Progress so Far (M31)

[RobST]

Hey Everyone

Just wanted to share my progress so far 😁 

First image taken 7th June this year, bitten by the bug 😁

I couldn't belive i could image M31 with my crappy setup, even though it was a little smudge, i was so excited 😁

Second Image Taken 27th July with an old 200mm lens i got from ebay and my canon 400d.

Quite an improvement in size but not much detail, but could now see M110 so was very pleased.

My Final image taken just a few nights ago 30 August, i finally got to try out my Samyang 135mm @f2.8 on my Canon 400d.

I was chuffed to bits with how much more detail i could now see 😁.

I am still very new to astrophotography and very new to post processing, I've used Deep Sky Stacker, Siril and Gimp although i hardly know any of the features of any of them.

I just got a used Canon 6d and cant wait to try it with my 135mm lens.

Also have a skywatcher star adventurer on the way.

To be honest i could carry on just imaging Andromeda, as it still blows me away that i can image something so far away and so long ago, from my back garden 😁

I have attached my Deep Sky Stacker Result and my Siril Result incase anyone would be interested in showing me what could be achieved with the data, if i knew what i was doing 🤣

Autosave.tif

result - Copy - Copy.fit

Any advice is much appreciated 😁

Thanks Rob

 

 

[callisto]

Excellent......you have done great, the more you practice, the better you will get 👍

 

Mark

 

[tooth_dr]

As Mark says you have done an excellent job.  I tried myself and could not do any better!  So I just turned yours the 'right way' up 🤣

 

 

[RobST]

Ha i never thought of that 🤣🤣

[RobST]

Thanks Folks 😁 can't wait to get out with my 6d 😁 hopefully a clear night soon 😁

[RobST]

My Latest Attempt 😃 alot less noise 😃

 

[RobST]

I would like to tweak the colours a little, but as i said I'm not great at post processing, i usually end up doing to much and ruining the image 😫

[Chefgage]

Looks very good. I am a bit jealous of your samyang 135mm. I am still waiting the delivery of mine, looks like it's on a back order at the minute.

[tomato]

30 minutes ago, RobST said:

I would like to tweak the colours a little, but as i said I'm not great at post processing, i usually end up doing to much and ruining the image 😫

That’s the trap I fall into every time. The trick is extracting as much ‘real’ detail from  your data without introducing artefacts from the processing, I’m certain I will never stop learning how to do this, but it’s fun trying.

Your progress is excellent, BTW, you already have the image capture fundamentals sorted, something that usually takes quite a bit of time.👍

[RobST]

47 minutes ago, Chefgage said:

Looks very good. I am a bit jealous of your samyang 135mm. I am still waiting the delivery of mine, looks like it's on a back order at the minute.

I managed to get one from amazon, all the instructions were in german, seems its a good one though, and i am enjoying using it, especially now i have my 6d 😃

[RobST]

17 minutes ago, tomato said:

That’s the trap I fall into every time. The trick is extracting as much ‘real’ detail from  your data without introducing artefacts from the processing, I’m certain I will never stop learning how to do this, but it’s fun trying.

Your progress is excellent, BTW, you already have the image capture fundamentals sorted, something that usually takes quite a bit of time.👍

Thanks 😃 just waiting on my tracker now, that image i stacked in dss but then used siril to edit, but no work in an image processing program 😃

[Spaced Out]

On 31/08/2020 at 21:22, RobST said:

I just got a used Canon 6d and cant wait to try it with my 135mm lens.

Also have a skywatcher star adventurer on the way.

 

Canon 6D, star adventurer and the sammy lens are a winning combo ! 👍

I use the 6D and star adventurer mini with some wider angle lenses, would love to get my hands on the 135mm tho.

[MrZuiko]

Hi Rob.....Great job on M31 absolutely first class! I enjoy astrophotography and have only a simple set up namely Omegon Mini Track LX2 which has it's limits e.g 2kg payload so can't use my Nikon 300 F4 ED (FL 450mm) on my D300 but I do use my Tokina 12-24, nifty fifty and my 85mm f1.8 which becomes a 127mm short telephoto lens because of the 1.5 crop factor.i would be very proud and excited if I had taken that image,I too will have to learn DSS I'm familiar with photoshop and know I have to take "dark frames" but what are "bias" frames and how do you taken them!

There's an Italian guy on FB Stefano Moschini that has taken some excellent deep sky photo's with this set up so I will continue and improve....can't wait for winter as Orion has to be one of my favourite constellations.

Keep safe people and clear skies.

Ash.

[ollypenrice]

You're going from strength to strength here.

Olly

[Albut]

Took this with a friend, our second attempt at M31 with better alignment, using ioptron tracker, Sony a7iiii camera and William optics Redcat51. Took about 50 or so photos iso 3200 60 secs. Then from something that looked pretty dull followed the andromeda video tutorial by Peter Zelinka and ended up with this. Probably the colours are out but pleased with the result.

[RobST]

18 hours ago, MrZuiko said:

Hi Rob.....Great job on M31 absolutely first class! I enjoy astrophotography and have only a simple set up namely Omegon Mini Track LX2 which has it's limits e.g 2kg payload so can't use my Nikon 300 F4 ED (FL 450mm) on my D300 but I do use my Tokina 12-24, nifty fifty and my 85mm f1.8 which becomes a 127mm short telephoto lens because of the 1.5 crop factor.i would be very proud and excited if I had taken that image,I too will have to learn DSS I'm familiar with photoshop and know I have to take "dark frames" but what are "bias" frames and how do you taken them!

There's an Italian guy on FB Stefano Moschini that has taken some excellent deep sky photo's with this set up so I will continue and improve....can't wait for winter as Orion has to be one of my favourite constellations.

Keep safe people and clear skies.

Ash.

Hi Ash

Thanks for the great comments, Bias frames are taken by setting your camera to the iso you intend to use for your light frames, then set your camera to its fastest speed , in my case 1/4000, and with the lens cap on take about 50 images, those will be your bias frames.

Another great youtube channel is Nebula Photos, a guy called nico takes you through every step in great detail 😃

[RobST]

14 hours ago, Albut said:

Took this with a friend, our second attempt at M31 with better alignment, using ioptron tracker, Sony a7iiii camera and William optics Redcat51. Took about 50 or so photos iso 3200 60 secs. Then from something that looked pretty dull followed the andromeda video tutorial by Peter Zelinka and ended up with this. Probably the colours are out but pleased with the result.

Fantastic image, yes i would like a touch of blue at the edges of the galaxy 😃 i will go and watch Peters video, i have watched some of them before 😃

[Chefgage]

2 hours ago, RobST said:

Hi Ash

Thanks for the great comments, Bias frames are taken by setting your camera to the iso you intend to use for your light frames, then set your camera to its fastest speed , in my case 1/4000, and with the lens cap on take about 50 images, those will be your bias frames.

Another great youtube channel is Nebula Photos, a guy called nico takes you through every step in great detail 😃

I have just been watching Nico's videos. Came across a point in GIMP that helps subtract light pollution after aggressive stretching that looks helpfull.

[RobST]

1 hour ago, Chefgage said:

I have just been watching Nico's videos. Came across a point in GIMP that helps subtract light pollution after aggressive stretching that looks helpfull.

Yes i find his videos very useful, although i think i probably push my images to far when using the techniques he shows 😃

[MrZuiko]

Hi Rob,

Thanks for that I'll have a look at that guy on youtube!

Can I ask why so many bias frames? would you take a similar amount of dark frames....say you only took 15 light frames would that mean you would only take 15 bias/dark frames?

all these questions 🤔.

I've never used DSS so that should be fun,I should think!

Clear skies all and keep safe.

Ash.

[RobST]

1 hour ago, MrZuiko said:

Hi Rob,

Thanks for that I'll have a look at that guy on youtube!

Can I ask why so many bias frames? would you take a similar amount of dark frames....say you only took 15 light frames would that mean you would only take 15 bias/dark frames?

all these questions 🤔.

I've never used DSS so that should be fun,I should think!

Clear skies all and keep safe.

Ash.

Hi Ash

Yes i just do 50 darks, bias and flats as one of the tutorials i watched said it was a good number, if i was doing 1 min exposure lights i would probably do less darks and flats as they require the same length exposures, but as i am only doing 2 second exposures its quick to do 50 darks and flats. The thing with the bias frames is you can do them for an iso and use them again and again, although i do tend to redo mine 😃 

[RobST]

Bit more processing today, stacked and processed with Siril mainly then a little tweak with gimp 😃 chuffed with this although might make it a bit brighter 😃

[ollypenrice]

On 27/09/2020 at 16:33, Albut said:

Took this with a friend, our second attempt at M31 with better alignment, using ioptron tracker, Sony a7iiii camera and William optics Redcat51. Took about 50 or so photos iso 3200 60 secs. Then from something that looked pretty dull followed the andromeda video tutorial by Peter Zelinka and ended up with this. Probably the colours are out but pleased with the result.

Have a look at my fairly detailed posts in this thread regarding black clipping.  The image above is massively black clipped and, without any doubt whatever, has much more to give.

Olly

 

[MrZuiko]

Hi Rob,

Found that guy on youtube fascinating to watch even more so that he takes his images using nothing more than a tripod with no tracker and 1 second exposures! I will give this ago because I'd originally planned to use my Omegon LX2 which I'm in the process of upgrading the sighting tube to polar align to a 5x24 finder scope to be more accurate on the polaris using my Nikon D300 and my 85mm 1.8 lens which because of the crop factor equates to a 127mm lens.

But having watched the video I would like to try my 300 f4 ED heavy piece of glass and metal! too much for the LX2 to handle...this would give me me a focal length of 450mm should fill the frame!

The editing looks very intense so I think I would have to be watching the video again on my laptop while working on my desktop.

Does anyone here use the LX2? I was all set the other night as i popped my head out into the back garden went back in camera gear packed stepped back outside and guess what....it had clouded over and the wind had picked up...so a no go🤨......does anyone use light pollution filters and which ones are best I know there's different types depending on what you want to filter out and what you want to let through etc.

Clear skies.

Ash.

[RobST]

On 30/09/2020 at 05:35, MrZuiko said:

Hi Rob,

Found that guy on youtube fascinating to watch even more so that he takes his images using nothing more than a tripod with no tracker and 1 second exposures! I will give this ago because I'd originally planned to use my Omegon LX2 which I'm in the process of upgrading the sighting tube to polar align to a 5x24 finder scope to be more accurate on the polaris using my Nikon D300 and my 85mm 1.8 lens which because of the crop factor equates to a 127mm lens.

But having watched the video I would like to try my 300 f4 ED heavy piece of glass and metal! too much for the LX2 to handle...this would give me me a focal length of 450mm should fill the frame!

The editing looks very intense so I think I would have to be watching the video again on my laptop while working on my desktop.

Does anyone here use the LX2? I was all set the other night as i popped my head out into the back garden went back in camera gear packed stepped back outside and guess what....it had clouded over and the wind had picked up...so a no go🤨......does anyone use light pollution filters and which ones are best I know there's different types depending on what you want to filter out and what you want to let through etc.

Clear skies.

Ash.

Thats how i do my processing, have the video in the background if i get stuck, once you have used the stacking software a few times it's easy, processing is not 🤣