Cats Paw with my 25 year old scope.

[cometcatcher]

Too much dew for the 8" so used my trusty 25 year old 6" F5 Newtonian that has a dew resistant baffle. I made the tube using hexagonal formers so the spider that I also made is a 3 vane, hence the 6 diffraction spikes. Can't wait to try this with my 10"!

NGC 6334 (also known as the Cat's Paw Nebula, Bear Claw Nebula and Gum 64) is an emission nebula located in the constellation Scorpius. It was discovered by astronomer John Herschel in 1837, who observed it from the Cape of Good Hope in South Africa. Distance 5500 light years.

Home made 6" F5 Newtonian with Meade optics, Baader MPCC MKIII, Baader Semi-Apo filter (also enhances nebula) 448 x 30 seconds, HEQ5 Pro unguided, Pentax K-5 (not modified or cooled).

The full field is at Astrobin. ---> http://astrob.in/179931/0/

[cometcatcher]

Just for larfs this is what 1 subs looks like.

[marco]

..as I have just wrote on another post, impressive result for a DSLR! Color balance is spot on, congratulations!
Marco

[RickS]

There's not much data in a single sub, Kevin! You did well to pull such a nice image out of that.

Cheers,
Rick.

[cometcatcher]

Thanks again Marco!



Thanks Rick! When I saw the sub in the viewfinder I thought this would be a dismal failure but persisted just the same. Glad I did now.

[jase]

The old scope looks a keeper, Kevin! Fantastic rendition of this target. Well done.

[cometcatcher]

Thanks Jason! I refurbished it with a new focuser which makes a world of difference. I also added a right angle finder. It needs a new coat of paint which I will get around to one year lol.

[Ross G]

Nice photo Kevin.

Good to get the "old toys" out sometimes.

Ross.

[cometcatcher]

It is indeed Ross, thanks.

[strongmanmike]

Yeah Kev, this is a great rendition of this baby, while it is correctly coloured red you also have some subtle colour variation too which is good to see, great field too :thumbsup:

Mike

[MGTechDVP]

Great result... one on my to do list, never attempted the cat's paw yet....
I said it before and I'll say it again.. who said DSLR is no good and you need a CCD to do astro imaging....

Awesome image, well done, especially on a unmodded camera.

[andyc]

This image is almost astonishing. I'm quite conscious of the value of many subs in smoothing noise levels, but this is a brilliant demonstration. I'm seriously tempted to try doing lots of 2-minute exposures rather than my usual 5 minutes, simply to up the number of subs and get closer to this level of noise smoothing for a similar imaging time. Though the eyes water at the thought of anywhere near 448 RAW files! Very impressive indeed for 30 second subs. :thumbsup:

[rmuhlack]

very nice work there Kevin! :thumbsup:

[cometcatcher]

Thanks Mike! The Baader filter seems to allow a good balance of Ha and OIII for my camera, while the CLS is mostly Ha. Sometimes it helps to mix them.



Thanks Marius! I know my DSLR will never match a CCD but I like the thing lol. It's compact and, well... cheap.



Thanks Andy! 448 RAW files do tie the computer up for a while, but I can still browse while is crunching away. I'm only using an i5 laptop as well.



Thanks Richard!