My first DSO - M31

[kirkster501]

From last night, quite a polluted garden with moon rising, 6 exposures of 3 minutes. No flats or darks or anything.

I stacked in DSS and copied onto clipboard, pasted into Windows paint to create a jpeg file to post here (must be an easier workflow than that?).

Anyway, I am chuffed to bits with it. A lot to learn and master but not a bad first go I also got one of M81/M82 as well.

Would love youtr thoughts and opinions and recommendations please !

Rgds, Steve

[Gina]

That's good for your first attempt There's data in that image just waiting to be dragged out. What you want is a decent image editor that will handle the 16bit TIFF file that you can save in DSS.

[Jessun]

You have all the reason to be chuffed! Very nice first go - my first were black as the cap was still on...

You can do a lot just using the Canon Utilities to drag out more, like the faint bits - M31 is rather faint I think.

The only advice I'd have is to work on the framing. You'll probably find that you'll be returning to the same target over and over again adding more subs to the mix, and after a while you'll kick yourself for not having the framing sorted from the first sub. M31 is relatively easy to centre using the core.

Great start into this addictive hobby!!

I played around a bit with your image:

[kirkster501]

Thanks very much for the encouragement Yes, need to look into framing, tricky though since so reliant on the GOTO on the scope and can't see a galaxy with live view to center - its too faint..... or *is* there a way ?

Nice result playing around with such a compressed image I posed Jessun!

[Jessun]

You can use a planetarium program, or someone elses image even to see how to frame it using the brightest stars in short exposures that you use to tweak the pointing.

Does the 1100d connect to a laptop via Canon Utilities?

[Gina]

You can use a planetarium program, or someone elses image even to see how to frame it using the brightest stars in short exposures that you use to tweak the pointing.

Does the 1100d connect to a laptop via Canon Utilities?

It should do - I tend to set up using the Canon utils and then run APT for imaging proper. Set the ISO to 6400 and exposure to 30 secs or for fainter objects to Bulb and open the shutter (with the shutter button in the Utils) and close it after 60s or longer if necessary.

[kirkster501]

It should do - I tend to set up using the Canon utils and then run APT for imaging proper. Set the ISO to 6400 and exposure to 30 secs or for fainter objects to Bulb and open the shutter (with the shutter button in the Utils) and close it after 60s or longer if necessary.

The point of this being to ensure the object is centered? It can take a lot of tweaking to get it centered though? Quite a few exposures with minute nudges to get it bang on center?

[Gina]

The point of this being to ensure the object is centered? It can take a lot of tweaking to get it centered though? Quite a few exposures with minute nudges to get it bang on center?

Yes, it can. You need plenty of patience for this lark And that's an understatement!! Personally, I find it both frustrating at times but also extremely satisfying when you get a good result and a nice looking image but it takes a lot of practice. Good luck and welcome to the nut-house