M83

[Paulyman]

Managed to get out on Friday night for the first time in nearly two months. I spent an hour or so testing out the new focus motor on the WO Star 71 and it worked brilliantly. The belt mod on the HEQ5 was also working fantastically, I managed less than 1 arc second guiding and could finally try dithering. I kept it at a low to moderate dither in BYEOS but the mount stood up to that so will up it a bit next time out.

After playing around with focus and since the mount was playing well I swung over to M83. I only managed 1.5 hours of 5 minute subs at ISO 800 but the when the integrated image popped up in PixInsight it was noticeably less noisy than previous images. I have only done a light process on it just to see what dithering has brought to the table and am optimistic. Seeing Martins awesome efforts I'm hoping that with 3-4 times the data this should start to look really nice.

Note - The CLS filter really messes with colour prior to careful processing, which I didn't do here so the colours of the stars are horrid. JPG compression hasn't been kind either.

[Startrek]

Paul
I think your refractor scope has an aperture of 71mm and focal length of 350mm ?
To get an image of M83 with those numbers is pretty darn good to say the least
M83 is a dim object and requires some decent focal length ( and aperture)
I’m flattered by your comments about my M83 but my scope has 200mm of superstore and a focal length of 1000mm and can successfully image dim objects like galaxies etc that’s why I upgraded from my 6” f6
Great image considering your equipment !!!
Cheers

[Paulyman]

Cheers Martin. I realise my scope isn’t going to resolve much in the way of fine detail. But hopefully with data I can get a nice wider field image, to show off the inky blackness of space with a small lonely speck of a galaxy near centre field?

[sil]

I like this shot as a piece of photography, to me it conveys sadness. a small island of a galaxy in a giant empty sea of stars. cropping and working to bring out the reds would ruin the effect. its a shot I would hang on the wall purely for artistic reasons. odd, AP are just AP to me, rare I find any of artistic interest.

[Screwdriverone]

Hi Paul,

The secret to killing the blue cast, is to load the CLS filter into the camera, snap on a lens (or use the telescope) and take a picture of a white piece of paper in the sun (no shadows on it) and then set the custom white balance of the camera to that shot.

When taking photos using the CLS filter through the scope, the custom white balance (which is of course, blue) will be used to remove the blue cast on astro photos, leaving you with correct colours, that you don't have to process out.

Give it a go, I had the CLS filter installed permanently on my Canon 1000D and never had a blue cast problem once the CWB was set and stored in the camera.

Nice image of M83, btw.

Cheers

Chris