New rig - first picture

Gavin1234 · #1 22-07-2018, 10:54 PM

Hi, I upgraded my gear this weekend. I bought a celestron 5se as my first scope 4 months ago and I’ve been using that with a canon 80d which was great to start out with. But I wasn’t happy with that anymore. So I got an Esprit 100ed, a Celestron CGX Mount and an ASI071MC Pro cooled camera.

Really happy with this setup. A few teething problems with the camera but I’m starting to get the hang of it. I managed to take my first picture tonight. It’s only my 4th time trying to process a picture which probably shows and I don’t think my alignment on mount was right either so obviously I have a long way to go but I’m just happy to even take a photo of a DSO. Here’s a picture of the rig and my first dso picture.

I want to go back into photoshop with this pic tomorrow and try to figure out how to make the black look blacker and see if I can make it look less busy. It kinda looks like there’s too many stars. Any hints or suggestions would be appreciated.

LewisM · #2 22-07-2018, 11:56 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Gavin1234

...to make the black look blacker and see if I can make it look less busy. It kinda looks like there’s too many stars. Any hints or suggestions would be appreciated.

That's because there are LOTS of stars in that area. See my M20 / partial M8: https://www.astrobin.com/full/352941/B/

Don't make the black darker.

barx1963 (Malcolm) · #3 23-07-2018, 12:32 AM

Yep, what Lewis said!! There is a temptation to try and make the sky "black". I have yet to see a black sky, even at "dark Sky sites, the sky is never black.
Anyway, that is a very impressive FOV for that setup. Very nice and great effort at processing.

Malcolm

Gavin1234 · #4 23-07-2018, 06:10 AM

Thanks. I actually cropped quite a bit off it.

sil (Steve) · #5 23-07-2018, 11:09 AM

Agree with Lewis. The black looks fine. Something you might want to look into is processing to reduce star size. I'm not sure if the star colours are accurate here but reducing star size reduces that cluttered look from all those over exposed cores. You could also look into HDR processing to reduce all the white core in the nebulosity to give a bit more colour and detail out. But withboth, be subtle not agressive with your approach. Its a good shot as is from what it looks like here on my calibrated monitor, so I assume you've got a calibrated setup. If not address that first as you will only ruin the shot at this point.

xelasnave · #6 23-07-2018, 05:27 PM

I love your rig.
Great image. Just for fun turn up your brightness and contrast to see if you can see how busy the bach ground is...you should get some magic images with that ... I want one but havent got round to getting one. The images they produce seem pretty flash.
I have the little 80 mm and I am most impressed. So happy with the focuser.
OK fire away.
Alex

LewisM · #7 23-07-2018, 05:57 PM

Just a little fiddle in PixInsight with the jpeg posted (best I could do without having the raw full data images):

kosborn (Kevin) · #8 23-07-2018, 06:54 PM

Great pic. You're going to love the Esprit. I've had mine since February and enjoy using it every time. Keep in mind the field flattener that comes with the Esprit needs 63mm spacing to the sensor. Out of the box with the attachments provided it's perfect for a Canon DSLR but will need adjustment for your ASI071MC. If you look in the corners you'll see the stars are elongated towards the center which says your flattener/sensor distance isn't quite right. Looking at your configuration you look a bit short on distance. I've been putting up with the same problem until last week when I bought some M42 spacers. I'm still out by about 2mm but that is close enough that any elongation isn't really visible.

Kevin

Gavin1234 · #9 23-07-2018, 10:20 PM

Thanks so much for all the feedback and advice, I really appreciate it.
I see now that there just a lot of stars in that area. Haha at first I thought I had some sort of stacking error and it was doubling up on them.

Lewis, I really like the blue in your m20 looks amazing.

Sil, I don’t have a calibrated monitor as far as I know, just a normal one. But I’m going to read up on that right now. Will also look into HDR and star size reduction. The blown out white core in the middle of my m8 is what I want to address the most now.

Thanks Alex and Kevin. The camera is what I’m struggling with the most so far. I’m using the two spacers that came with the camera 16.5 mm and 21mm connected together but still spending a lot time getting focus and gain set (mainly focus). Once I can see a star on my screen Im ok. I can get to about 1.75 HFR. But I spend a lot of time with a black screen just wandering through the range of my focuser until I eventually stumble on a faint signal of a star. It’s taking up a lot of my time.

I haven’t tried the field flattener yet (or looked up what it does either lol). I’ll also look into the m42 spacers but I really need to keep reading up on this side of things because I don’t really have a good understanding of how the spacers and camera work yet.

Next Saturday I’m getting a zwo 30f4 guidescope and a ASI 174MM mini autoguider camera as well. This will add more to learn but I’ve read a fair bit about guiding already so I at least understand the concept. Any thoughts on those two items? I’ve been told they’re good options.

Once again thanks everyone for your very helpful comments.

kosborn (Kevin) · #10 23-07-2018, 10:56 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Gavin1234

I haven’t tried the field flattener yet (or looked up what it does either lol). I’ll also look into the m42 spacers but I really need to keep reading up on this side of things because I don’t really have a good understanding of how the spacers and camera work yet.

Oh, OK that explains it. That's why the stars are elongated in the corners. The flattener will give you round stars right to the edges of your sensor and is definitely worth adding to the imaging train. With your camera, the sensor is 17.5mm from the front edge of the camera body. The flattener comes with an adapter that is 8mm width. You will then need 37.5mm of spacers (which you already have) to get perfect stars all the way to the edges of the image. All you need to do is screw the flattener on the telescope side of your spacers and you will be set.

Kevin

kosborn (Kevin) · #11 23-07-2018, 10:58 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Gavin1234

I haven’t tried the field flattener yet (or looked up what it does either lol). I’ll also look into the m42 spacers but I really need to keep reading up on this side of things because I don’t really have a good understanding of how the spacers and camera work yet.

Oh, OK that explains it. That's why the stars are elongated in the corners. The flattener will give you round stars right to the edges of your sensor and is definitely worth adding to the imaging train. It must be 63mm from the sensor. With your camera, the sensor is 17.5mm from the front edge of the camera body. The flattener comes with an adapter that is 8mm width. You will then need 37.5mm of spacers (which you already have) to get perfect stars all the way to the edges of the image. All you need to do is screw the flattener on the telescope side of your spacers and you will be set.

Kevin

Gavin1234 · #12 23-07-2018, 11:12 PM

Awesome. Thanks Kevin will add the flattener tomorrow.