What £70 on remote scopes can get you (Warning: Big Images)

[Zakalwe]

how you draw the line I don't know...

Thats just it though...there is NO line to be drawn. Some people rail against GOTO. For them you MUST have spent years learning the night sky. Others see a Dob as the pinnacle. Others (like me) struggle with relatively inexpensive kit, rubbish weather and no imaging time to produce images that are, at best, pretty poor. Some, like Olly have made it their livelihood. Others will only settle for the best...I was recently speaking to someone who knew a guy with two Paramount mounts and two 20" Dall Kirkhams (total kit cost £97K). Others get their jollies using hired telescopes from all over the world.

There is no line, no black or white. just an infinitely varying shades of grey. We should all learn to respect each others attraction to the hobby and respect what it gives the individual.

That or set up a gert big Thunderdome and bludgeon each other to death with a variety of weapons crafted from old telescope parts. Two men enter, one man leaves! :grin:

[Wolfgangwand]

Thats just it though...there is NO line to be drawn. Some people rail against GOTO. For them you MUST have spent years learning the night sky. Others see a Dob as the pinnacle. Others (like me) struggle with relatively inexpensive kit, rubbish weather and no imaging time to produce images that are, at best, pretty poor. Some, like Olly have made it their livelihood. Others will only settle for the best...I was recently speaking to someone who knew a guy with two Paramount mounts and two 20" Dall Kirkhams (total kit cost £97K). Others get their jollies using hired telescopes from all over the world.

There is no line, no black or white. just an infinitely varying shades of grey. We should all learn to respect each others attraction to the hobby and respect what it gives the individual.

That or set up a gert big Thunderdome and bludgeon each other to death with a variety of weapons crafted from old telescope parts. Two men enter, one man leaves! :grin:

Think you're spot on , if we are all the same , life would be quite boring .

.............Anyway can't get that out of my head now ...... Break the deal , Spin the wheel ( or something like that ).....

[steppenwolf]

I hadn't realised just what an emotive subject this was but it's a really great debate. For anyone interested in going one step even further removed, how about availing yourself of the Deep Sky Survey 2 (DSS2) data files comprising red and blue data and compositing your own images with a synthesised green channel, all for free! The equipment isn't yours, the raw data isn't yours but the fun of processing it is all yours ......

Here's one I prepared earlier:-

[Jessun]

Rock bottom line might be that we're all imaging something that someone else made.

/Jesper

[Earl]

I guess, where do you draw the line..... You Draw it where suits your lifestyle.

Some people grind there own Mirrors, (maybe a select few even have the ability to aluminiumise and coat (however its spelt )) make the mount with all its own electronics, make a CCD, add cooling.. etc

Others just buy kit and set it all up.

Others use kit provided by others.

All are just as valid options.

[ollypenrice]

Rock bottom line might be that we're all imaging something that someone else made.

/Jesper

Dead right! And relying on software engineers to help us do the processing.

Olly

[fredster]

do you focus the rig in Australia? (genuinly I don't know), physically change your filters, polar align your scope, check collimation, mirrors, lenses etc. I think It's a great concept and one i'd like to have a crack at some day but i'd be hard pressed to say its "my" image. I must stress that this is my opinion, not the right one or the wrong one...just mine

While they may not be setting up the kit they are still only getting the raw data unprocessed and to be frank, its the processing that makes or breaks an image, determines whether its merely average or great. I think anyone that does this has a much right to say the image is theirs as someone who pops out to their garden, opens the observatory, flicks a switch or two and captures some data while sat in some comfy warm room.

[ncjunk]

I´m trying to make sense of this thread and so far I´ve got the following....but I´m getting confused:

itelesope is the devils work and their just tempting us to sell our souls for cheap gratification.

Olly effectively owns sodom and Gamorrah where you can indulge in the sins of envy and use fantastic equipment.....I am only talking astronomy here and am not implying any connection with other sins either living, dead or ficticious if you go to Ollys.

...and now I´m missing a reference for those poor folk at the bottom who own their own equipment and have to drag it out and set it up every night...constantly tempted by robotics, Olly and cheap sketch artists wafting their lovely beautiful perfectly drawn....I need to lie down...

Oh and the thing of paying a sketch artist....surely if I provide the pencil, paper and telescope it´s more my drawing than if they provide it all??

[Cath]

Expensive images! .. nice though.

I think for a lot of people the enjoyment is having a hobby and their own equipment. Seeing the objects for yourself and/or doing your own photography is a big part of astronomy.

It's a bit like paying someone else to ride your bike for you on a nice summers day round the country side rather than having the enjoyment of riding it yourself

[Earl]

Expensive images! .. nice though.

I think for a lot of people the enjoyment is having a hobby and their own equipment. Seeing the objects for yourself and/or doing your own photography is a big part of astronomy.

It's a bit like paying someone else to ride your bike for you on a nice summers day round the country side rather than having the enjoyment of riding it yourself

I dont think its really that expensive if you cost up a complete rig of professional quality say 30-40k

[johnrt]

Wow, can't quite believe this thread is rumbling on, I'm glad nobody has mentioned people who go on the Hubble Legacy Archive and play around with unprocessed .fits files from there, ooops too late.....

Seriously though, this sort of thing has it's place. Why can't I log on to image something in the southern hemisphere I'll likely never have the chance to get from my garden? My house blocks most of my southern sky, I can barely get more than an hour or so on the Orion nebula and thats through thermals coming off my roof. Why can't I log on and supplement my own data with some - maybe I want to image the outer shell of M27 and I will just never get it from my light polluted hovel?

[Jessun]

I'm glad nobody has mentioned people who go on the Hubble Legacy Archive

Post 70.... At least that's what I meant.

/Jesper

[ollypenrice]

Curiously emotive, this one. Who would have guessed?

Let's hear it for the night sky.

Olly

[ncjunk]

I sold my soul and got cheap gratification....but I think sodom and gamorrah is probably better if you want processing help as well

B.T.W. appologies for starting everyone off again....I was interested in itelescope, saw the thread and thought...oooh I´ll just make a little reply even though its been 2 months since anybody replied.

like kicking a blumming honets nest with you lot!

The image is 10 min sub on their T3 scope but it was done just before the dome closed so I got a refund.

[Earl]

I have just joined iTelescope, this will work for me rather well i think.

[Sp@ce_d]

Oh yes.. and round 3 has started over here.. ..

[ncjunk]

I imaged M51, 300 seconds on the t4 scope, and M16 this morning but M16 suffered from bad tracking.

I´ve added M51 as proof of a lack of processing skills. nice to have a play though. First time in months.

One nice feature they have is the ability to request a refund if the image suffered from guide or tracking failure.

So I got a refund for this picture.