The learning journey continues! M101 attempt

[oymd]

Good afternoon everyone

Tuesday night was crystal clear...

I aimed for the Pinwheel Galaxy, M101

100 subs, 30 seconds each, Unguided. No guide camera yet, so keeping exposure times low.

Stacked in DSS, and some basic processing in GIMP.

Still learning the ropes, and very keen on feedback and comments...

Ossi

 

[MarkAR]

Much better than my first attempt, well done.

[oymd]

Here is my second attempt last night...possibly a little better..

 

 

[rickwayne]

Focus looks much better on second one. What are you using to focus?

You might consider downloading starnet++ and trying out a star-elimination workflow. I suspect that you've got more data available in the low end, and might be able to stretch more nebulosity while retaining smaller, more colorful stars.

An excellent start.

[oymd]

4 hours ago, rickwayne said:

Focus looks much better on second one. What are you using to focus?

You might consider downloading starnet++ and trying out a star-elimination workflow. I suspect that you've got more data available in the low end, and might be able to stretch more nebulosity while retaining smaller, more colorful stars.

An excellent start.

With the top image I tried using the FVMH option in APT, but could not get my head around it and I think I botched it. 
 

With the second image I used my regular focusing routine. A bhatinov mask and manually checking the focus in live view on APT. 

 

Can you please elaborate on the starnet ++ hint? I have no idea what that is, but would love to try it and give it a go?

thanks

 

Edited April 7, 2020 by oymd