ha channel, but it turns out it was ok. The problem came when filters changed ... definitely not the greatest focus as temperature had changed. But I did not realize until I woke up and looked at the subs. Oh well ... I process the total accidental data and here is the result.

For an image I wasn't planning, I think its ok, other than some iffy focus & clouds and resulting required additional processing steps.

What do you think? Maybe one of these days I should image this for real!

Imaging Scope: Celestron CPC800XLT @ 1280mm

Imaging Camera: Atik 314L+

Guide Camera: StarlightXpress Lodestar

Filters: Astronomik Ha, L, R, G, B

Integration details:

Ha: 7x1800s, 3x1200s = 4.5 hrs

L: 12x600s = 2 hrs

R,G,B: 12x300s, 2x2 each = 3 hrs total

Total time: 9.5 hrs

Also including a crop of just the DSO.

[SteveL]

Thats a serious amount of outer halo!

[antimorris]

Apparently the key is Ha with dark skies, and 30min (or more) subs .... who would've thunk it?

[lukebl]

That's a magnificent bit of work. Love the capture of the faint galaxy IC1296 to the lower right.

[Fenriz]

Wow that is one seriously impressive image, well done Anna

[hayju01]

Amazing!!!

Wish I had accidents like that :-)

[Black Knight]

That's a magnificent bit of work. Love the capture of the faint galaxy IC1296 to the lower right.

I was just going to say the same thing! Oh, and err, great image

[RogerTheDodger]

Lovely, just lovely

[AztecastroMcJ]

Great result

[barkis]

Cor Blimey, If this result comes from playing about, I can't wait to see the results from your serious imaging sessions .

This is a tremendous result .

Ron.

[Glasspusher]

Yes, very nice indeed. Don't often see the ring looking like that!

John

[oldfruit]

Great result, to be honest i have never seen M57 looking like that in any picture. Great detail.

[ollypenrice]

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Olly

[antimorris]

!!!!!!!!! Olly? :-) Is !!!!!!! good? LOL

[hayju01]

I was thinking the same Anna. I believe Olly may be lost for words????

[Beyond_Vision]

Now that is some experiment , hats off to your halo

Regards

Kevin

[harry page]

Hi

Crickey and crumbs

Harry

[Adamski]

Thats an awesome image. It looks like a giant eyeball,lol.

[ashworthacca]

That's a cracker Anna, superb!

[adamsp123]

I was so stunned by the quality and amount of data you managed I had to go for a lie down.

Maybe that is what Olly meant!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Coco]

Wonderful... now how interesting is that!!

Who ever is doing POW this weeks in for a headache

.

[nightvision]

Very impressive, looks so different from the usual M57 images, it shows that there is still plenty out there to image in your own way, inspiring.

[ollypenrice]

!!!!!!!!! Olly? :-) Is !!!!!!! good? LOL

Good???

It's a darned site more than just measly good. The outer haloes show real structure. Given that they are rarely seen at all this is quite an achievement. Also that little propellor shaped spiral is showing beautifully.

I never get our 10 inch out for DS imaging but you have inspired to to dust it off and have a go at this. I have always been too scared of the guiding challenges!

Olly

[johnh]

Perfect halos, the best M57 I have seen here.

John.

[Psychobilly]

Wowser... what a Halo!!!

Go for it Olly I can get "reliable" 30 min subs out of my CPC800 at f10 guided with a 500mm f8 telephoto lens... Well I could before I took it of the pier - still haven't got round to PA'ing it again...

Peter...