Ngc 1398

[DiscoDuck]

About 10 hours luminance + 1.5 hours each of RGB with an RC8 and a ZWO 294MM-Pro on an AP Mach1 from a trip to a dark sky site last weekend.

This is still a new camera for me, and I am struggling to get a well-corrected flat field. But cropped the issues away in this case :)

Loved all the background galaxies in this area.

Astrobin version is here (https://www.astrobin.com/ckocle/). Comments and suggestions, as always, more than welcome.

Paul

[codemonkey]

That's a cracker Paul! Well done.

[Placidus]

Exquisitely beautiful.


Such a tidy, orderly galaxy. Bet the people there all drive at the speed limit and park within the lines.

[multiweb]

:eyepop: That is seriously good. :bowdown:
You've got that scope dialled to 11.

[gregbradley]

I agree that is a wonderful image. I love this galaxy, its so picturesque.

But its rising very late so you must have been imaging late for this?

Greg.

[DiscoDuck]

Thanks Lee.



:D

Thank you, Mike and Trish.



Thanks Marc. Actually, having trouble with the field not being flat enough with the slightly different sensor than my old 1600, plus vignetting in the corners that flats not correcting. Thankfully in this case, I planned to crop down anyway.



Thanks Greg. Yeah. I try to make the most of time away. So all-nighters for me :( I imaged NGC 6188 during the first half of the night and switched to this after midnight - and let it run through to 5am on those nights without cloud.

[alpal]

Excellent image Paul.
You could have even jazzed it up with a bit more
local enhancement color saturation in the galaxy.


cheers
Allan

[AdamJL]

First class, that is beautiful

[DiscoDuck]

Thanks Allan. That's worth a try. Ta.



Thanks Adam.

[strongmanmike]

Top shot Paul, great image of one of the most beautiful galaxies, the effort you went to to acquire and process were well worth it :thumbsup:

Mike

[Mickoid]

This is such a wonderful image to look at Paul. A magnificent job done on capturing and processing this and so many interesting objects to peruse in the background. Pat on the back for you! :thumbsup:

[DiscoDuck]

Thank you, Michaels :)

[gregbradley]

Use flat darks and no bias with these cameras. Perhaps that will help.

I have the QHY294m and used it to an extent. I don't recall issues with flats. Flats can look odd with this sensor, but from what I have read it calibrates fine.

One area your image could be better, the outer rings are usually shown as being blue. Quite blue in some images. You could up the blues.

Greg.

[DiscoDuck]

Thanks Greg. Will look at the blues.

Yep - I don't use biases and do use flat darks. Did same with the 1600MM.

Re flats, yeah the Ha and SII are really odd, but calibrate out. What I have an issue with is the brightness of the corners of the lum dropping off a bit too much and not calibrating properly - I end up with a bright band near a couple of corners. I have 31mm filters and have them a tad further from the camera than normal as I have the filter wheel backwards!!

With the wheel in the correct way round and the Ha filters one (the correct) way, the Ha flats were very very odd - i.e. serious reflections that were way beyond calibration. But I might try it back with the wheel the right way round but with the narrowband filters the other (wrong!) way (i.e. reflective surface to the camera). I'll see if the lum is closer to working like that.

Oh - and an extra thing to address at the same time is my reducer flattened enough for the 1600 in the corners. It is not doing it for the 294 as I think those corners are a little bit further out (only about 4 or 5% but enough to cause an issue). So I need to move the reducer (closer??) at the same time to see if it helps. It'll give me a smaller image scale too - which I'd prefer, as I like about 0.7" per pixel. But with the OAG to contend with too, I might be lucky to find a solution where everything fits!!!

Some experimentation to do :)