M104 Virgo & M66/M65 Leo

[laser_jock99]

What a treat to see M104 come up on the computer screen for the first time- litterally a wow moment for me!

And nearby M65/66 in Leo make a great pairing.

Both photos were with 200mm F4 Revelation Astro (GSO) Newtonian with Baader coma corrector. Single 300s sub @ ISO1000, Fuji IS Pro camera from a dark sky site in Mid Wales

[Stargazer Jack]

Nice images. Are you planning on adding more data as I think you could get some great images with some more subs

[Gina]

Very nice

[laser_jock99]

Nice images. Are you planning on adding more data as I think you could get some great images with some more subs

Yes- when tracking & collimation issues are resolved.

Another sub from the same session- NGC 3242 (also known as the Ghost of Jupiter) in Hydra

[PorkyB]

These images and your M101 really are excellent. I am very impressed with what you have achieved from such short exposures. I don't have the time or patience to spend hours (or weeks or months) over an image, so it is very encouraging to see these and gives me something to aspire to.

Question: could I expect to get similar results by stacking 10 or 20 exposures of 30 seconds each, rather than a single 5 or 10 minutes exposure as has been done here?

[TakMan]

Great shot of an iconic galaxy - M104 and with really little-to-nothing data - just shows what can be achieved!

I bet you had goose-bumps when you saw that....

Best of luck resolving the scope issues.

Damian

[SamAndrew]

Nice job on M104! looking forward to imaging this myself, blew me away the first time I saw it visually

[laser_jock99]

Question: could I expect to get similar results by stacking 10 or 20 exposures of 30 seconds each, rather than a single 5 or 10 minutes exposure as has been done here?

To record faint targets you should expose for as long as you can in my experience. The real limiting factors are the amount light pollution you have and how good your guiding is. I was keeping my shots down to 3 mins since the guiding seemed to be going badly that night, but the site is dark enough go for 20mins+ with no moon.

Stacking 10x 30s unfortunately won't capture the same faint detail as 1x 300s. You will record the brighter parts but the few photons from the fainter parts will litterally be lost in the noise.

The other problem I have had with shorter exposures is 'read noise' or 'bias noise' (more info here):

http://photo.net/learn/dark_noise/

It means you would have to apply calibration frames to subtract the noise. The best practice- if you have the time, clear skies and the patience- is to stack as many of the longest exposures you can achieve. This might mean imaging only one target per night (or even over several nights). But if you are impatient (like me!) or are testing new equipment (like I was for these pictures) then I sometimes operate in 'sky tour mode' i.e. take a few short subs, check them, then move on to a new target.

[PorkyB]

Thanks for the info.