Omega Centauri

[ReaPerMan]

I managed to get a bit of time in last night before dew and thin high cloud became a problem. Had to throw away nearly half the subs but here is a little Omega Centauri

LRGB 30,15,15,15

Thanks for looking

Paul :thumbsup:

[MrB]

Looks nice Paul, this was with the 12"? What corrector are you using?

I had the same problem with the cloud. Got off work early to set up but had many setbacks.
Ascom kept giving me blue screens, eventually worked out it was eqmod's fault. By the time I had all that sorted I only got one 10 min sub in before the cloud. After the first wave had passed I was able to get an hours worth on M8 before the clouds were set for the night :( Better than nothing I s'pose.

[ReaPerMan]

Hi Simon,

Yep I was inside watching what was going on with Teamviewer and I was wondering why my tracking was having occasional blips and going a bit nuts! This was the thin cloud streaming by and screwing things up. When I went outside I saw that things had deteriorated and eventually called it a bit before midnight.

This was with the 12" and I have the 3" ASA Wynne corrector. Working quite nicely now that I've got it all set up. Having built the Obs at Christmas time has provided the next biggest improvement as it's a pure joy just to wander out roll off the roof and fire it all up. Takes out so much hassle from the whole image acquisition process.

Here's a couple of tracking captures from when it was going OK

All the best

Paul :thumbsup:

[MrB]

Yes that is the problem I'm having with the 2" 0.73x Wynne. Just don't get enough free clear nights to get the spacing right.

Would love an obs, but until I get out of this rental I'll just have to be content with a pier. Atleast I don't have to realign each time.

[ReaPerMan]

I hear you there. I took nearly 2 months to get the spacing and collimation right. I was getting so frustrated that i nearly gave up. Suddenly there was the Ah Ha moment and it all came good. I had heard how frustrating it could be to have a fast Newt and they were right. But now that it"s working it"s totally worth it.

All the best

Paul

[The_Cat]

Good one Paul.

Omega Cen is always a tough one so this is very nice. Have you tried to use HDR processing? Many moons ago I had a go at this object with about 10 exposures ranging from 1s to 512 sec using my EOS 350D and the results were quite good. i processed the images using a program called
Photomatix. I could dig it up to show you if you lke?

Jeremy.

[ReaPerMan]

Thank you Jeremy,

I haven't tried the HDR approach on this object before, and whilst realising it was bright I was a little slack and didn't span out my image capture like I would for M42 or the like. I haven't heard of that program before. Thanks for the tip,
I'd would like to see what the result was.
all the best

Paul

[The_Cat]

Here's my attempt.

Unless I am really serious, when using the DSLR, I do not take darks but rely on the camera dark frame processing.

Jeremy.

[MrB]

Oh I did give up. The newt got shelved and I used the little 70mm refractor for many months. Now the new bub has settled a bit I've got a little more time to have another crack at it.
To add to my woes it's not just the spacing and collimation I'm fighting with but also some tilt in the feathertouch.