Helix Season - Now 25.5 hours

[multiweb]

Inspired by MBJ's super deep helix I got 12h so far on it across two nights. We had good(ish) seeing in Sydney over the week-end although transparency was a little on the hazy side Sunday night. Back to cloudy now until Wednesday where I'm hoping to stick in another 6h. This stuff is real faint and too close to my sky orange glow for comfort, but I'm getting there bit by bits. :)

Also posted a pic of the rig, C11/Hyperstar3 and QHY9 mono + Baader Ha 7nm.

Added Data, now 19h.

[RickS]

That's fairly deep already, Marc.

[strongmanmike]

Gee Marc, the negative version is displaying most of the major outer features, very cool :thumbsup:

In that configuration, your OTA looks like the old Meade 12" F2.2 Schmidt (http://sctscopes.net/SCT_Basics/SCT_OTAs/Meade_12inch_Schmidt_Camera.jpg)tel escope...also very cool :thumbsup:

Mike

[atalas]

Looking very deep Marc....fantastic start :thumbsup::thumbsup::thumbsup:

[Camelopardalis]

Holy Helical photons, Batman :eyepop:

[multiweb]

I expected a little more after two nights. Bit of teething issues remembering how to use the hyperstar as well. It's been over a year. Also have to redo my flats. The EL panel started blinking. Just figured out today there is another small switch at the back I inadvertently clicked in the dark. It's a blinking mode. :doh: I originally bought it from a signage shop. :lol:


Thanks Mike. Yeah it's heading the right way. Next iteration should be cool.

[multiweb]

Thanks guys. Watch this space. I'll update as I go. :thumbsup:

[gregbradley]

Nice work Marc.

You've got the outer chevrons showing nicely already.

Greg.

[peter_4059]

Looking good Marc. What sub lengths can you do with that setup?

[RickS]

I was wondering what caused the "Eat at Joe's" watermark :lol:

[Placidus]

Wow, what a superb reward for time and effort! Magnificent.

[multiweb]

Thanks Greg. :thumbsup: yeah they're starting to show up.

Thanks Peter. :thumbsup: Currently 10min subs but I can go as long as I need once the primary is locked in focus. Only limited by sky brightness.

:lol: Can you see the arrows on the sign? Another 6h and I'll get the lights on.

Thanks Mike. :thumbsup: Got yours as a reference on my desktop. Still a long way to go. :)

[Stevec35]

Looking very good already in my opinion Marc

Cheers

Steve

[Atmos]

The inverted image is showing its depth real nicely. You'd better bi-colour ;)

[rustigsmed]

Nice work Marc you've done well with the hyperstar there - I can't imagine trying to tame stars at that ratio ! Good outer detail coming through.

Russ

[multiweb]

Thanks Steve. :thumbsup: Still wanting to go a lot deeper though. The stuff I'm after is just barely starting to show now.


Thanks Colin.:thumbsup: Yeah that's the idea. Oiii will be next but that's going to be super hard from here. Ha first see how far I can go.


Thanks Russ. :thumbsup: I've spent years on and off modding and tweaking that C11. It's a bit of a frankenstein concoction now but it's doing the job as advertised. It weights a ton though, even with all the CF which makes it very akward to take on the field. The day I retire out of the smoke under darker skies I'll have a lot of fun with it. :)

[MortonH]

Wow - that's really cool.

[multiweb]

Thanks Morton. Got out last night again and added more hours. Seeing has been ok for the past few nights. Transparency so so. We had a big grass fire in Cecil Hills the night before and there was a lot of moisture in the air as well. All that makes it a bit harder to get that faint stuff. Just clocking subs makes it deeper each time. Will keep going tonight and Friday then I think that will be it for a while.

PS: Also attached one single sub to see the full field of the hyperstar. So the crops presented are very close to 1:1.

[strongmanmike]

Hey look!... a mini M&T image :D

Very deep and very cool :thumbsup:

Mike

[multiweb]

:lol: Mate, not even close... Mike's shot is better than GALEX. Never going to get that level of details and depth but it should make for a nice "wide field".

[Shano592]

Crikey O'Blimey, that is superb. I can't wait to see what this looks like at 100 hours...

[RickS]

Very deep, Marc!

[multiweb]

Thanks Shane. :thumbsup: 100 hours :eyepop: :lol: nah... not gonna happen. Would be a cool shot though. :)


Thanks mate. :thumbsup: Now it's starting to show better details. Soon I won't have to stretch it that hard. Hopefully. :)

[Octane]

This is looking fantastic! Can't wait to see the final result. :)

H

[multiweb]

Thanks mate. :thumbsup: Me too. Right now it's a race between dodging LP, fog, incoming bad seeing and end of week heat wave. :lol:

[strongmanmike]

Poor excuses :rolleyes:

:lol:

[multiweb]

I forgot I'm sleep deprived too. :D ... and Louie is imaging as well and keeps texting me... that's about it I think. :question:

[Placidus]

Wow! There is some incredibly faint stuff - a thick streak heading off radially toward four o'clock - which is visible in the GALEX image and therefore real.

[multiweb]

It's well defined in your image Mike, right on the edge of the frame. :thumbsup: Seeing's good tonight. Done 4 more subs so far. There is a bit of high altitude thin clouds but it's not too bad. The FWHM is better than yesterday at the same time. Will see how the night progress. Supposed to fog up later on. I'll grab what I can. Tomorrow night should still be ok. Then the Saturday heatwave will be upon us with the jetstream back to boot. Fun's over then :sadeyes:

[atalas]

:lol:

[multiweb]

Conditions have been less than ideal last night and tonight is heading the same way. Here's a shot of my rig under "the stars" if you can spot any.
Got nearly 30h now, smoother but no improvement in the faint stuff. It's going to be hard to process. But I have so many subs now maybe I can pick the ones with the best contrast.
I think imaging under light pollution, no matter what, has its limitations. You can't go fainter than your sky glow.

[RickS]

According to the maths you can, Marc, but it takes really, really long integration times and we'd rather be wine & cheesing :lol:

[multiweb]

Within my lifetime? :question:


Now you're talking... of course o'fromage!

[RobF]

Coming along very very nicely Marc. Glad to see you've been stubborn and squeezing every available photon!

[multiweb]

Tonight I'll be passing the 200x600s mark so I'd better get something for it on the other end or sh|t's gonna get hectic... Will have to be very creative with processing. I might even use PixInsight. :scared3:

[RobF]

Didn't realise the situation was getting so serious!! ;)

[multiweb]

Probably just caffeine talking... :)
Last night was a bit better with transparency. Seeing was also still ok but gone now and it's getting hot. Bit of clouds out west after 2:00am so I slew to M42 to finish the night until sunrise. Certainly got a lot more to show for it in the 3h I did than the 37h on the Helix. Was starting to wonder If I had forgotten to take the lid off the scope. :lol:

[DJT]

Wow! Deeep! Keep going ;)

[multiweb]

Nope. This is it. :) Just going to take my time to process it now and get the most out of it. Doing some darks and flats tomorrow indoors.

[Peter Ward]

Impressively deep. Nice one :thumbsup:

[multiweb]

Thanks Peter. :thumbsup:

Well that's it for me. Out of 37h I have culled down the best subs to a total of 25.5h so 153x10min subs. It is smoother but the sky glow makes it too hard to bring the faint stuff out of the background so my next go on the new moon will be from a dark site with longer exposures, weather pending.

Normal [1731x1620 - 1.4MB] (http://www.astropic.space/astro/NGC7293_Ha_HS3_153_fff.jpg)
Inverted [1731x1620 - 2.1MB] (http://www.astropic.space/astro/NGC7293_Ha_HS3_I_153_fff.jpg)

[Placidus]

Amazing how much you've pulled out there, Marc. The super-faint twisty stalk heading off toward 4 o'clock is definitely there now.

[Atmos]

Really nice Marc! We are in a strange photographic field where sometimes less is more ;)
Culling 10+ hours of data improves a final image stack.

[multiweb]

Thanks very much Mike for your help, encouragement and inspiration. :thumbsup: Looking very much forward to a reshoot at Placidus. :cool:



Thanks Colin. :thumbsup: In the end, even keeping only cloud free subs shot close to the zenith still proved to be very complicated to get rid of gradients and light pollution. I hear it's possible to get signal from heavily light polluted areas but I just don't have the processing skills nor the patience to deal with the situation. I'm at an impasse. So it's off to the styx next and take the easy way out. :lol:

[Retrograde]

This is phenomenally deep. Well done!

[multiweb]

Thanks Pete. :thumbsup: but will definitely revisit :)