Good morning!
I'm very excited today
It's been almost 5 months since I last imaged anything useful, and also been 5 months since I've posted an image here. Well today that changes. Having spent that time going through many, many equipment and guiding options I've finally settled on a setup and will now focus on imaging itself. The first 4 images here were all taken on the one night (Friday) and the latter 2 were taken last night at 4am (after a big night out in the city with friends - they all think I'm slightly crazy
). I'd like to add that these are purely 'proof of concept' images to test out how everything was going. I have used no flats, bias or dark frames and my
RC8 is very, very much out of collimation (And it kinda shows I know
). In fact I havent even touched it since I bought it! This gross mis-collimation is further accentuated when using my 0.67x reducer (spacing is not correct either). And for the first 4 images I think my OAG mirror was slightly protruding in front of the CCD so one particular edge would always be darker. So with all that being said, here is my recount for the night(s) in order that they were taken:
General setup
Mount: NEQ6
Imaging Train: RC8 - Reducer (Optional) - OAG - FW (Baader 2" Ha) - QHY9M
Guiding: Lodestar used with a TSOAG9, 1sec guiding
Image processing: Captured in Maxim 5, 'On the fly' stacking in DSS & editing in Photoshop CS3 (These were just rough and dirty images I put together whilst in between targets)
Tarantula (11pm)
4*600sec 1x1
Seeing was atrocious, the temperature was hovering around 27 and the stars were twinkling like mad! I think my focus was off too, but I was just too excited to finally use my new setup to really care. I also took 4*600sec OIII subs to try my hand at Bi-colour NB processing but the seeing really put me off, the resulting image looked pretty average so left it out.
Gabriela Mistral (1.30am)
1*600sec + 3*900sec 2x2 + CCDT67
Seeing started becoming better but I decided to use my 0.67x reducer for the rest of the night otherwise I'd be sampling at 0.61 arcsec/pixel and probably wouldn't be much point. Focus was much better too. I also started binning 2x2 for funsies. I was quite happy with this, there's alot going on in this region. Definitely looking forward to a NB composite of this with no reducer!
Chook (3am)
3*900sec 2x2 + CCDT67
Getting the composition right was difficult but not a bad image. Focus started becoming worse here but I didnt notice.
NGC 3603 (4am)
1*3600sec 1x1 + CCDT67
I was stunned by this image. I've actually never imaged this nebula before and didn't know what to expect, it's just such a complex and beautiful nebula. I did it just to see if I could do a 60min sub and it worked out quite well so I feel that this is my best work for this night. I did get some field rotation since my PA isn't really all that flash. Focus wasn't that great again grrrr.
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At this point I packed up for the night. Only the next morning did I see the focus issue, and came to the conclusion I must be getting a little drawer slippage. This proved to be right because the next night when I imaged, over 4 subs you could see the image becoming more and more out of focus. I'll see how I go next time but now I'll be more mindful of it. It's odd because I use a Bahtinov mask and tightened the focuser tube in place quite hard, maybe its a temperature effect? Anywhos then saturday got home at ~3am from the city and saw that it was clear and decided why not
NGC 3603 (4am)
3*900sec 1x1
I wanted to focus on one part of the nebula which I liked the most, no reducer or binning this time. Turned it on and went inside, came out and realised I had 45min worth of out of focus data and got very annoyed as I had the focus spot on before I turned it on. You could see that the drawer was slipping as the stars got worse and worse. I then took another 2*900sec subs which were much better but by this time dawn was approaching and all the faint nebulosity got lost in the bright background. So all in all it ended being a useless exercise
but it made me realise how much more depth I got with the previous 60min sub.
Keyhole (5.30am)
3*600sec 1x1
By far the best work I've done to date with the QHY9. With dawn approaching and it becoming light enough for me to see without needing a torch, I decided to image something really bright. I tried staying away from Eta cause lets be honest - almost everyone images this!! But I was very very very content with this. Focus was pretty good, lots of detail and only 30min of my life needed for it
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Well, that concludes my essay on the topic of 'Your imaging weekend'. Please critique my work and tell me where I can improve and your thoughts
I hope one day I'll be there with the titans here on ISS who take such stunning images on this forum, and regularly too! One day hehe
Clear skies and thanks for reading!
Just thinking about that scares me to bits. Not that it should as I would never be able to do that with a dslr.
. Looking forward to more images from you.
