Pacman as a target?

[ryandsimmons]

Hi All,

Clear skies predicted tonight, so I have a 6 hour window for imaging. This should be my first 2 hours plus exposure I can achieve so am trying to prepare as much as possible.  My ideal target would be something around Cassiopea, it is the part of the sky that is least light polluted and visible between the surrounding houses etc.

I am using a C8 on a CG5 mount, which is F10 and unguided, so exposures are likely to be 30 seconds to a minute depending on how I can get my alignment tonight,  Camera is an umodded EOS1000D.

According to http://www.12dstring.me.uk/fov.htm my FOV is 37.5' x 25'.  Call it 30x20 by the time cropping etc occurs after stacking.

Targets available I am taking from here: http://dso-browser.com/

Ideally I want a galaxy or something with colour which limits things a lot.  I would love to try the Pleides but size is out unfortunately.

I seem to have a choice of:

Pacman

Iris Nebula

M103

Cats Eye

M74

Cocoon Nebula

Of which I eliminate:

Cocoon (I did a 30 x 30 secs of it last night, and while I can make it out, there is no way I can actually get a photo.)

M74 is too far south and will go behind a building at one point.

Iris I tried briefly, but it was so uneven I didn't get close in my test shots.

Cats eye is too far west.

This really leaves me with:

Pacman - My first choice, but I would appreciate any advise on this.  Should I vary shots?  Or will 100 x 60 second exposures be a good start?

With a secondary target of M103.  Some nice coloured stars which would be nice, but I really wanted something more spectacular.  I did get a lovely Dumbell a few weeks back and would like something similar if possible.

As usual any advice, or alternate targets would be greatly appreciated.

[toxic]

what focal length is the c8 is it the same as the 200 pds if it is then the  pleides will fit in you frame if you angle it. if not you could go for m33 or ngc 6888.