Mars - second attempt heritage 150p

[MimasDeathStar]

What a difference a night makes!

loosening the clutches and getting the balance near perfect made a huge difference, as did spending 10 mins getting the red dot finder as accurate as possible! Although I think if I keep doing this I may have to get a finder scope too as we’re getting into the territory where the RDF dot is too big to centre mars properly.

watched a tutorial on wavelets - I think I’m a little clearer but struggled with the maths so I think I’ll have to keep coming back to that. Discovered an RGB Align button in Registax that totally transformed it so very pleased about that!

Heritage 150p on tabletop base.

2 x barlow

Svbony SV305

best 50% of 547 frames.

Sharpcap, PIPP, Registax.

thanks for looking, comments welcome.

[happy-kat]

Well done, that's great.

Was that the one video processed or did you take several short runs?

Did you fettle the clutches with the aim of getting the smoothest nudging to keep Mars in the fov with least vibration? 

[MimasDeathStar]

I did take several short runs but was messing about with the exposure / gain combo each time so I didn’t want to risk stitching all the videos together as I wasn’t sure if it would make it better or worse. Also I spent that long messing I was beginning to worry about rotation.

yes definitely playing with the clutches helped. I think holding the base between thumb and forefinger seems to be the technique that’s working best, But up/down is tricker as there’s still a bit of friction - it seems to want to “lean” a bit and then jump. But it’s not the end of the world. If I like it enough I’ll save up for some sort of motorised mount so I don’t mind working with what I’ve got at the mo. I’m really bowled over by the results so far.

[JeremyS]

Nice job, @MimasDeathStar!

[dweller25]

Excellent 👍

[markse68]

Really impressive result from a tabletop dob Mimas! Nice work

Mark

[Pete Presland]

Very nicely captured.

[wobblewing]

That's impressive.   What does one image look like?  My son and i (he's 9) took the heritage 150p out tonight and had a go at mars, after getting some great shots of a full(nearly) moon tonight. 

I soon realised that getting a good image of mars this is not easy!

Balance of the dob is critical and it's the 'stiction' in up/ down that didn't help. 

The 'stock' 25mm lens seems ok,  but not sure about the quality of the 10mm supplied lens.  I have an 'astro essentials' x2 barlow.  But the barlow in combination with the 10mm stock lens is a struggle.

What are the opinions on this barlow?  I suppose your camera is a good investment.  I've 3d printed a mount to hold my (64mp) phone camera.

Edited December 27, 2020 by wobblewing

[MimasDeathStar]

One image is just a blur! I use the exact same Barlow it’s fine.

im sure you know this but if shooting mars make sure you shoot video not photo, then stack in registax. There’s loads of guides out there, but very different to shooting moon 😀

Also I don’t think phone cameras actually shoot at 64mp - they normally interpolate the pixels to produce a higher quality (prob 16) mp picture using clever AI. So you’d want to stay away from these settings. My planetary camera is 2mp for example. For planetary small sensors and high sensitivity are your friend.

edit; @wobblewing this video - (not mine) is a pretty good approximation of what it looks like although I think conditions are slightly better in the video than what I was dealing with but same ballpark

 

Edited December 27, 2020 by MimasDeathStar

[wobblewing]

Thanks.  I'm totally new to this,  but have done a lot of research and as an electronics designer, I'm tech savvy. 

Just getting the phone to sit right is a fiddle (home made 3d printed clamp/mount) and i was getting shots like this (below small dot). Now i know stacking is magic, but i reckon more magic is required on this one🤣.

The video looks similar.  Tracking with the dob mount was a nightmare.. so you tend to place the mount then take a video of it going across,  then move the mount and take another video? Etc etc.. or do you need to keep the mount on the target whilst taking video? I'm guessing the software lines it all up for you. 

Still playing,  but remembering this is only my second time out, so about an hour's worth of playing in total!  Was pleased with my moon shots though, for a total beginner!  You can see the lens of the phone 'bluing' the edges

Edited December 28, 2020 by wobblewing

[MimasDeathStar]

That’s not the lens of the phone it’ll be the eyepiece.

11 hours ago, wobblewing said:

The video looks similar.  Tracking with the dob mount was a nightmare.. so you tend to place the mount then take a video of it going across,  then move the mount and take another video? Etc etc.. or do you need to keep the mount on the target whilst taking video? I'm guessing the software lines it all up for you. 

Yes,  I’m not sure it would be possible to track by hand.

if you use PiPP before registax then it will line it up for you (and does a pretty good job). It’s not a substitute for tracking but it’s a lifesaver nonetheless. 

[wobblewing]

I'll give that a go,  thanks. 

We are enjoying so far,  but don't want to spend  a fortune at this early stage.  Next step i think is to get some better lenses.. rather a lot of brand choice to choose from!

The moon shot was taken with the stock 25mm lens.  I found clarity was lost moving to the 10mm lens..

Edited December 29, 2020 by wobblewing