First (DSO) Light for my ED120APO: M42, Rosette, M35

[Bizibilder]

I finally managed to get a clear night (Jan 23rd 2012) with no Moon to try out my Skywatcher ED120APO with reducer and Canon 1000D(unmodded). These are all short runs as I have to contend with neighbours trees to the south! So 1hr 10mins of 5min subs on M42, with 7.5mins of 30sec subs for the core. Processed in DSS and PSCS5 using a layer masking technique for the first time to merge the two images - just followed a web tutorial and it seemed to give quite pleasing results in that I "can't see the join!".

The Rosette is 50mins of 5min subs - far too few but the trees got in the way! and M35 was taken with 52mins of 2min subs.

All taken on an HEQ5 with EQMOD and PHD guiding via a finder-guider. I am quite pleased with these as an example of what the 120APO can do. I just hope I can get a few clear nights so I can start to amass some decent exposure times (and maybe finally get my 1000D modded as well!).

As always comments please:

[Stargazer Jack]

Superb images with lots of detail and colour in every single one, well done

[todd8137]

very nice and detailed images you must be please