M13 ASI224

[cuivenion]

This is The Great Globular Cluster in Hercules also known as Messier 13. I recently found out astronomers have sent radio wave messages to this area as an experiment in attempting to contact extraterrestial life. 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arecibo_message

Mount: HEQ5

Scope: 130PDS

Imaging Camera: ZWO ASI224 with cooling mod (had the sensor down to around -5c)

Guiding: Colour Altair GPCAM with Finderguider

Software: Sharpcap 3.2, PHD2, Pixinsight

I had some problems introduced by the cooling mod. The extra weight of the camera was causing the focuser to slip slightly effecting focus. Tightening the focus stop to prevent movement caused tilt. Not entirely figured that one out yet. I'd like to avoid buying a new focuser.

This was taken in early May before the sky became way to bright for imaging, this is around 3 1/2 hours of 30 second exposures. I really needed more time on this target, but I ran out of dark nights unfortunately. I used a small stack of low gain exposures to try making this a HDR image.

Any comment/criticisms welcome as usual, let me know what you think.

 

Edited June 18, 2020 by cuivenion

[MartinB]

Nice result despite your problems.  No evidence of the tilt on what I can see here.  

[cuivenion]

Thanks Martin, the tilt was very noticible in the low gain subs, thankfully it seems to have worked out ok in the final image. I'd like to get about 10 hours on this someday and really bring out those fainter stars.

[ultranova]

Nice colours and great separation of stars on the cluster,

A very nice take on m13 well done.Paul

[cuivenion]

Cheers Paul.