Help Imaging with Skywatcher 200 PDS with synscan.

[kroy]

I am a complete novice in astro-photography and bough this scope after my research hoping to have a great view / image.

Visual using eye-pieces that came with the scope:

The scope is collimated and when I look I can get an OK - decent view of Saturn. When Orion Nebula was visibile then a haze of nebula with Astronomik UHC filter ON and may be decent view of Jupiter and its moon.

I am attaching a picture of Saturn and that is exactly how I saw from my telescope.

Photography using Canon unmoded 550D:

When I try to take a picture of a planet using a webcam - I see on my laptop that its never focused and hence the only picture I was able to take was of moon.

Orion nebula : I never trying taking a picture because I thought when I cannot see it clearly how can a color picture come out with great details - visually it was just like a small white haze in my scope with Astronomik UHC Filter on it .

When I see others posting brilliant photos from 130 pds and 200 pds I dont know what I am doing wrong and why the pics are not coming great.

Any guide/advice will be really helpful

Thanks

KRoy

[Tinker1947]

You would do well to buy the linked book, save you a shed load of time and save you wasting money.....

http://www.firstlightoptics.com/books/making-every-photon-count-steve-richards.html

[toxic]

great scope by the way and good saturn as well, but you don't mention what mount you have because if you are going to be into astrophotography then that is the most important piece of kit and it will need to be a decent mount for the 200 pds.

[MarsG76]

When you're using your web cam, you say it looks as if its never focused... it may seem that way, but if you're seeing a hint of the Cassini division, I'd say you're pretty much in focus... to get the sharp views you see in peoples images, you need to capture a video for a minute or two of Saturn, than stack about 300+ frames in something like Registax.. than use the wavelets in Registax to sharpen the detail.

[ronin]

Is the setup a 200PDS on the EQ5 mount?

Assuming that it is then the focal length is likely too short, it is I believe 1000mm, the images you will see of Saturn are taken with a SCT with a focal length of about 2000mm and then with the addition of a barlow at either 2x or 3x, giving a resultant focal length of 4000-6000mm. I recall people talk of an resultant f number of f/25 to f/30, yours if f/5.

The 200pds is a big lump, any breeze will create vibration.

Also any "clunks" will cause vibration - thinking of the camera here.

What video length can the DSLR achieve?

I would have thought that you need 60 -120 seconds worth of video.

Planetary imaging is usually a video and the stacking of the the best 30% of the .avi frames.

Cannot be sure how the image was taken as you say:

Photography using Canon unmoded 550D:

When I try to take a picture of a planet using a webcam

So under the heading referring to a Canon 550D the first comment concerns using a webcam ???

The image does not look sharp, you say this is representative of what you also visually observe. That is not really good.

[xtreemchaos]

hi mate thats a cool pic of saturn for a first one,try to get some vid with your webcam and then you need to stax it with registax its free to download. clear skys charl.

[Astrosurf]

Nice first go!

I used to use a Webcam with a 3X Barlow for planetary, which was fine. (Now I have a dedicated planetary cam, which I use with the Barlow.) If you use a Barlow, make sure it's very good quality!

For the processing, make sure the vid is an AVI or Registax etc won't recognise it. The file can be converted to AVI in the freeware PIPP (Planetary Image PreProcessor).

This is what I do (all the software is free):

I crop the vid of most of the black sky in Castrator. This will speed up processing and reduce the file size.

Then I stack in AutoStakkert!2. I find it MUCH better than Registax.

Then, when the resultant TIFF image is produced, I load it into Registax to use the sharpening Wavelets sliders - use with care! I tend to concentrate on the last three sliders.

That's a starter for 10. Then you'll need instruction in each of those apps! Ask on here, or there are tutorials on the Web, and instructions on the softwares' sites.

Ask on here for links as I can't get to all of the sites on my work's network.

Good luck!

Alexxx

[kroy]

You would do well to buy the linked book, save you a shed load of time and save you wasting money.....

http://www.firstlightoptics.com/books/making-every-photon-count-steve-richards.html

Sure I will try this book - thanks

[kroy]

great scope by the way and good saturn as well, but you don't mention what mount you have because if you are going to be into astrophotography then that is the most important piece of kit and it will need to be a decent mount for the 200 pds.

Hi !!

I have an EQ5 mount with synscan that came with the scope.

[kroy]

Is the setup a 200PDS on the EQ5 mount?

Assuming that it is then the focal length is likely too short, it is I believe 1000mm, the images you will see of Saturn are taken with a SCT with a focal length of about 2000mm and then with the addition of a barlow at either 2x or 3x, giving a resultant focal length of 4000-6000mm. I recall people talk of an resultant f number of f/25 to f/30, yours if f/5.

The 200pds is a big lump, any breeze will create vibration.

Also any "clunks" will cause vibration - thinking of the camera here.

What video length can the DSLR achieve?

I would have thought that you need 60 -120 seconds worth of video.

Planetary imaging is usually a video and the stacking of the the best 30% of the .avi frames.

Cannot be sure how the image was taken as you say:

Photography using Canon unmoded 550D:

When I try to take a picture of a planet using a webcam

So under the heading referring to a Canon 550D the first comment concerns using a webcam ???

The image does not look sharp, you say this is representative of what you also visually observe. That is not really good.

Hi,

yes it f/5 - so for sharper and better pictures should I use barlows.

Sorry that canon comment was for the Saturn picture. I looked through the webcam once and then left it.

[kroy]

When you're using your web cam, you say it looks as if its never focused... it may seem that way, but if you're seeing a hint of the Cassini division, I'd say you're pretty much in focus... to get the sharp views you see in peoples images, you need to capture a video for a minute or two of Saturn, than stack about 300+ frames in something like Registax.. than use the wavelets in Registax to sharpen the detail.

is Cassini division visible from this scope?

[kroy]

I see people posting brillian pics of orion nebula and horse head.

Is it something visible from the scope ??? or is it something that comes only in pics after long exposures of DSOs

[brantuk]

You can barely make out the horse head in a 25" scope - it's almost impossible to find visually. Long exposure imaging is the only way to get a good image of it. The seeing wasn't too good last night so you did well getting your first shot of Saturn - but as mentioned above - you need a 2mins well focused video, then stack the best frames for better results.

You shouldn't need a UHC filter to see M42 - I've seen it many times in all sorts of scopes with no filter - it is very bright. However you need a lot of knowledge to capture a good image of it. E.g. there are varying levels of brightness in M42 - the core is very bright requiring a set of short exposures, the edges are very faint requiring a series of long exposures, and the rest in between varies between requiring different lengths of exposure and different types of filter. You also need a set of darks, flats, and bias frames.

Then all your exposures need staking together and tweaking up in a photography app like Photoshop. Also a modded camera will give best results. Hth

[kroy]

You can barely make out the horse head in a 25" scope - it's almost impossible to find visually. Long exposure imaging is the only way to get a good image of it. The seeing wasn't too good last night so you did well getting your first shot of Saturn - but as mentioned above - you need a 2mins well focused video, then stack the best frames for better results.

You shouldn't need a UHC filter to see M42 - I've seen it many times in all sorts of scopes with no filter - it is very bright. However you need a lot of knowledge to capture a good image of it. E.g. there are varying levels of brightness in M42 - the core is very bright requiring a set of short exposures, the edges are very faint requiring a series of long exposures, and the rest in between varies between requiring different lengths of exposure and different types of filter. You also need a set of darks, flats, and bias frames.

Then all your exposures need staking together and tweaking up in a photography app like Photoshop. Also a modded camera will give best results. Hth

Hi Super Giant,

thats a good peice of guidance - I should not expect to see things in scope and then capture with camera - many objects might be difficult visually but long exposures imaging will bring them out.

Thanks

[PorkyB]

What you see at the eyepiece and what you get from long exposure imaging will be very different.  A good target this time of year is the Dumbbell Nebula M27.  Through the EP it is a barely visible smudge.  Take a photo and you will get a beautiful image with vibrant colours.  Try 60 seconds at ISO 1600 using your 550D.  Take 25 of these and stack them in DSS, then load into your favourite image processing package and adjust the curves and levels to get rid of the orange sky glow.  This was taken with very similar kit to yours...

Dumbbell Nebula by Andrew Butler, on Flickr

Also try M57 Ring Nebula and M13 Hercules Globular, all good targets for a 200P.

[NGC 666]

Saturn is blurry because:

it is fairly low in the sky (and sinking as the days go by) - therefore the atmosphere is turbulent and distorts the image (shorter exposures and stacking help overcome this)

[NGC 666]

Accidentally posted, sorry.

Blurry possible because:

- atmosphere

- or scope is not fully collimated and focused

- cheap barlow lens can cause chromatic aberration (looks like it in the photo - red and blue on opposite side of planet)

Solutions to those problems (same order):

- take many short exposures and stack them, reducing how much the planet can appear to 'wobble' in the image (a bit like photographing a fast moving object, which would appear blurry at long exposures)

- use a laser collimater, unfocused method, or any other popular method to collimate the scope, and then use a bahtinov mask to focus properly (use on a star, since it is point like)

- use photo editing software to align the red, green and blue channels of the photo to help reduce the chromatic aberration in the image, as well as a bit of sharpening.

I tried the final solution (hope you don't mind me using your photo):

Original:

Edited:

[kroy]

What you see at the eyepiece and what you get from long exposure imaging will be very different.  A good target this time of year is the Dumbbell Nebula M27.  Through the EP it is a barely visible smudge.  Take a photo and you will get a beautiful image with vibrant colours.  Try 60 seconds at ISO 1600 using your 550D.  Take 25 of these and stack them in DSS, then load into your favourite image processing package and adjust the curves and levels to get rid of the orange sky glow.  This was taken with very similar kit to yours...

Dumbbell Nebula by Andrew Butler, on Flickr

Also try M57 Ring Nebula and M13 Hercules Globular, all good targets for a 200P.

This is a brilliant photo - I should try these - Thank you

[kroy]

Accidentally posted, sorry.

Blurry possible because:

- atmosphere

- or scope is not fully collimated and focused

- cheap barlow lens can cause chromatic aberration (looks like it in the photo - red and blue on opposite side of planet)

Solutions to those problems (same order):

- take many short exposures and stack them, reducing how much the planet can appear to 'wobble' in the image (a bit like photographing a fast moving object, which would appear blurry at long exposures)

- use a laser collimater, unfocused method, or any other popular method to collimate the scope, and then use a bahtinov mask to focus properly (use on a star, since it is point like)

- use photo editing software to align the red, green and blue channels of the photo to help reduce the chromatic aberration in the image, as well as a bit of sharpening.

I tried the final solution (hope you don't mind me using your photo):

Original:

Edited:

Thank you !!!

I have heard a lot of Bahitnov mask. I believe its high time I should get one.