First attempt at the Cacoon Nebula

[Quatermass]

Seems to be a lot of fine stuff to be imaging around the Cepheus region with the Iris Nebula and the Bubble nebula and while looking on Stellarium I found the Cocoon nebula near by, so as it was a nice clear night last night decided to hunt it down.

Two hours later I finally found it hiding just near Lacerta above a very faint little box of stars that took some doing, no go to nonsense for me thanks:) much more fun hunting them down with a pair of binoculars and then the finder scope.

It was very faint compared to the Trifid but just as much fun to go for

Usual 80x80 subs ISO 800 with 60 darks flats and bias. Taken with my 200p. Beginning to wonder why I got the ED80 instead of a new mount. And having a bit of trouble with noise in this warm weather might have to look at modding my canon 350d further still and fitting a cooler on it.

[pixueto]

Nice one QM. Wasn't the Moon a problem? I'm going to try learning drift alignment whilst our satellite is around.

[Quatermass]

The moon had gone down by the time I was ready for this one Pix I was up till gone 2.30am spent most of the night trying to locate it not easy to do as it was so faint.

[badgers]

Are you using a mac or linux by any chance QM ?

My little star-hop system works a treat for finding things.

You get as near as you can, take a 5 second image then it gets solved in about 10 seconds and plots the position of your CCD frame in stellarium so you can plan your star hops carefully and see how you are doing along the way.

Even though I went to a goto mount I'm still using it to get my framing bang on and it saves me hours of faffing about.

Maybe I should have a crack at compiling it for windows.

[badgers]

That's a lovely capture QM btw.

Have you got some bogus subs in there though, there is some star trailing, but it seems to be different across the image, might be a few frames throwing off the alignment ?

Edit: Maybe it's coma, was this a crop from the bottom left of the image ? I've been using lens correction in photoshop recently to subtract the coma a little.... I'm too broke to buy an MPCC now

[Quatermass]

I am using an old Dell with xp on it at the moment Badgers. I do have coma problems with my 200p have to get things bang in the middle and then sort out the stars later on I'm not that fussed waiting for when I get my Heq5 then I will put all that behind me and move on up to a coma corrector new ccd etc

I'm not surprised your broke mate lol this is a money draining hobby if you let it get hold of you.

I really enjoy looking for stuff just using the binoculars and then the finder scope which I could get a finder scope that showed things the right way up!

Have you not got a go to system on your Heq5?

[Chris]

Your really caning these nebs QM another lovely example, you must be knackered:D

[badgers]

Might be worth just trying lens correction in PS before the crop, might tighten things up slightly.

Yes the goto is pretty good now that I know how to use it. But It will never quite place things right in the centre, although its usually very close even after a few hours slewing about.

I've a similar coma story with the large canon sensor so I try to get stuff dead centre with the stellarium/script solution.

I remember the night I went hunting for M81/M82 on the EQ3-2, I think they probably heard the swearing in Suffolk.

[Quatermass]

Your really caning these nebs QM another lovely example, you must be knackered:D

Cheers Starfox If it was another clear night I would go out again I love being under the stars. One of the things I really enjoy is finding a target and letting the camera click away while I get my binoculars out and scan around the sky. Using binoculars is a lot of fun and nice and easy on the back just sitting in a chair chilled out under the heavens you cant beat it. I will be going with Chris and Richard to see the Transit of venus on the 5th an all night session followed by the transit in the morning then a meeting at 10am and another one at 7pm in the evening for the broads angling strategy group of which I am chairman. I will be zonked out then I can assure you

[Quatermass]

Might be worth just trying lens correction in PS before the crop, might tighten things up slightly.

Yes the goto is pretty good now that I know how to use it. But It will never quite place things right in the centre, although its usually very close even after a few hours slewing about.

I've a similar coma story with the large canon sensor so I try to get stuff dead centre with the stellarium/script solution.

I remember the night I went hunting for M81/M82 on the EQ3-2, I think they probably heard the swearing in Suffolk.

I know what you mean badgers I tend to put a night aside for finding stuff first then dedicate a full imaging session to it once I have noted down where it is and how to find it quickly the hardest one this year was the Makarian Chain that was a nightmare to find.

[Quatermass]

How do you use this lens correction thing in photoshop? Not tryed that one yet

[badgers]

Filter -> Lens Correction -> Custom

Zoom into one of the corners of the image and then drag the 'remove distortion' slider until it improves the coma a little.

Not in the same league as an MPCC but it can help with some fiddling

[badgerchap]

Nice one QM. Wasn't the Moon a problem? I'm going to try learning drift alignment whilst our satellite is around.

Oh great idea Pixueto, might follow your lead there!

[Quatermass]

Cheers for that Badgers I will give it a go. I need a coma corrector though for the 200p the one one the ed80 is great.

When I stacked this one I had a couple of overlapping frames that needed sorting out feeling a bit tired with all these nights out but loving it still.

[badgers]

I've heard the skywatcher one isn't half bad at all and its about 40 quid cheaper than the Baader one. Any that crop up on astro buy and sell tend to vanish quickly.

[Quatermass]

thats good to know the baader one is about 150 quid but no money will go on anything but a new mount for now.

[pixueto]

Filter -> Lens Correction -> Custom

Zoom into one of the corners of the image and then drag the 'remove distortion' slider until it improves the coma a little.

Not in the same league as an MPCC but it can help with some fiddling

Thank you very much for that one Badgers! You've probably saved me £150. I'm really impressed by this little feature! Here you have a comparison before and after applying the lens coma correction applied to the JPEG file:

[Quatermass]

Its a bit like having a fish eye lens effect but it cant kill off egg shaped stars in the edges for that im going to need a corrector.

Sent from my GT-S5670 using Tapatalk 2

[earth titan]

That's nice. Must have a try at that one.

I think all astronomers are insomniacs.... at least potentially!

You know it's time for bed when you notice the subs getting lighter again

[Quatermass]

You know it's time for bed when you notice the subs getting lighter again

He he yes had that happen a few times now these summer nights are way to short. If your going to have a go at this one it was not that big in the 200p and quite faint so a good dark night would be best. The Iris Nebula was easier to capture, the bubble was less easy and a bit smaller, and this one was a bit smaller still and the hardest one.

[Gina]

That's a lovely image Mark - well done

You really are doing the right thing by saving up for that mount. The mount is definitely the most critical thing for AP. I've certainly never regretted making that my priority. Oh a CCD camera would be nice but useless without a decent mount. Meanwhile I'm doing the best I can with a large colour CMOS Though ATM funds are so tight I can't even afford the plastic box for it! Be alright tomorrow though

[Quatermass]

Thank you Gina, yes that mount has got to be my top priority at the moment. My be I should have got that before I got the ed80 and focal reducer but my thinking was the ed80 is fine for the eq5 and it is for now.

I have also been asked to lead the local Halesworth U3A Astronomy group so that is going to be a lot of fun this year, meetings held at the members homes and trips to the local astronomy society.Heres our facebook page that I have set up for them all.

https://www.facebook.com/HalesworthAstronomyGroup

Its only a small group at the moment but hoping it will grow and several of its member have lovely dark sites to view from so that will be great.

[Gina]

Good luck with the group Mark and enjoy it