Quote:
Originally Posted by AlexN
Awesome!!
I've been meaning to point to one of these dusty targets but my usual setup location prevents targets much past -70° Dec.
Do you find that you have any tracking difficulty this close to the pole?
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Thanks Alex.
I'm a very long way south compared to you, so Chamaeleon sits much higher in the sky for me. The only challenge is the neighbour's oak tree which is immediately below the south celestial pole! With good polar alignment, I can get around 0.5" RMS error tracking according to PHD2. The Esprit100 and ASI2600mc I used for this image gives me a pixel scale of about 1.4"/pixel, so the stars are nice and pin point at that error, and I could still tolerate a much higher tracking error without really affecting the image too much.
I've recently converted to NINA for imaging which has a very accurate 3 point polar alignment plugin. It also has a great framing wizard that lets you search by object types and altitude (e.g. dark nebulae above -70° Dec).
Cheers, Kevin