Taking flats remotely

[Somnium]

in the past i have taken flats with my light box which gave me great, evenly illuminated flat images. since setting up the observatory i thought i would take flats before an imaging session during dusk but i have found there is about a 15 min window where i am not shooting many stars and my sensor is not being saturated which makes it difficult to get the flats i need. granted i am shooting at f4 (10") with a 8300 sensor so i might get a bit more range when i am shooting at higher f and a different sensor. regardless, i am thinking that it would be better to get flats that are taken off a consistent and even field.

i just wanted to get a feel for what others use ...

there is this option http://www.optecinc.com/astronomy/catalog/alnitak/flatmanxl.htm

a little expensive so i was thinking of making one.

maybe converting one of these
http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/ECO-Light-40-Watt-High-Output-595-x-595-LED-Panel-/191606944777

[RickS]

I capture dawn and dusk sky flats using ACP and two sessions are adequate to capture a dozen flats for each filter (full set of LRGB and Ha/Oiii/Sii). That gets me to my target of 500Ke- per flat master. Fortunately, my camera has deep wells so 12 flats is plenty, but it also has slow downloads and a smaller sensor would probably be able to capture more flats in the available time.

ACP automates the process nicely, tracking the anti-solar point and taking test exposures to judge the right time to start flats for each filter. It would be difficult to do effectively as a manual process.

Cheers,
Rick.