Silver dollar per hour.....

[Peter Ward]

Ray's interesting post reminded me it is indeed Ngc 253 season! :)

The attached also shows what's possible from "the burb's" ...but I candidly admit the L data attached took me nearly 10x longer (9x 10 minute subs)

I was also being dogged by an annoying reflection that produced the faint arcs top right of frame (which thankfully has now been tracked down due a shiny
surface at the very rear of the baffle tube :doh: now eradicated! )

Sadly no colour...and of course the new moon weather doesn't look good...again.

Also I pulled the field corrector for this data set, hence the slight elongation
of stars at the edge of field.

[Slawomir]

Nice result Peter; a big scope on a quality mount certainly makes a difference :thumbsup:

Just to clarify, the exposure for luminance in your version is 15 times longer, not "nearly 10x" :)

[codemonkey]

A better comparison, yet still weighted in your favour, would be to show a single one of your subs.

[Peter Ward]

I was comparing total exposure times...but...What can I say? ...there are three types of people in this world, those that can count, and those that can't :)

[Peter Ward]

Ask and ye shall receive! :) (attached is a 600 second sub exposure, cropped due my inability to locate the matching flat field, for your perusal)

[silv]

:D

good image, yeah. and actually thanks for posting in b/w. These days, I get a kick out of every b&w version of any object because I can appreciate the details more without being overwhelmed by (beautiful) color.

[silv]

OMG!
HOW did you get rid of THAT noise?????

[Peter Ward]

Discussions about read noise not withstanding, the (antiquated, I know :) ) STX16803 running at -30C doesn't kick out too many thermal electrons.

But the background is hardly smooth....a good deal of "grain" is indeed present with just one sub.

[Atmos]

That's really nice Peter, what was your seeing like on that? Your single image is showing more than my near 2 hour stack.
I took it last weekend and has quite poor seeing (3.6") which isn't that unusual for this year :/

[Peter Ward]

Seeing rarely goes below 2 arc sec for me...and if it does I'm either away/asleep or it's a full moon :lol:

Best guess?.... about 2.2 arc sec.

That said....everything was working well on the night...AO-X was humming
and the scope/mount performed as per specification.

Yes, this "uber" system (Alluna RC16 +Zerodur/PMEII) sure cost me some $$$....but, hey, good nights are too rare to waste these days.

[Andy01]

Looks great Peter, terrific result from the 'burbs. :thumbsup:
Would love to attend a talk one day when hopefully you can share with us how you get such great LRGB results from light pollutionville. :D

[Peter Ward]

Well...I've now given a couple of talks at Sydney Observatory

The first was:
https://maas.museum/observations/2013/09/26/urban-ccd-imaging-capture-the-stars-from-your-own-backyard-a-skywatcher-presentation-by-peter-ward/


The second was last week :eyepop: ....sorry no Blog as yet.

[Shiraz]

nice result Peter - resolution looks great.

[Placidus]

Remarkably sharp image, Peter.

Just had another look at your colour 253 from last year. Also extremely sharp and wonderful contrast in the dust fountains.

[Regulus]

That's excellent.

Trev