NGC281 - Pacman in HST Palette...

[RichieJarvis]

Hi Everyone...

Over the last couple of weeks I've been concentrating on NGC281 in narrowband. I've been suffering with a lack of polar alignment recently, and wanted to push things. I was pleased to get 20 minute subs throughout, so hopefully the alignment gremlins are gone. For those interested in how, I used the WCS polar alignment software with my SPC700 webcam to realign the mount and make sure everything was bang-on.

In the end, I captured 12 x Oiii, 11 x Ha, and 6 x Sii. I threw away half of the Oiii data, and some of the Ha, as it had a terrible gradient as a result of the Moon, leaving 6 x Sii and Oiii and 8 x Ha 20 minute subs. Total exposure time: 6 hours and 40 minutes.

Equipment wise, I used the Televue Genesis with the SXVR-H18 on the EQ6.

And here it is (click for biggie):

Thanks for looking!

Cheers,

Richie

[ollypenrice]

Awe, that takes me back, Richie! I did this in the same scope a couple of years back with Jim Mehta.

Yours looks a treat.

For gradients, I kid you not that PixInsight is awesome and worth it for that alone.

Any clues on why my webcam won't talk to WCS? I have the drivers loaded okay.

Olly

[RichieJarvis]

It must have remembered the photons then Olly! Hehehe

This is a slight crop, as the H18 picks up some strangeness (crescent shaped stars) to the top-right of the image. Must post about that actually....

Anyway, wcs. I found it recognised my webcam without issues, however, I did have to tweak the settings from its default of 320x240 to 640x480., otherwise it wouldn't work.

What webcam are you using Olly?

Cheers,

Richie

[ollypenrice]

Celestron branded Toucam, Richie. It just does not appear in the capture window. Never mind, I can always drift but I liked WCS when it worked.

Olly