Saturn 08.04.11

[beamish]

I thought I had a really good night last night

spent hours processing all the data only to find that for some reason all my RGB data was in red only ???

Anyway not all was lost here's an example of 6mins Red data -try again tonight.

[neil phillips]

Its amazing what a lot of red frames can do isnt it, glad to see its working. though this still looks a little bit too high for a 7" scope i think. Its hard to tell because my dongle produces noise on jpgs ( but not pngs ) the image looks good but very dim. im having the same problem with a bigger scope. post processing can improve the dim captures. but that also produces noise. catch 22. the only real way is to get a better histo, at capture. so what FL is this ? and i assume re sized ? all those reds add up dont they. by the time you get to blue its a blur often. which will pull the colour down trust me. especially at this size with this histo. im trying one as we speak

[beamish]

This was me having a play ,thinking the decent data was in the bag ! it's actually around F34

I'm just feel soo down ATM, the conds. were good last night in spite of being blown a bit by the breeze ! ( just discovered Castrator too

[Space Cowboy]

Thats a cracker Karlo! At a lower f ratio that would be fantastic. Cassini is very well defined nice and round. Inner ring showing too!

[neil phillips]

Dont be down, although its gutting i know. when i first started, i captured what i thought was a lovely set of saturn images. it was my first go with a webcam EVER and a 7" F15 MEADE mak. K3 had reset the time. instead of 6 min captures i had seconds on each one. because of my inexepriance i didnt notice, because the capture kept running. But i vowed it would never happen again. and i knew that night. i could do it. Next time i did. You have learned something from this. and ( unlike me ) you got a quality red, from your mistake of a night. Just experiment to figure the colour problem before you go out. ( and or anything else ? ) That scope looks pukka. i knew the long reds could do it. really top job Karlo. Like your style. you think like me. push it for the hell of it. I like that attitude, especially when you can pull it of. which i now know you can. by looking at this. good result. really just keep experimenting. colour will likely be harder, and of a lower quality than this red, if you stay at f34. but im willing to be proven wrong. lots of experimenting for you to do. tonights clear Karlo

[beamish]

I should have trusted my eyes not the confirmation "ding" of filter changes:mad:

It all seemed ok when I was running thru the filter set programming the settings in, I thought

I had a range of fl's lengths, transparency was better than of late and you know you get to thinking " blimey this could be it !"

Having just had another look at the pic posted I think I've better still in the folders but I just can't bring myself to go back in just now !

Noise IS the killer- the age old task of trying to balance exp with gain and fl I tried a shorter fl earlier in the week and although I was getting better responses the seeing was reasonable but transparency was just utter mush !

Cheers guys.

[brianb]

you know you get to thinking " blimey this could be it !"

Yes - if you're like me, things only work properly when you're not thinking about it ... so you have to practice enough to make the physical act of capturing the images unconscious, which means a lot of "wasted" sessions in poor to bad conditions.

I'd notice from the preview screen if the filter wheel jammed, the planet just looks different in different wavelengths; in fact I'd even manage to tell you which filter was in from the monochrome preview. Takes practice but familiarity sometimes breeds success.

[beamish]

another at just F30

[astroman001]

Looking good taking into account the conditions. You will reallyu see the difference on a night with good seeing. If you use the red channel as the luminance, you will almost be able to get the same quality in the final LRGB image. R + G works well as a luminance.

regards

Peter

[beamish]

Y

I'd notice from the preview screen if the filter wheel jammed, the planet just looks different in different wavelengths; in fact I'd even manage to tell you which filter was in from the monochrome preview.

Brian I did have an inkling to what may have been happening, but I'd just run thru the filters to put the exp etc in and try and balance the images, so even tho I thought it a bit " quirky" didn't check by listening for the motor but instead trusted the "Ping" =there's the lesson- trust your inner instincts not the s/ware:mad:

[beamish]

Cheers Peter,

yes, I've been experimenting with combining R & G for additional luminance -I quite like that approach

[AztecastroMcJ]

Great result Karlo

like the brightness and process on 1st pic rings look really good

cheers James

[Kokatha man]

I don't think there's anything to be too upset about with the images per se Karlo - sure, the filter wheel problem would've p..... you off, but those red channels don't look too foul at all imo...

Seeing really makes us just keep on waiting and waiting, but as Brian said, if we don't keep on practising we get rusty!

And I try to see a silver lining in even my most tragic imaging sessions....!

As you'd know, I floated the question on CN re histo values other folks are employing on Saturn at this point in the apparition; many are using 50% and even considerably lower.....this question was precipitated by my trials with 60% after I'd been using 70% - I saw nothing wrong with 60% and I'll now go lower.

I've also been using a slight histo stretch at the end of Registax of 0-245 & smoothing value=10 (and equalising frame intensity during stacking also.)

AstrImage appears to do some additional stretching/brightening when you open the fits files therein.....but none of this seems to affect the outcomes adversely.....