Seestar S50 images

[M40]

High level clouds but had to try..... both simple screen shots

NGC6992 Eastern Veil Nebula, 24 x 10 seconds with filter

 

NGC6960 Western Veil Nebula, 36 x 10 seconds with filter

 

Edited October 8, 2023 by M40

[Giles_B]

I'm having some issues with retrieving (rather than just viewing) the stacked images from SeeStar (no problem getting the fits and stacking them myself). I've worked around this by taking screenshots of the images - these are my favourites from the lovely clear spell on Saturday night. Generally I tried to linger on the objects for a while to see how much detail the SeeStar could extract, but I'd emphasise that the results were generally very impressive after a couple of minutes or less:

 

[Cosmic Geoff]

There should not be any problem getting the 'instant' .jpg files off your smartphone.  With an iphone, you can either connect to a PC via a Lightning to USB cable and 'allow', or set up icloud so that the phone images are made available on your PC without any further intervention from you.

I don't know about Android phones, but something similar ought to be available.

[Giles_B]

47 minutes ago, Cosmic Geoff said:

There should not be any problem getting the 'instant' .jpg files off your smartphone.  With an iphone, you can either connect to a PC via a Lightning to USB cable and 'allow', or set up icloud so that the phone images are made available on your PC without any further intervention from you.

I don't know about Android phones, but something similar ought to be available.

Thanks Geoff - That's usually the case with photos on Android, so I'm not sure if it is an issue with using a phone with an old version of Android, something weird I've done with the SeeStar app setup, or something else, but the stacked jpegs are definitely not on my phone - I've been searching on and off since Sunday(!). I've filed a bug report, and will do some more experimenting by using a different device (with newer Android) to control the Seestar next time.

[Cosmic Geoff]

Three Seestar images taken 13 Oct 2023:

These are iphone images, reduced in size by 50%.  Bortle 6 skies,  v1.9 & v1.58

The background looks blacker in the originals.

Edited October 14, 2023 by Cosmic Geoff

[happy-kat]

I like how the images have a title and time included, do you get an option to add date as well?

[M40]

2 minutes ago, happy-kat said:

I like how the images have a title and time included, do you get an option to add date as well?

It's in there, bottom left, it details location, y/m/d, time. It came in with an update to the software. Good move from zwo that.

[Giles_B]

A second beautifully clear weekend, and a chance to try out the updated v1.9 app and 1.6 firmware.

Unfortunately I spent much of the small hours of Saturday imaging the elephants trunk only to find that the SeeStar was pointing at a tree. There is only so much operator error you can take out of a go to system!

A couple of images from early on Friday night worth sharing all the same - in both cases I've included post processed versions I manually restacked and further processed using Siril and Photoshop:

M13:

 

Pelican Nebula:

 

 

Finally, the power died during a visualisation of M32 - this was after the elephant's trunk debacle, so the battery was pretty low. No SeeStar processed version to be found, but the FITS survived. I've included it here because I did a rather lacklustre job of capturing this with my first weekend with the SeeStar - I forgot to use the internal filter - so I was pleased to see the amount of detail the SeeStar FITS hold when the filter is used as it should be. This was from a total of 112 10 second subs, restacked with Siril and post-processed in Siril and Photoshop:

All imaged in Bortle 5 suburban skies.

 

Edited October 15, 2023 by Giles_B

[DaveL59]

lovely images guys 🙂

For me it was a weekend of skool nights as I've been working so no chance to play which was a shame since the sky looked clearer last night than it has in a long while. Same for trying solar or anything much really for me. Much the same story every weekend this month for me, such is life, so I'll just have to hope for some clear skies in Nov.

Edited October 15, 2023 by DaveL59

[M40]

One minute on M45 from last night. Interesting to compare Giles_B's 44 minute above and this 1 minute. 

[Cosmic Geoff]

Some Seestar images from 22 Oct.  These are smartphone images, lightly enhanced  in contrast and reduced in size by 50%. Bortle 6 skies.  I'm impressed by the performance of this device on nebulae and need to figure out why I don't get images like this with my other EEVA rig (102mm f5).  M17 also known as Omega Nebula,  IC1396 known as Elephant's Trunk.

 

 

Edited October 24, 2023 by Cosmic Geoff

[Giles_B]

Full moon over the weekend so not the most favourable conditions, but had a go at the flaming head nebula about 5am this morning. Quite dim, but managed to bring a bit of detail out with post-processing:

 

Also got aquainted with Sirilic and had a go at stacking 3 sessions on IC5070 - Pelican nebula:

Original first (posted this before), then post-processed: 

 

 

[Stu1smartcookie]

My first image from the SeeStars .  4 mins in total , processed on the Phone 

 

Edited November 6, 2023 by Stu1smartcookie

[Stu1smartcookie]

Second night out with the SS50 … a great evening … M33 , M31 … and the Pac-Man Nebula . No additional processing . Updated image on the Pac-Man Neb , after a bit of processing on the phone 

 

 

Edited November 7, 2023 by Stu1smartcookie

[carastro]

An impressive bit of kit for the money.  I have been looking at a few images that members of my astro group have produced and the ones above are very good.  

l think the only problem with this is going to be getting sucked into imaging for real and all it’s costs etc   Lol 

But certainly great to be able to get these sort of results with this kit. 

[Stu1smartcookie]

7 hours ago, carastro said:

An impressive bit of kit for the money.  I have been looking at a few images that members of my astro group have produced and the ones above are very good.  

l think the only problem with this is going to be getting sucked into imaging for real and all it’s costs etc   Lol 

But certainly great to be able to get these sort of results with this kit. 

As a visual astronomer who craved being able to image but doesn’t have the patience to do so , the Dwarf and SeeStars are “my heaven”. I have spent ( and lost) so much money on this hobby already …. As my long suffering wife would agree . 😂. So I am immune to an astrophotography rig costing £1k + 

But you are right … these small scopes are so good that some might be tempted go down that rabbit hole 

[M40]

10 hours ago, carastro said:

l think the only problem with this is going to be getting sucked into imaging for real and all it’s costs etc   Lol 

I suppose time will tell, but for me, at the moment, as my only widefield piece of kit the seestars enables me to get pictures of things that I just would not be able to get with my other telescopes. So I see no need to go down that rabbit hole; maybe learn how to brighten the ss50 pictures so that would be my only step into processing.

[Elp]

It's a marketing tactic really. Introduce a low cost of entry product showing enticing advanced features but dial it back slightly from an existing product higher up the purchase chain. Every company with the resources to do so do it. Is it coincidence they happen to also have a complete whole product range to cater to those that would want to "upgrade"?

For what it does and so simply is fantastic, it was the same when the asiair was introduced. Those that already have AP equipment already are buying it because it fits a certain need/usage scenario. Those that don't, well it's an entry point, possibly to bigger things...

[Cosmic Geoff]

I continue to be impressed by what the Seestar can do in imaging nebulae from my murky backyard. Conditions last night were dismal, with the Plough barely visible, but I still got good-looking images of some nebulae with which I was not familiar at all, with imaging runs of from 30 to 45 minutes. 

I also have an EEVA rig based on a 102mm f5 achromat, and am wondering why I can't get good nebula images with it, though it performs better than the Seestar on imaging a typical galaxy. Maybe I need to buy the ZWO dual-band filter and try a long run of 10 sec stacked exposures.

[Elp]

An OSC dual band filter provides a night and day difference than imaging without in LP environments.

[M40]

3 hours ago, Elp said:

An OSC dual band filter provides a night and day difference than imaging without in LP environments.

Interesting point, I noted that Cuiv in one of his video's on the ss50 talked about the Optolong L extreme filter. Other than a few cost effective colour filters that I bought for planets, I have no filters to speak of so if I got one, it would likely be for the ss50 only.

Looking on flo, the optolong is a osc dual band type and the 2" filter would in my mind be an expensive one, so, is it worth getting? Does anybody have one?

Edited November 7, 2023 by M40

[carastro]

Absolutely get it.  Will make a big difference to NB targets.   

[M40]

Out of stock..classic 🤦‍♂️ 30 - 40 days.....but I want it now 🤣

[Elp]

The LP filter built into the Seestar is a wide bandpass dual band (ha and o3) filter so you don't need one, likely you've noticed a significant difference if looking at a galaxy with it enabled and not enabled as it'll block most of the galaxy out if the specs of the filter are correct. For anyone who uses camera lenses or a telescope, an Optolong Lenhance/extreme/ultimate or equivalent Idas NBZ/Antlia ALPT etc make a lot of difference on emission nebula rich in ha and o3.

Edited November 7, 2023 by Elp

[M40]

2 hours ago, Elp said:

The LP filter built into the Seestar is a wide bandpass dual band (ha and o3) filter so you don't need one, likely you've noticed a significant difference if looking at a galaxy with it enabled and not enabled as it'll block most of the galaxy out if the specs of the filter are correct. For anyone who uses camera lenses or a telescope, an Optolong Lenhance/extreme/ultimate or equivalent Idas NBZ/Antlia ALPT etc make a lot of difference on emission nebula rich in ha and o3.

I suppose Cuiv was going to try it as he likely already has one and he would turn the inbuilt filter off. Will make for a good comparison, hope he does a video on it soon.