Horse head after moding DSLR camera

[SimonfromSussex]

I had the funds this month to mod my canon 1000d so sent it to Astronomiser - Automated Astronomy and AstroImaging Solutions and it was back within a week, great service.

Below is my first light with it on the horse head. Because of the moon I was restricted on sub length (anything longer was washed out) so this might be a little noisy! 112 subs at 90 sec iso 700. ED80 on CG5 mount. I think longer subs would reduce the noise?

If you compare that to my effort before modding (although not as many subs on this one - 37 x 90 sec iso 1600) both unguided, you can see the difference, well worth it IMO!

[AndyUK]

That's certainly a VERY good demonstration of the difference you get with modding the camera - You must be very pleased with the "investment" (Andy did mine too just over a year ago ).

As you've noted, the last few days, whilst having some great clear skies, have been more than slightly marred by the position of the waxing gibbous moon

I'd urge you to come back and try this again when the moon is WELL out of the way and I think you'll get a very pleasant surprise - I suspect that the noise that you're seeing is probably due to your processing trying to "lift" the nebula out of of the moonglow. Usually it's the quantity of subs that helps to remove noise, but I reckon that with 112, you've probably got that pretty much covered ! If you can take longer exposures without trailing (under a preferably moonless sky!) then yes, absolutely - go for it... But be careful going above 10 mins with a DSLR in the winter (maybe 15 mins with the -8C temps we've had this week), and in summer you may need to keep below 5 mins, as with a DSLR, when the chip temp starts to get higher, it introduces digital noise. Trial and error really, but you can denoise a fair bit of it out in post processing...

[SimonfromSussex]

Thanks Andy, i will def take your advice and try it with moon out the way. I think with guiding 5 mins is probably a good compromise for my dslr so I will try a run at that and see how it compares. Cheers.

[AndyUK]

(My first crack at this last year was with a full moon too - It wasn't pretty at all...!)

[Gina]

The moon was a nuisance last night (after I had imaged it) but it was well away from Orion so I had a go at that.

[Zul]

Very nice changes!

[Charon]

Simon, what mods were carried out on your camera?

[SimonfromSussex]

Thanks Zul,

Nereid3, Filter replacement, details here: Astronomiser - Automated Astronomy and AstroImaging Solutions

[Charon]

Cheers Simon.