Latest Saturn but still not right

[geoff_k]

I think I have missed the one good night of seeing - perhaps it was between 4pm and 4.01pm one morning when I was asleep!

Anyway, latest Saturn effort using eyepiece projection with a 12.5mm Sirius Plossl and the ATIK camera.

Very frustrating this time around. I have this nagging worry that the new Crayford I had fitted to my scope has something to do with the poor results I am getting as well as bad seeing. Certainly, focusing as you can see with the image below is proving to be difficult. However, my lunar pics have come out fine so I don't know.

I've also done a quick process of the AVI in K3 Tools by way of comparison. I still have a couple more from last night which were done by more conventional methods so I will see how they work out.

k3sat240208_02epp125.bmp

[russ]

Plenty of detail and nice colour. And a hint of Cassini too.

Well done

Russ

[Trevor]

Hi Geoff

I found that collimation is not so critical when imaging the moon, as it is when imaging the planets did you collimate the scope after fitting the Crayford?

Trev.

[barkis]

Not a bad result at all Geoff. The planet won't get high in the sky until very late, and thereby out of the murk.

What time did you do the imaging session?

Ron.

[geoff_k]

Hi Ron

You are too kind. Not good enough for me, I'm afraid but I am a finicky devil!

The images were taken around midnight so the planet was quite high but the moon was below near the horizon and the sky was very bright or so it appeared to me. It's probably fair to say that if I didn't know better, Saturn looks for all the world like another bright star in Leo as it is definitely twinkling to my eye.

Trev

I try and collimate as near to an imaging session as I can, but last night it peed down earlier and then cleared later so couldn't do it. Scope was out for several hours so no problem with cooling down.

With my Newtonian being F4.8 the 'sweet spot' is difficult to nail precisely every time. As Shakespeare might have said if he'd cast Hamlet as an astronomer "Tis a collimation devoutly to be wished"

Having been so used to my old focuser, I tended to instinctively know if it was out or not. With the new one, I'm not quite so sure. I may call on the services of a friend who lives locally to give me a second opinion but I don't think it is usually drastically out of kilter.

Onwards and upwards.

Geoff