My Best Saturn - 27 April

[Stargazer33]

I finally managed to get out last night and do some imaging.

The seeing was really poor after quite a nice day, but hey, at least the clouds kept to the horizon for most of the session.

C8 (XLT), CG-5 GT, Revelation Astro 2.5x barlow, SPC900NC, Baader neodymium filter. Captured at 10 fps, stacked in AutoStakkert with wavelets in RS6 and some tweeking in PS7.

I think I probably pushed it too far with the 2.5x barlow from reading replies/suggestions to other peoples pictures. Next time I get an opportunity to try I will leave the barlow off.

Any comments/suggestions would be gratefully received & thanks for looking.

[starman1969]

Very nice image. The colour looks good & you have resolved slightly more detail than I did with my Celestron 6SE with Neximage CCD.

[Stargazer33]

Thanks Starman. I'm not that happy with the result, but the conditions were far from favourable and it is my best attempt so far. I still have a number of .avi files to process yet from the same night but my computer gives up the fight with large files in Registax 6. That is why I have started using AutoStakkert, but it means learning a new program!

[cgarry]

Considering how poor the UK seeing has been recently that is not a bad result. I might swap out your x2.5 barlow for a x2 one, but I would not bother imaging with no barlow at all as the image scale will be tiny.

AutoStakkert may be a new program to learn, but it is easier to learn than RegiStax 6 (I think) and should eat your large AVIs for breakfast. I would suggest you persevere with this approach.

If you do still want to get your large AVIs through RegiStax 6 you could reduce their size (and processing requirements) by running them through PIPP first to centre, crop, equalise histograms and remove the low quality frames. RegiStax should easily handle these pre-processed AVIs and give you something to compare your results from AutoStakkert with.

Cheers,

Chris

[Stargazer33]

Thanks for all the suggestions Chris, that's a great help.

Do you know if it would be a good idea to try to get a Televue Powermate or Astro Engineering Imagemate rather than a standard barlow? I did seem to have a lot of chromatic aberration on my original image.

[cgarry]

Thanks for all the suggestions Chris, that's a great help.

Do you know if it would be a good idea to try to get a Televue Powermate or Astro Engineering Imagemate rather than a standard barlow? I did seem to have a lot of chromatic aberration on my original image.

I have both and they are both excellent. I would go for the Imagemate first as you can very the magnification by adding and removing extensions. The Powermate is stuck at x2.5.

Of course you will get chromatic aberration due to the atmosphere with Saturn being so low so your barlow might not be to blame. Only an atmospheric dispersion corrector will remove that.

Cheers,

Chris

[Stargazer33]

Thanks again for your help Chris. I've just had a birthday and received money from my parents as they never know what to buy me, so I will look at getting an Imagemate.

[todd8137]

Great capture the focus is slightly of but apart from that not bad keep it up great work

pat

[Stargazer33]

Thanks Pat!

I did think that the focus was off slightly. I recently got the Revelation Superfocus R&P focuser and it was first light for that unit. I was hoping it would make focusing a lot easier but my scope was still bouncing about during the focus procedure. That was with 9 kg of diving lead hanging off of the tripod too! I ended up taking a number of video runs with slightly different focus. This is the first file that I have processed, so hopefully one of the other files will have better focus. I may now have to look at getting electronic focus control!!!

[todd8137]

1367307554[/url'>' post='1918647']

Thanks Pat!

I did think that the focus was off slightly. I recently got the Revelation Superfocus R&P focuser and it was first light for that unit. I was hoping it would make focusing a lot easier but my scope was still bouncing about during the focus procedure. That was with 9 kg of diving lead hanging off of the tripod too! I ended up taking a number of video runs with slightly different focus. This is the first file that I have processed, so hopefully one of the other files will have better focus. I may now have to look at getting electronic focus control!!!

Hi i think its just a bit of as it looks a bit soft on the focus thats all its still a corker of a image , a bart mask is great for focus easy to make a Y mask diy style keep at it ,i wish i could get a clear gap to have ago at Saturn

pat

[Stargazer33]

Hi i think its just a bit of as it looks a bit soft on the focus thats all its still a corker of a image , a bart mask is great for focus easy to make a Y mask diy style keep at it ,i wish i could get a clear gap to have ago at Saturn

pat

Thanks for the encouragement Pat! The trouble is it's that last 'bit' that I always seem to have a problem with!

I have got a bahtinov mask but it took me so long to get Saturn in the camera that I didn't dare slew away to focus on a nearby star.

I know what you mean about the clear nights. It seems that the best nights we get here are on a Monday and Tuesday when my wife and I go out!

Still, tonight looks promising and my wife is out at a friends so my fingers are crossed for another attempt.

[si@nite]

Nice tidy image Bryan very natural looking too, well done!

[todd8137]

Thanks for the encouragement Pat! The trouble is it's that last 'bit' that I always seem to have a problem with!

I have got a bahtinov mask but it took me so long to get Saturn in the camera that I didn't dare slew away to focus on a nearby star.

I know what you mean about the clear nights. It seems that the best nights we get here are on a Monday and Tuesday when my wife and I go out!

Still, tonight looks promising and my wife is out at a friends so my fingers are crossed for another attempt.

just use the % function on your capture software and use one of saturns moons to get focusmthats what i do but if you do not want to do that , just try you own way

pat