M27 Dumbbell Nebula

[Darth Takahashi]

This is my first attempt at an LRGB image... What a struggle... with the camera, filter wheel, software and producing the final image... its taken ages...

I'm still not sure this is all worth it at the moment, its a steep learning curve and the results that I'm producing now are not good enough. I guess I just have to find the right techniques...

Telescope: TOA130F with ExtQ

Camera: SBIG 2000XM

Filter wheel: CFW7

Capture software: MaxIm DL

All the final adjustment were made in Photoshop CS4.

There's a lot of room for improvement...

Neil

[steppenwolf]

It is a steep learning curve, Neil but worth the climb. The colours look good so you haven't made a hash of the processing. The focus is soft which doesn't help but exposure/colour balance are fine so don't beat yourself up this is the first - onwards and upwards!

[TakMan]

Not bad going Neil for a first attempt!

If you want, PM me and I'll do my best to offer some 'beginners' advice as this was my first target also...

are you guiding with the built in guide chip? What mount are you on...?

Best of luck - easier, brighter targets coming up!

Regards

Damian

[Darth Takahashi]

I'm using an EM200 USD3 which is a little overloaded with everything on it! Approx 20kg. Guiding is done with an external Sky90 II with an Atik 16IC ccd camera.

PHD is my preferred guiding software and has done a good job so far.

I'll send a PM soon as advice is always welcomed and at the moment I need it!

Neil.

[TakMan]

Neil

As already mentioned the focus is soft.... I to was having the same problem so got myself a Bahtinov Mask from: Stay Focused Bahtinov masks from £9 (Powered by CubeCart) - although you could make one yourself(!) see: astrojargon - Bahtinov Focusing Mask Generator: Overview

Have also discovered that my spacings were not correct from the back of the CA35 (etc) to the camera chip face - have you got yours sorted correctly without any flexure.....

You could always leave off the Extender to speed things up a bit - I used the drizzle function in Nebulosity2 (Mac version for me) to increase image size - and I'm running the colour ST4000XCM version of yours (same pixels though at a much shorter f. 5 - 530mm) and getting reasonable results.....

Are you also using the inbuilt guide chip...?

As for Photoshop, I can send you some web links for processing, etc (that I found useful) if you wish - just PM me. Are you using FITS Liberator..?

Best of luck - easier, and brighter objects on their way!!!

Regards and clear skies

Damian

[MartinB]

The colour has worked out great Neil. If you are overloaded why aren't you using the guide chip on your camera? The EM200 tracks so well that you can use quite long guide exposures if you're struggling for stars.

Any new technique takes a bit of getting used to and when you are getting to grips with new software the frustrations are increased further.

[Darth Takahashi]

The colour has worked out great Neil. If you are overloaded why aren't you using the guide chip on your camera? The EM200 tracks so well that you can use quite long guide exposures if you're struggling for stars.

Any new technique takes a bit of getting used to and when you are getting to grips with new software the frustrations are increased further.

Martin, any advise here or tips would be welcome. The reason that I'm not currently using the built-in guide camera is that I didn't want to change to much... Also PHD has so far worked great for me so if it isn't broken etc...

Now I finally feel like I'm getting MaxIm under control so maybe guiding can be added next.

Neil.

[Taff]

That's a very nice capture of M27 great colour.Mark