The "No EQ" DSO Challenge!

[The Admiral]

On 17/10/2016 at 17:07, Nigel G said:

In the layer module there is tabs to offset one image on the vertical and horizontal planes

So I wonder if that means the cropped images needn't be the same size? If you can move one in relation to the other it follows that there will be borders where images will not overlap, much the same as if the images were different in size. Anyone know where the stipulation of the same size originated?

Ian

Edit. Ah, I see it was mentioned by a correspondent in the ST Forum thread. Worth checking out though, as his  situation was quite extreme.

Edited October 19, 2016 by The Admiral
Discovery

[Nigel G]

2 hours ago, The Admiral said:

So I wonder if that means the cropped images needn't be the same size? If you can move one in relation to the other it follows that there will be borders where images will not overlap, much the same as if the images were different in size. Anyone know where the stipulation of the same size originated?

Ian

Edit. Ah, I see it was mentioned by a correspondent in the ST Forum thread. Worth checking out though, as his  situation was quite extreme.

I would have thought as long as the images are the same scale it doesn't matter about the size/

Personally I would crop both images the exact same size pixel wise, hopefully I will get a chance to try later.

Nige.

[parallaxerr]

Tonight's experiment. ST120 instead of WO ZS66. Nearly twice the aperture but plain old achromatic glass. Is it worth a shot?

Either way I'm going to drop the ISO to 800, see if I can reduce some of the noise I had at 1600 during my first attempt.

[Filroden]

It's always worth testing. Different scopes will give you different fields of view which might be better on some targets. Bear in mind that as focal length increases so does difficulty of tracking so you may need to watch your exposure times. 

[parallaxerr]

23 minutes ago, Filroden said:

It's always worth testing. Different scopes will give you different fields of view which might be better on some targets. Bear in mind that as focal length increases so does difficulty of tracking so you may need to watch your exposure times. 

Good shout Fil. There was me thinking"oh the focal ratios are about the same" but didn't think about focal length. Not gonna be much use on Andromeda me thinks...

[happy-kat]

Startools has tools to help kick the CA. Go for it worth a try.

[alacant]

Hi. +1 for having a go with the big refractor, underrated I feel. These days better than they used to be. I've a f10 petzval working at f5. Loads of fast, affordable no-spikes flat field contrast. With a uv-ir filter it works well and a decon on the blue channel really nails it. Have a look at this ST thread for the workflow. HTH and clear skies.

**having said that, to get the whole of M31 I think the biggest you can go on an aps sensor is a 300mm lens. Do maybe nearby m33 instead?

Edited October 19, 2016 by alacant

[The Admiral]

I can just about fit M31 in by using the APS diagonal, on a 715mm fl 'scope fitted with a 0.79x reducer (565mm effective fl).

Ian

[parallaxerr]

Well I chickened out and put the WO ZS66 to work tonight, I will definitely try the ST120 on smaller targets but want to get a good M31 first.

I got x106 30s subs on M31 tonight at ISO800, stacking now to see what comes out. Good news is I absolutely NAILED the alignment, M31 dead centre in all frames

If the ISO 800 data is cleaner then I'll keep adding to it every clear night I can. The only problem I have now is the Alt limitation of the mount which puts a stop to M31 imaging at around 10pm.

Edited October 19, 2016 by parallaxerr

[SteveNickolls]

8 hours ago, parallaxerr said:

"... The only problem I have now is the Alt limitation of the mount which puts a stop to M31 imaging at around 10pm."

Hi,

I'm curious to know what restriction your mount is causing you, is it because of potential collisions of the telescope and mount? Anyway good luck amassing frames of M31.

Cheers,
Steve

[parallaxerr]

41 minutes ago, SteveNickolls said:

Hi,

I'm curious to know what restriction your mount is causing you, is it because of potential collisions of the telescope and mount? Anyway good luck amassing frames of M31.

Cheers,
Steve

Yep, exactly that Steve. At about 62°, the camera contacts the base of the mount. I may be able to address this by fitting a long dovetail bar and sliding the whole lot forward as it's quite tail heavy at the moment anyway.

 

[SteveNickolls]

7 minutes ago, parallaxerr said:

Yep, exactly that Steve. At about 62°, the camera contacts the base of the mount. I may be able to address this by fitting a long dovetail bar and sliding the whole lot forward as it's quite tail heavy at the moment anyway.

 

Ahh, thanks for the clarification. Yes a longer dovetail bar way well solve your problem-good look experimenting. 

Cheers,
Steve

[alacant]

57 minutes ago, SteveNickolls said:

I'm curious

Me too. I'm guessing a fork? 

Edited October 20, 2016 by alacant
cross pòsted sorry

[Stub Mandrel]

10 hours ago, The Admiral said:

I can just about fit M31 in by using the APS diagonal, on a 715mm fl 'scope fitted with a 0.79x reducer (565mm effective fl).

Ian

It's a good fit on my 400mm lens and Canon 450D.

[Nigel G]

I got a chance to do a bit last night. Conditions were not idea but ok.

First NGC 6960 aka West Veil, !50p, canon 1300D iso 1600, 45minutes of 20s & 30s with a couple of 60s, 75 matching darks, 40 flat 50 bias. DSS & ST finals in PS express.

A tough one to capture, high altitude.

Second M45, 150p, canon 1300D iso 1600, 20 minutes of 30s dark, flats, bias. I particularly like the spikes in this one, note the spikes in the first, due to turning the camera to keep in right frame.

Cheers

Nige

[Filroden]

Those spike are amazing and you've got the orientation on M45 perfect. It's a little noisy but that's not surprising with on 20 mins of data. I can't wait for you to get more clear nights and add to it.

[Victor Boesen]

2 hours ago, Nigel G said:

I got a chance to do a bit last night. Conditions were not idea but ok.

First NGC 6960 aka West Veil, !50p, canon 1300D iso 1600, 45minutes of 20s & 30s with a couple of 60s, 75 matching darks, 40 flat 50 bias. DSS & ST finals in PS express.

A tough one to capture, high altitude.

Second M45, 150p, canon 1300D iso 1600, 20 minutes of 30s dark, flats, bias. I particularly like the spikes in this one, note the spikes in the first, due to turning the camera to keep in right frame.

Cheers

Nige

Wow! very colorful and nice images with that short time of exposure! Did you use any kind of flattener or cc?

Edited October 22, 2016 by Bossen

[The Admiral]

3 hours ago, Nigel G said:

I got a chance to do a bit last night. Conditions were not idea but ok.

First NGC 6960 aka West Veil, !50p, canon 1300D iso 1600, 45minutes of 20s & 30s with a couple of 60s, 75 matching darks, 40 flat 50 bias. DSS & ST finals in PS express.

A tough one to capture, high altitude.

Second M45, 150p, canon 1300D iso 1600, 20 minutes of 30s dark, flats, bias. I particularly like the spikes in this one, note the spikes in the first, due to turning the camera to keep in right frame.

Cheers

Nige

 

A couple of lovely images there Nige. I'm amazed at how visible the Western Veil is with just 45 minutes of exposure. There again, a 6"aperture is more than I'm used to, almost twice the area.

Strangely although I'm not a fan of diffraction spikes, somehow they seem right on M45. When I get around to imaging it (waiting for it to be well placed at a respectable hour), I might try using ST to add them.

Ian

[Nigel G]

1 hour ago, Bossen said:

Wow! very colorful and nice images with that short time of exposure! Did you use any kind of flattener or cc?

Thanks Bossen.

No to both, just prime focus no filters or correctors.

Nige.

[Victor Boesen]

2 minutes ago, Nigel G said:

No to both, just prime focus no filters or correctors.

Nige.

ok, thank you. still really impressed with how you made the pictures that colorful without filters or really long exposure times.

Victor Boesen 

[The Admiral]

6 minutes ago, Bossen said:

ok, thank you. still really impressed with how you made the pictures that colorful without filters or really long exposure times.

Victor Boesen 

The secret is in the processing . That and stacking lots and lots of short exposure subs!

Ian

[Nigel G]

12 minutes ago, Bossen said:

ok, thank you. still really impressed with how you made the pictures that colorful without filters or really long exposure times.

Victor Boesen 

Victor, I used StarTools to process, which I have finally got to grips with the colour module, then a final touch up with PS express.

It takes quite a while to extract some detail and colours but you lose out on the finer detail with noise reduction, theres a lot of noise to remove.

Nige.

Edited October 22, 2016 by Nigel G
rename

[Victor Boesen]

Just now, The Admiral said:

The secret is in the processing 

i know, but well-processed pictures can always make me drop my jaw

[Victor Boesen]

3 minutes ago, Nigel G said:

It takes quite a while to extract some detail and colours but you lose out on the finer detail with noise reduction, theres a lot of noise to remove.

Nige.

you did a good job at doing that. Practice makes perfect

[Yamez]

Hi

I was linked to this thread after posting my First M42 image taken with a Nikon D3300 attached to my Skywatcher 130P on an Alt-Az mount. I got 20x10seconds of subs and some darks and bias' before the clouds came rolling in. Stacked in DSS and processed in Photoshop.

ISO 3200 + a 50% moon... Anyway here it is.

It is noisy and am hoping to get some more subs to add to it. This is my first ever image of any nebula.