Messier 51 - getting better and better over the years!

[Jannis]

I remember this was one of my first and favorite targets in the night sky, and i still love it! I mean, how can one not love this beauty of a galaxy?

The latest version consists of RGB data from March 2013, and L data i captured this night. Seeing was quite poor, but I'm still more then happy with it. Looking back at my previous versions i see a huge difference - although i just captured this i almost can't wait to see how this will  look in another few years...!
Was struggling with some dust bunnies as the dust had shifted before i was able to do my flats, and also some banding that the dark frames was unable to correct completely - but i think i got it all covered up quite OK?

L data is 330x 60 sec exposures using the Polemaster on the Explorer 200, 16 bit, gain set to 30. Just using a normal UV/IR block filter.
60x dark frames and 500x flat frames.

Just for fun, here are also my previous attempts on M51 over the years.

March 2016:

March 2013:

February 2011:

[Guest]

Amazing BIG progress.. and the final image is also Amazing..

[Maximidius]

That really is a fantastic journey and a huge improvement. The final image has some great detail with tidal structures and some great colours. Something to be proud of for sure, very well done. 

[simmo39]

Wow, an epic journey.

[Swoop1]

I love to see series of images tracking progress of abiltiy, technique etc. Well done.

Looks like you are getting the hang of it ;-)

 

[AKB]

Oh dear, is it going to take me THAT long (6 years) to get that good?

How did the kit change over that time?

 

[MARS1960]

Gorgeous image, great improvements, thanks for sharing.

[Jannis]

Thanks for the replies all!

AKB, I saw your other pictures and they are really nice. Much better then what i had not long ago, so i think you'll get the hang of it quite fast. I'm a rather slow learner with few clear nights and a very limited budget (did i mention i took this image with the Polemaster? ), so.. My fist recommendation is to take flats. It was my biggest mistakes ever to not use any flats for a couple of years as i first failed at taking them and then was afraid i couldn't do it properly - turned out i did nothing wrong at all, but had light leaking in from behind my primary and the focuser. After taking the flats in the early evening or morning it's all good!

My kit didn't change too much over time, I've always used the 550D and the Explorer 200 scope for imaging, but back in 2011 i didn't use guiding. In 2013 i used guiding,  and then in 2016 i reused the 2013 color data and added 65x 60s light frames from the QHY5L-II unguided (as i captured with the guide cam). Then now i was guiding with the QHY5L-II and captured 330x 60s with the Polemaster instead, and again reused the 2013 color data.

[AKB]

4 minutes ago, Jannis said:

After taking the flats in the early evening or morning it's all good!

'Top Tip' ... thanks!  Also, re. guiding.

...but what about the processing?  Obviously improved too.  What do you use?

[SkyJamie]

Great stuff Jannis!!

[Xplode]

Very nice Jannis!

The sharpness is very good, unusually good for data captured from Norway so you got this during nice conditions

I also had nice conditions yesterday so it got some Ha on M51, haven't worked any on the data yet thou

[PatrickGilliland]

Plenty of progress going on there, some nice detail there well done.

Paddy

[Tommohawk]

That's a great result! I had to check the post through a couple of times as I couldnt quite believe this was mostly achieved with a DSLR! So there's hope for me yet!

Are you saying you got L data using the the guidecam, or the polemaster cam? Or both? I wonder how much difference the L data made?

I had a go at M51 last night with essentially the same kit, 550D and SW200 - but my image is a nothing like so good! It was windy.... but when the wind dropped I got condensation on the secondary so a limited number of decent subs. Just wondering if the trick is more decent subs or maybe L data. Can you remeber what length of subs you used?

[CraigT82]

Wow! That's superb considering the kit used... Polemaster (QHY5L-IIm) and a 200p... Talk about bang for buck! That really is what you call getting the best out of your gear.  Great processing too. What mount are you using? 

[Jannis]

Thanks! :-) 

Tommohawk, The L data really did the whole differense. I used the old dslr data only for color. I used the polemaster for capturing the L data and used the qhy5l-ii for guiding.

On the march 2013 image there is only the 550D data. On the march 2016 image i reused the 550D data as color and usee L data captured with the qhy5l-ii unguided. Your m51 pic looks really nice. If you have a similar guide cam as me i would use it to capture L and use the 550D data for color. High gain and short exposures, and loads of frames to stack.

Craig, im using the heq5 pro mount.

[Tommohawk]

Hi Jannis

Well thats really interesting, thanks. Your 2013 DSLR only version isnt a million miles different to mine - so just need some Lum data maybe. I have a Starshoot autoguider which i have never used for imaging - maybe now's the time to try.

Can I also ask how did you combine the data - using a Lum layer in PS maybe? Would need rescaling though I guess

 

[Jannis]

I would try capturing some L data if you can, yes. The ssag is using the same sensor as the qhy5 i think, so it might be up to the job. 

I use registar to align the images and process them in photoshop. Ive done manual scale and align before, and while it does usually work when using the same scope for both cameras, its a very slow process. I use multiple lenses and so i don't regret one day buying registar.

[Tommohawk]

Hi Jannis - OK thanks. I'll try the Lum data with the SSAG and see what I get.

I read good things about Registar and hope to use using the C9.25 for small DSO data at some point (once my guiding is sorted) so maybe I need to get my check book out.

Meantime I got some more RGB data with the Canon which has definitely improved things - I'll post this whe I have a moment.

Errrrr - suddenly realised I have no idea how to capture images with the AG camera!