M31 Andromeda Galaxy (AstroTrac)

[x6gas]

This is second light with my AstroTrac.

Andromeda Galaxy from Ag Nik in Crete.

10 x 120s subs, Nikon D40, ISO 800 with 85-200mm kit lens @ 200mm. Stacked and with small stretch in DSS.

Won't win any prizes, but I'm really happy to be doing some imaging on hgoliday! When I get home I'll try to clean up the egg shaped stars.

[x6gas]

Oh dear - where did that gradient come from! Couldn't see it before I posted the image...

[Gina]

I often find my images look fine in PS but look a bit dfiierent when posted Even the same image viewed in MS Photo Viewer looks different from the posted image in Firefox. There was even one occasion where the image looked too red on here so I toned it down in PS, saved it again and posted it and it hardly looked any different from the previous uploaded image - weird!

[x6gas]

Was hoping that a closer crop and less aggressive stretch would cut out some of the gradient.

m31_3.TIF

[williamnohair]

Hi

I have just bought an Astrotrac and am a complete novice. Have managed to polar align quite well and my stars at 200mm focal length for a two minute exposure are reasonably round. What I can't quite get is how to find the Andromeda galaxy! even with a laptop and Stellararium showing me where it is I can't find it.

Any hints on how to find it?

Thanks

[Quatermass]

If its a clear moonless night its pretty easy to see with just 10x50 binoculars just star hop from the main stars beneath it and look for a bright foggy blob

nice image by the way gradiants are a pain try it from a very dark site that will help

Sent from my GT-S5670 using Tapatalk 2

[x6gas]

Well I must admit that I was at a fairly dark site with no moon...

But, I just followed Andromeda from Almaak to Mirach (the slight dogleg of the four stars including these and Delta Andromeda plus Alpheratz is easy enough to identify, and then I swung the camera up towards Caph in Cassiopeia and there it was...

[Quatermass]

Galaxys are tough to find this one is easy compared to something like the traingulum galaxy or m101 so keep at it you will soon be spotting lots more

Sent from my GT-S5670 using Tapatalk 2

[x6gas]

Not sure if this will look any better, but I tried to see if I could get this looking any better.

This time stacked in AA 5, which I also used for gradient removal with a final tweak in PhotoPlus X4.

[andyo]

Yes looks a lot better to me nice capture