A Bit Optimistic

[Adam1234]

After having bought the ZWO Electronic Automatic Focuser a few weeks ago I've been dying to test it out, but crappy UK weather has meant I haven't been able to get out recently (my last image, of the Elephant's Trunk, I got back in September), and I've been getting withdrawal symptoms from lack of astronomy. 

Fortunately there was a bit of a break in the clouds this evening so I took the scope out to test the EAF - I was a bit optimistic and hoped to try getting 45 mins each of R, G and B on the Crescent Nebula while I was out, despite the current moon phase and knowing that it could cloud over at any moment.

Managed to get 45 mins of R before the clouds started coming in, oh well! At least I tested out the EAF, and it was so much easier than manually twiddling around with the focus knob! As sods law would have it though, I started packing up and the clouds started to clear, but I know if I had set everything back up the clouds would probably have returned, so I called it quits.

Anyway, here's the 45 mins of R (45 x 60s subs). Hopefully soon we get some clear nights so I can at least get some G and B to go with the R (that's probably also a bit optimistic, but one can hope)

 

Adam

[andrew s]

Nice start. You have to grab what you can in the UK. Regards Andrew 

[Adam1234]

9 hours ago, andrew s said:

Nice start. You have to grab what you can in the UK. Regards Andrew 

Thanks, and yes indeed! Clear skies here almost as rare as a blue moon

[Spitfire]

Hi Adam,

Did you use manual focus for the ZWO or are you using NINA/APT with the auto focus function?

Geoff

Nice image by the way.

[Adam1234]

2 hours ago, Spitfire said:

Hi Adam,

Did you use manual focus for the ZWO or are you using NINA/APT with the auto focus function?

Geoff

Nice image by the way.

Thanks Geoff. 

 I used the autofocus function in APT using the FWHM

[Paul M]

Good to see you getting the EAF working nicely. It's on my wish list but the mount belt mod kit just pulled rank due to constant guiding failing to calibrate , so I think it's a while off.

I'm not yet sure whether I'm struggling with focusing or not but it's become my least pleasurable "chore" in my new life as an imaging wannabe  

 

[Adam1234]

54 minutes ago, Paul M said:

Good to see you getting the EAF working nicely. It's on my wish list but the mount belt mod kit just pulled rank due to constant guiding failing to calibrate , so I think it's a while off.

I'm not yet sure whether I'm struggling with focusing or not but it's become my least pleasurable "chore" in my new life as an imaging wannabe  

 

Hope you get your mount sorted out. 

Yeah focusing is not my favourite part either, sometimes when focusing by hand it seems to either go really well and I'm focused with a 5 mins, other times I'm still focusing after half hour! 

Took less than a minute or so with the EAF!

[tomato]

I find automatic  focusing to be a big step forward in accuracy and time saving, it’s certainly not just another nice to have gadget.

I shared your dilemma last night, a big cloud bank rolled in just before a planned meridian flip and I powered down only to find clear skies about 10 mins later. Fortunately having a permanent set up up meant I could get going again in about 10 mins, when I had a temporary set up once I had made the decision to dismantle I resolved not to look up for fear of being tempted to change my mind.

[Adam1234]

10 hours ago, tomato said:

I find automatic  focusing to be a big step forward in accuracy and time saving, it’s certainly not just another nice to have gadget.

I shared your dilemma last night, a big cloud bank rolled in just before a planned meridian flip and I powered down only to find clear skies about 10 mins later. Fortunately having a permanent set up up meant I could get going again in about 10 mins, when I had a temporary set up once I had made the decision to dismantle I resolved not to look up for fear of being tempted to change my mind.

Very handy to have a permanent set up then! 

I managed to have another clear sky here last night to, up to about 23:30. I think I need to experiment with the best setting etc to use for auto focusing, as the G and B frames I took last I think looked ok, will have a look this evening and confirm, but I took some Ha as well and after running the autofocus routine in APT, checked with a bahtinvov mask and the focus was considerably off! I was watching the FWHM numbers during the autofocus routine and noticed that it didnt exactly settle on the lowest number, in fact, it got to a low ish number, continued adjusting focus and then settled on one much higher FWHM of 5-6! 

[tomato]

Yeah, the software can be fooled if a bit of stray cloud happens to drift across the field when you are running the routine. I check with a Bahtinov mask if the curve doesn’t look right.

[jimjam11]

AF makes a huge difference and most parfocal filters are not parfocal enough, so once you get your offsets worked out things become much easier and you will get sharper images.

Nina is in the process (V1.11) of introducing a killer feature for people like us with temperamental sky. You can configure your sequence (e.g. 5xR,5xG,5xB) and then iterate through this group for as long as you have/desire (e.g. 10Hr). It means you can get a colour image within minutes, and progressively go deeper and deeper without paying the time penalty of full filter interleaving (1xR,1xG,1xB) which takes an age. It also means you smoth out fluctuations in seeing, transparency etc so all channels are better balanced. This was technically possible before but you needed to configure a ridiculous repeating sequence (create 5:5:5 events and copy/paste until you lose the will to live). Having said that, IMO the new sequence builder in Nina is seriously intimidating and it took me several nights to get comfortable with it. It is like no sequencer I have seen before but it has flexibility and benefits which makes the effort worthwhile...

[ultranova]

Congrats on first try with the EAF,

looks like its working a treat,

Bag your data, you never know when opportunity will strike.

well done 

Paul