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Hello from Somerset

stevewanstall

By stevewanstall
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stevewanstall

stevewanstall

Posted
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My first time trying Astrophotography. Starting in May I have


1 Bought  an Altair Astro 8"Newtonian on a Celestron CG5 GT GEM secondhand via Ebay  for £425 (minus eyepieces or finderscope). 


2 Bought  a cheap and totally out of collimation laser collimator, collimated it and then collimated the scope (way out)


3 Bought a Baader Laser Red Dot finderscope - very good!


4 Two plossls fron Ebay, one a secondhand Skywatcher SP Series Super Plossl Eyepiece 25 mm  and one a 

Ostara Telescope Plossl High Resolution 15mm Eyepiece , £20 the pair.


5 Set up the GEM and used a polarscope for the first time, plus an app on my phone ot find out where Polaris is at any time.


6 Attached my Nikon D5300 DSLR for prime focus.


7 So far had three viewing nights. One finding out how dififcult it is to focus!! After buying a Bahtinov mask and then realising that using the camera on video zoomed in on a bright start made it a breeze, I actually photographed some stars in focus!!


8 Started to get a routine of setting up the GEM, attaching scope, finding Polaris, doing the two star alignment, focussing the scope with camera attached, taking 20+pics plus 20+ darks


9. Played with Deep Sky Stacker for the deep sky stuff (!) and Registax for the planetary.



The only photos of any worth so far are:

















Anyway, things that have had me scratching my head and are unresolved:


1 The GEM is good for tracking once aligned. I have taken 30 second exposures with no trailing (no way of guiding at the moment though). The Nikon has a built in intervalometer which I am getting to grips with; even though I set it to take 24 exposures, it rarely does ( something to do with processing each RAW in the camera, eating into the 'interval' maybe?). But, the GEM goto is not good, only getting to within a couple of degrees of the new object. Is this a measure of the quality of the mount, my setting up (polarscope then two star alignment) or can it be improved?


2 I only seem to get monochrome when images have been processed in Deep Sky Stacker.  I have read of others having the same issue in these forums but no clear resolution. Is there a resolution?  I bought 'Making Every Photon Count' and  the software  Steve Richards uses, Maxim DL , doesn't seem to have this problem, just a whacking price tag. Is there any software between the two that people recommend?


3 I think I would like to get a refractor. From what I have read the Skywatcher 80ED is very good for a beginner, but would it be an improvement over the Altair newtonian?


4 Slightly longer term, I know I need better eyepieces. Baader Hyperion sound good ?


Regards


Steve

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JamesM

JamesM

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Hi Steve and welcome to the forum. If imaging is your objective in astronomy then you are in good company as there many enthusiastic imagers here on the forum who will be keen to help you sort out the smaller details as and when they arrive.

Nice images by the way!

Clear skies and hope you enjoy forum.

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swag72

swag72

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Hi Steve and welcome from another imager! Glad that you found SGL and hope that you enjoy your time here.

If you've not already done so, get hold of a copy of the book 'Making Every Photon Count' available from the book section of the FLO website. It really is something of an imaging bible.

The ED80 refractor is a good scope for imaging - Many DSO's are surprisingly huge and so you don't want a long focal length, which often appears counter intuitive I know. 

Look forward to seeing you around :)

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glowjet

glowjet

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Hi Steve welcome to SGL, seems you are well into the thick of things with your Astrophotography and enjoying the journey. Best advice for you is to repost your inquiries into the relevant imaging sections of the forum, rather than here in the Welcome section, where you should get helpful advise on the various aspects of imaging that you require. 

Well done with your images so far, enjoy your Astronomy and the forum :)

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