fraudulent imaging

[Paul73]

It's only fraud if you pretend that you are outside in the cold like us proper stargazers ?. Only joking. Each to his / her own.

Definitally not a "fraud". Well done for getting your gear working that well.

Escaping to the peace and quiet of a shed/obsy would be my preference. But, at my stage in life (3 children, cat, wife, to do list longer than the Amazon river) escaping is probably the key word!

Paul

[gorann]

If my job was to accumulate as much AP data as possible and every night was a clear moonless one, I would probably also computerize everything and run it from the sofa, but as this is a hobby and the clear moonless nights are usually few and far between, I see it as a treat to go out there now and then to check on the rig and guiding graph and view the sky for a while, looking out for clouds and taking a SQM reading. I have the computer in the warm room in the obsy but since watching the guiding graph can get slightly boring (or slightly stressful) I usually retreat into the main house most of the time, often checking in on SGL, but after an hour or two I feel the urge to go out and check things again. New for this season is my home built rain alarm so I can relax more while in the house.

[ollypenrice]

1 hour ago, AKB said:

I do have a park position, but often move the mount manually for flats, etc.  I’ve tried aligning by looking along the scope, but it’s often pot luck as to whether I find it on the camera, so, much to my chagrin, I’ve added an RDF to the setup recently.  Perhaps my FOV is somewhat lower than yours.

Certainly agree, though, that setting up that one-star alignment is just nice.

I use an RDF and even a finderscope on our high res outfit because, as you say, the FOV is too limited. But on the Taks, with full frame cameras, we have a 4 degree-wide field. Now that's cheating!

lly

 

[Astrith]

20 hours ago, alan potts said:

I must be very new to it because I don't care about the cold and I was even laying on cold concrete to see if the sub was in focus, had my glasses out with me too, it won't late.

alan

Its a Hull trait !

[wimvb]

Two years ago I manually dithered in -15 C, struggling to keep both the battery of my intervalometer and my feet warm. And trying not to upset the local wildlife too much. A bit of tinkering solved the need for manual dithering, so I could go in to warm up. With my new mount, I couldn't use this solution anymore. So last year I skipped dithering all together.

Last week, when I came out after an imaging session, the whole setup was covered with frost. Thanks to an eqdir cable and a raspberry pi I'm a happy w(h)im(p), imaging and dithering from my sofa.

Otoh, I do have to set up and tear down for every imaging session, and be out for polar alignment. So I guess I'm still roughing it.

[sloz1664]

22 hours ago, alan potts said:

I must be very new to it because I don't care about the cold and I was even laying on cold concrete to see if the sub was in focus, had my glasses out with me too, it won't late.

alan

You will do. The cold will get you in the end 

My personal choice is VNC never let me down and it actually helps being indoors. When you are cold you mental & physical reactions are slower and you are prone to making mistakes.

Steve

[MattJenko]

Methinks that gathering data on an imaging run is pretty boring. Setting up, fiddling with everything is fun and a challenge, but the run itself is simply about gathering data, nothing more and once running, I want as little to do with it as possible. The real fun comes in after the data is gathered. Olly used the word mechanical, and I completely agree. Not touching it and being as far away unless something goes wrong is my imaging default position. I have a dob for enjoying the night sky, and set that up as far away from the imaging setup as I can. VNC/teamcity are great ways of keeping tabs without bumping into things just to check that guiding is still working...

[tomato]

I take the view that the sky quality means an awful lot in imaging and to get the best in the UK it’s highly likely I’ll need to keep a portable rig and hence being outdoors  will always be a part of the hobby.

But, I do want to retire to a rural setting, have an observatory, and automate that as far as my skills and budget will allow.

Can you have the best of both worlds? ?

[LukeSkywatcher]

Oh get out there you big bunch of sissy's and have a look through a telescope.

Never imaged and never plan to. 

Each to their own. 

[Tomatobro]

You can get a lot of fun imaging the clouds at night....

[tomato]

On 13/11/2017 at 14:26, MattJenko said:

Methinks that gathering data on an imaging run is pretty boring

Boring?

Start the run then wondering if the neighbour is going to put the rubbish out and set off his backyard floodlight, will the USB connection drop out? Will the cloud roll in? Will the guide scope dew up? Will the mount throw a wobbly? Will an aircraft or satellite wander into the field of view? Will the run finish before the scope starts to image the roof of the house, trees etc or Mrs Sitech cooly declares “mount approaching meridian limit”?

Trust me, there is never a dull moment....

[Uranium235]

Nowt wrong with watching the data roll in from the relative comfort of your mancave I often stack on the fly to see how things are progressing, and suss out whether I need more data or move on to another filter or target.

I've done my time out in the cold, if I remember rightly the coldest was somewhere between-12 and -16 (about 7 years ago that was). From open air, I progressed into the old outside toilet, then to the utility room, then finally to the mancave (basement) once I installed powerline networking.

And when Im at the dark site, there is no escape from the cold - even if im sitting in the car it can get quite nippy!

[Jessun]

I used to like this screen a lot from indoors. Nothing wrong with being remote :-)

/Jesper

[wxsatuser]

11 hours ago, tomato said:

Boring?

Start the run then wondering if the neighbour is going to put the rubbish out and set off his backyard floodlight, will the USB connection drop out? Will the cloud roll in? Will the guide scope dew up? Will the mount throw a wobbly? Will an aircraft or satellite wander into the field of view? Will the run finish before the scope starts to image the roof of the house, trees etc or Mrs Sitech cooly declares “mount approaching meridian limit”?

Trust me, there is never a dull moment....

It's normally put the dogs out, the backyard floodlights always go on and off.
USB never seems to dropout, cloud will roll in.
Guidescope never dews up, got a band on it.
Aircraft and satellites will get in the FOV.
The run will include next doors house/trees.
EQMOD will turn off the mount at the meridian.

Have fallen asleep and woken with frost on hat and beard.

May be it is time to build a warm bolthole and become a wuss.