Things don't always go to plan with DSO imaging and that's perfectly normal :D

[Chris]

 In a recent video I attempted to image the Heart and Soul nebula with a vintage lens and Skyguider pro, and yeah, things didn't go particular well which got me thinking. 

People post amazing images almost routinely on SGL and other forums, and I've noticed the standard go up and up over the year. Anyone starting out with DSO imaging must be pretty daunted at the sight of what some folk manage to produce!? I also think things are getting more challenging with increasing numbers of satellites and weird weather.

So in the spirit of solidarity with those of us that struggle with this challenging yet rewarding hobby, here is a documentation of one of my failures   

p.s. There might be some tips for anyone thinking of trying AP with a lens and star tracker.....despite the failure. 

 

[RobertI]

Well done for being brave enough to share this Chris, why shouldn't we share the failures as well as the successes, perfection can get boring (not that I would know!).

[Frank the Troll]

As someone just starting out, I'm likely to make  mistakes too. So, good to see I will be following in others footsteps, somewhere along the line

 

 

Edited February 25, 2020 by Frank the Troll

[Chris]

11 hours ago, RobertI said:

Well done for being brave enough to share this Chris, why shouldn't we share the failures as well as the successes, perfection can get boring (not that I would know!).

lol thanks Rob, it can only help to see and maybe share the funny side of failures. Having said this, there probably is a limit. I wouldn't expect anyone to laugh off accidentally dropping and smashing their Fluorite Apo! But e.g. I remember once doing an entire imaging run with the focus mask still on which did make me swear at the time. Looking back though it just makes me giggle. 

Maybe I should start an epic fails thread lol

[Chris]

3 hours ago, Frank the Troll said:

As someone just starting out, I'm likely to make  mistakes too. So, good to see I will be following in others footsteps, somewhere along the line

 

 

Oh you will, but it's part of the fun when you look back, plus the successes will seem better for it

[MarkAR]

Things can only get better from now on. Keep trying and keep posting up vids.

[Frank the Troll]

1 minute ago, Lockie said:

Oh you will, but it's part of the fun when you look back, plus the successes will seem better for it

Yes I will make mistakes, but its all part of the learning process, I will try to make the most of them, more than happy to share them too

[carastro]

Whoops, well it happens to us all.  Thanks for sharing.

1) Imaging with the Bahtinov mask on.

2) After spending ages (as a newbie) polar aligning the mount and 2 star aligning and finding the target, I trip over the mount cable and disconnect it and have to start all over again.

3) Trying to focus the guide camera and after several minutes of not being able to see anything, realise I still have the lens cap on.

4) Spent ages trying to polar align and wondering why I can't find a star realise I have forgotten to let down the counter weight shaft which was obscuring the view.

5. Did a whole evenings imaging only to realise I forgot to switch on the cooling. 

Learning to image is beset with evenings like this.

Carole 

[Chris]

3 minutes ago, MarkAR said:

Things can only get better from now on. Keep trying and keep posting up vids.

I had the exact same thought after seeing those subs lol Thank you

[Chris]

2 minutes ago, carastro said:

Whoops, well it happens to us all.  Thanks for sharing.

1) Imaging with the Bahtinov mask on.

2) After spending ages (as a newbie) polar aligning the mount and 2 star aligning and finding the target, I trip over the mount cable and disconnect it and have to start all over again.

3) Trying to focus the guide camera and after several minutes of not being able to see anything, realise I still have the lens cap on.

4) Spent ages trying to polar align and wondering why I can't find a star realise I have forgotten to let down the counter weight shaft which was obscuring the view.

5. Did a whole evenings imaging only to realise I forgot to switch on the cooling. 

Learning to image is beset with evenings like this.

Carole 

Brilliant lol I love how slap stick number 2) is I assume you and the equipment were ok. 

[Chris]

I think the highlight of my illustrated night was when the kids swing set started appearing in the subs!  

[carastro]

Quote

I love how slap stick number 2) is  I assume you and the equipment were ok. 

Yes luckily no damage.

More recently after about 9 years of imaging, I got 3 nights on the trot at Astro camp when my stars were coming out elongated,  I checked everything and could not puzzle it out.  PA had been OK (I had used Polemaster), nothing seemed to be loose.  Finally Davey T who was with me said he thought the PA was out.  So decided to re-check it.  It was out.

Finally realised that I must have not quite spread the tripod legs fully and they must have slipped after I had done the PA 3 nights earlier.  Re-did the PA and stars were perfect.

2 1/2 nights imaging wasted !!!

I always check the tripod legs, but since they can be a little stiff, I obviously hadn't pushed them hard enough. 

Carole

[ApophisAstros]

1. Dropping your Bhatinov mask on the patio and it shattering into many pieces.

2. Imaging a whole nights subs with an Eagle3 , so i go out after moving all the subs to the USB stick when i should have copied them and i pull the USB stick out and its one of those adapter ones that holds a mini usb , hence the mini usb fell out on the patio and bounced "somewhere"in the garden, its still there so moral of the story only copy subs from Eagle 3 to USB sticks in future as moving deletes them off the Eagle3.

Roger

[Chris]

8 minutes ago, carastro said:

Yes luckily no damage.

More recently after about 9 years of imaging, I got 3 nights on the trot at Astro camp when my stars were coming out elongated,  I checked everything and could not puzzle it out.  PA had been OK (I had used Polemaster), nothing seemed to be loose.  Finally Davey T who was with me said he thought the PA was out.  So decided to re-check it.  It was out.

Finally realised that I must have not quite spread the tripod legs fully and they must have slipped after I had done the PA 3 nights earlier.  Re-did the PA and stars were perfect.

2 1/2 nights imaging wasted !!!

I always check the tripod legs, but since they can be a little stiff, I obviously hadn't pushed them hard enough. 

Carole

Oh jeez that's slightly not funny considering it was most of a star party, yikes! We could do with an imaging faux pas crib sheet  

[Chris]

4 minutes ago, apophisOAS said:

1. Dropping your Bhatinov mask on the patio and it shattering into many pieces.

2. Imaging a whole nights subs with an Eagle3 , so i go out after moving all the subs to the USB stick when i should have copied them and i pull the USB stick out and its one of those adapter ones that holds a mini usb , hence the mini usb fell out on the patio and bounced "somewhere"in the garden, its still there so moral of the story only copy subs from Eagle 3 to USB sticks in future as moving deletes them off the Eagle3.

Roger

Dito with number one, those masks are so brittle! and you're not selling the Eagle3 to me  

[carastro]

Quote

bounced "somewhere"in the garden, its still there

Can't believe that hasn't turned up yet Roger, though doubtless it will be useless now even if you did find it soaked in Rain and mud.

Carole 

[Chris]

4 hours ago, KevS said:

My favourite in recent times was spending hours trying to get PHD to work, replacing cables re-balancing lots of swearing usual stuff. Then realising I had turned the guide camera during the day when I fitted a new dovetail and  as a consequence the guide set up wasn't calibrated. Only 3 hours of a nice moon free rare clear sky down the pan. So could be worse.

It can't help that this is mostly nocturnal hobby. Not as easy to problem solve at the end of a long day! 

[Chris]

Would anyone mind if I canvased this thread for common imaging faux pas/ failure? I think it would make for a great video

[geeklee]

If there's any DSLR users out there that may have had any of the same comedy moments below (you'd think I'd learn to listen to the shutter after the first one!):

1. Getting everything setup including guiding, setting the intervalometer program.  Clicking start button on the intervalometer and tip toeing away.  Wait for the initial interval time and peek out and think the lights on the camera etc are all looking as they should.  Pop out after the plan should be finished (lets call it 2 hours to be kind to me) and realise I didn't actually press start properly so nothing happened.
    
2. As above but on a different occasion, but when I pop out after the plan should have finished, I realise this time I hadn't switched the camera to "Bulb" mode after using shorter exposures for focusing.  So, again, nothing happened even though the intervalometer tried! 

I was very glad to get a dedicated astro camera even with the extra complexity it might bring - at least I could see on the computer that things are actually happening (The above was with an older camera I had that couldn't be connected to a PC) 😅

Edited February 25, 2020 by geeklee

[alacant]

Start imaging. Fine. Nice round stars. Go back to make a periodic check. Guiding has stopped and blank frames are being downloaded. Check all cables, connections, park and unpark mount and start again. Still nada. Best part of an hour.

Only then do I look upwards...

[carastro]

Quote

Would anyone mind if I canvased this thread for common imaging faux pas/ failure? I think it would make for a great video 

Fine by me, I have actually heard of some more hilarious gaffs.  There is another thread on here which I started, I'll see if I can find it.

Quote

Only then do I look upwards...

Been there, done that.  

Carole 

[carastro]

Yup, this is the old thread.

I can also add to that one I read on a different forum where some-one started everything up from the comfort of their warm room and could not make out why they couldn't see any stars.   Looked outside, the sky was clear.  Eventually realised they had forgotten to open the dome.

Carole 

[Chris]

On 25/02/2020 at 20:07, geeklee said:

I was very glad to get a dedicated astro camera even with the extra complexity it might bring - at least I could see on the computer that things are actually happening (The above was with an older camera I had that couldn't be connected to a PC) 😅

This is a very good point regarding dedicated cameras! 

 

On 25/02/2020 at 20:07, geeklee said:

f there's any DSLR users out there that may have had any of the same comedy moments below (you'd think I'd learn to listen to the shutter after the first one!):

1. Getting everything setup including guiding, setting the intervalometer program.  Clicking start button on the intervalometer and tip toeing away.  Wait for the initial interval time and peek out and think the lights on the camera etc are all looking as they should.  Pop out after the plan should be finished (lets call it 2 hours to be kind to me) and realise I didn't actually press start properly so nothing happened.
    
2. As above but on a different occasion, but when I pop out after the plan should have finished, I realise this time I hadn't switched the camera to "Bulb" mode after using shorter exposures for focusing.

This is gold! I'm taking notes  

[Chris]

16 hours ago, carastro said:

Yup, this is the old thread.

I can also add to that one I read on a different forum where some-one started everything up from the comfort of their warm room and could not make out why they couldn't see any stars.   Looked outside, the sky was clear.  Eventually realised they had forgotten to open the dome.

Carole 

Thanks Carol I'll jump over and take a look now.

 

lol I bet their next job will be to automate the dome then  

[carastro]

You must post this video up on here once you have done it.

I see people are also adding to the 2017 thread as well. 

Carole 

Edited February 27, 2020 by carastro