Markarian's chain - 27 seconds test

[SimmoW]

Hmm, I was THAT close to mothballing my Sony A7s. Images with my 6nm ha filter were terribly noisy.

but the last lot of plain ole RGB images I nabbed with the 10 inch setup have saved its bacon! Maybe its the combo of dark skies too? Don't care, I'm keeping it and will grab 5min subs asap with decent collimation and focus to boot. I was so excited to see these faint fuzzies and details that I just had to share. Sorry for my enthusiasm!

32 lots of 27 secs and 6 lots of 1 min each. No real logic to the selection, was just pleased the whole system was working together (don't ask how hard it's been...)

Higher rez (https://www.flickr.com/photos/48232585@N00/38604586940/)

[RickS]

Nice one, Simon. A bit of noise reduction and it would polish up well :)

[SimmoW]

Thanks Rick. I did some minor ACDNR but not work spending a long time on it as yeah, it's only a test. Never imaged the region before, so was a bit gobsmacked.

[RickS]

I have a heap of data for a mosaic of the region that I must get around to processing one day... I just know it will take me a couple of weeks once I get started :)

[Placidus]

Awesome! Fantastic result. Perhaps worth collecting even more data, given how much you've achieved so far. :thumbsup::thumbsup::thumbsup:

[SimmoW]

Thanks Trish, yes I'm addicted to this area now so will definitely get much more data next dark sky time. Moon up now, grrr...

[Ross G]

Great capture Simon.

Good luck.

Ross.

[alpal]

Interesting pic but that collimation is frightening.
I hope you can figure it out.
I had to use a Takahashi Barlow with my laser collimator to
reflect a black paper re-enforcement circle from the primary mirror back to the laser window
to get my 10" f4 right - then it was easy.
My Baader RCC was already set to the right length from my previous telescope.
https://www.flickr.com/photos/24719437@N03/8029429824/in/photostream


cheers
Allan

[multiweb]

Impressive for the integration time. :thumbsup: I had my eyes on the A7s couple of years back but a bit rich for me.

[Atmos]

For such short exposure and limited data you’ve got a really nice shot in the end :)

[atalas]

I'm scratching my head why this looks deep in such a short exposure...very promising Simmo :thumbsup:

[strongmanmike]

Overall a pretty damn good result considering, I can see why you are happy :thumbsup: Will you be able to adjust to fix the stars across the top of the image, looks like perhaps some field rotation too..? The bottom left quadrant looks spot on though :thumbsup:

Mike

[SimmoW]

Thanks everyone for your observations and suggestions.

Mike, the collimation was way off, just lazy due to test.

I'll post my other Cone image today, Andy noticed my seagulls. The cam is full frame but I fear my RCC1 corrector is not up to the task at the edges. No matter, a bit of cropping can help. I think as it has 91mm backfocus, it can't possibly do well at the extremes? I never had such probs with my Tak.

I also see the long image train and connections have a bit of play in them, so sensor tilt won't help.and every time I rotate the cam it'll change.

Louie, I will be doing 5 min subs on this soon I hope, getting real detail and colours is the big test!

Thanks COLIN, I'm hoping the combo works well. It is great for RUB but I feel noise is too high being uncooled. Maybe doubling subs or dithering might help?

Marc, Thanks, and I'm in the beta program for ASCOM for this camera. But sadly you need to upgrade firmware to 3.2 meaning I would get the dreaded star eater feature after 30sec. Will need to test 30 sec subs....

Alan, I have a Howie glatter laser and tublug, so when I actually spend the time, coll is pretty good. But coma at edges is bad as noted.

What I need to do soon is compare efficiency to my asi1600, then hopefully just use the 1600 that supports elec focusing so much better