First 4 shots

[MattsGazingAgain]

Hello all,

First post since my initial hello message due to a lot of cloudy nights and a small wait until I could afford my very entry level camera. I would like to apologise straight away for my lack of knowledge and the poor quality of my images. The framing is terrible and they're out of focus, but I'm also completely over the moon with them. I'm very eager for you guys to rip them apart and tell me all the ways I went wrong but I will always love these 4 images as they are the very first successful AP images I've taken

My equipment is as follows

skywatcher 150pds on a eq3-2 pro synscan mount

Polar scope

Canon 2000d

Super coma corrector

I have tuned the motor drives for the mount but haven't stripped down and cleaned and greased the mount itself yet but plan to. Also plan to upgrade to a heq5 Pro asap. I have no guiding other then synscan. Again something else I hope to change as soon as I can but for now its an oppurtunity to learn.

None of the images are stacked, they're single 30 sec exposures. I very slightly adjusted the raw files by placing a slight s curve on the linear channel but will leave any further processing if I bother until after a good nights sleep. I've included both the before and after image.

The first image is just of vega, I took it while star aligning. A awful pic for many reasons, especially the flare coming from the star, but my first so will keep it for sentimental reasons. The second I was very happy to catch some light from the ring nebula, and was equally happy to catch the dumbell nebula a little. The fourth is the globular cluster. All really bad framing but was suprised to catch the nebula on just a 30 sec exp with my light pollution. 

Can't wait for your ideas,suggestions and criticisms. My apologies for a very long post but feel very hyped up even after such awful results.

Many thanks and clear skies

Matt

 

[Davey-T]

Well done Matt, nothing like your first astro' images to get you going down the slippery slope to bankruptcy 😂

Loads of promise there, once you get over the excitement of trying to image ten targets a night I'd pick one and gather as many subs as possible, M31 will give you a larger image.

Keep up the good work.

Dave

[johneta]

Nice images. Stars look nice,with the exception of one image with star trailing. Exciting times for you.

Looks better than some of my first outings.

Have fun and enjoy the thrill, I remember being amazed that anything showed up on the screen at all. (A pic showing up on the LCD of the camera still excites me)

+1 for Davey-T    ... when you settle on one target a night and get longer and more images of it, and then stack them I predict you will get a lot of satisfaction from that.

I watched a camera lens astro tutorial when I first started, that encouraged 1 object a night and its really good advice.
I still occasionally try for a couple of targets in a night but usually dont do either justice.

Enjoy, you are doing well already!

[MattsGazingAgain]

Thank you very much guys. I without a doubt got over excited and went through the the deep sky tour on my synscan snapping anything I thought was high enough in the sky. One thing last night taught me was to plan my next imaging session. Decide in advance what I'm going to try to image and how I'm going to frame it etc. Have seen some useful tools in stellarium to that end. 

And your completely right, the joy i felt after just seeing stars on the lcd screen was worth everything I've paid so far lol. Can definitely see a lot of money going after this hobby, luckily for me my gf enjoys it too. 

Many thanks for your comments. Have realised probably placed this post in the wrong thread, beginner imaging would have been more suitable, my apologies for that. 

I plan to take multiple exposures of one target on my next imaging session and then stack those. Have no experience with any stacking software, does anyone have any feelings as which one is the best?

 

[johneta]

I started using Deep Sky Stacker but use Siril now, considerably better IMO.
Try this starter video. You can stack with very basic operation and get great results 

 

[MarkAR]

A good start, get to know your set up better and you'll soon be creating some really good images.

[callisto]

1 hour ago, MarkAR said:

A good start, get to know your set up better and you'll soon be creating some really good images.

Good advice 

 

Mark