First attempts at guiding

[AstroMuni]

My first attempt at guiding. This image is taken with the ASI224mc via Celestron Astromaster 130 scope mounted on HEQ5 Pro and comprises of 30 x 120s subs. The capture and guiding was all done using Ekos and post processing done in SIRIL. Obvious scope for improvement on guiding to get more rounded stars and lots more to learn on post processing 🙂 Comments welcome.

M33 Triangulum galaxy situated around 2.7 million light years from us and spanning 60k light years across. One of our smaller companion galaxies.

 

[ONIKKINEN]

2 hours ago, AstroMuni said:

This image is taken with the ASI224mc via Celestron Astromaster 130 scope mounted on HEQ5 Pro

I always find it shocking how much variation people have with the Astromaster 130. Mine was more like an aluminum foil piece stretched on a frisbee instead of a telescope, yours is clearly working much better 👍. Stars look quite round although i would take shorter subs, maybe 60s. Camera is uncooled but has high QE, target is bright and newtonians suffer from sailing issues. 60s subs are still manageable from a processing standpoint but you will get significantly more untrailed subs if its even a bit windy. Or the HEQ-5 just suffers through it, i dont own one so it might be good.

[raadoo]

Looks like focus wasn't quite spot on coupled with guiding errors leading to the kind of polygonal look to the stars. The larger ones all show this kind of lopsidedness towards the top right.

With your setup especially (uncooled camera), you'll appreciate the kind of magic that calibration frames bring to the table. If not from a flatness of field point of view, then definitely in terms of getting rid of noise. Though you may very well already know this 😀

[AstroMuni]

3 hours ago, ONIKKINEN said:

newtonians suffer from sailing issues. 60s subs are still manageable from a processing standpoint but you will get significantly more untrailed subs if its even a bit windy.

What is a sailing issue? If related to wind then yes it was windy on Monday night just before Barra hit us.

3 hours ago, ONIKKINEN said:

always find it shocking how much variation people have with the Astromaster 130.

I consider myself fortunate or persevering  or both 🙂 See my other images (without guiding) in my signature link

Edited December 8, 2021 by AstroMuni

[ONIKKINEN]

6 minutes ago, AstroMuni said:

What is a sailing issue? If related to wind then yes it was windy on Monday night just before Barra hit us.

Yes, wind. The telescope is physically large but not that heavy = sails in wind.