First light TEC180mm Fluorite 15:20 hours

[gregbradley]

This is first light for this magnificent telescope.

I thought I would do a classic - The Horsehead Nebula.

Longest exposure time ever for me. A total of 15 hours and 20 minutes.

TEC180mm fluorite triplet with TEC field flattener at F7, FLI Microline 8300, Astronomik RGB filters, Baader clear filter (no UV or IR coating for maximum transmission), Astrodon 5nm Ha filter.

Tak NJP mount, taken at my dark site over 2 trips.

HaLLRGB 450 120 120 120 110 120 for a total of 15 hours and 20 minutes (same luminance used twice in the image).

The Ha on this object is very dim but the clear filter really worked well so a 10 minute subexposure was quite bright and detailed.

NJP mount handles this scope (probably only just) which weighs about the same as my AP140 (16.5kgs).

My favorite is the crop:

Horsehead crop http://upload.pbase.com/gregbradley/image/108303578/large

usual size:

http://www.pbase.com/gregbradley/image/108338629

Large for the explorers:

http://www.pbase.com/image/108339034

I am stoked with the performance of this scope.:thumbsup:

Here is a link to a photo of the setup:

http://www.pbase.com/gregbradley/image/108063178

Greg.

[atalas]

Awesome detail Greg ! great work dude.

[Octane]

Greg,

Wow, just wow. You must be a very proud father.

Mate, the last link isn't working.

Regards,
Humayun

[leon]

Bugger the last link Humayan, :whistle: we have seen enough, :eyepop: stunning work Greg and so clear, very nicely captured :thumbsup:
Leon :thumbsup:

[avandonk]

Looks very good to me Greg. There is subtle detail I have never seen before everywhere!

Bert

[Matty P]

:eyepop:

That is a ripper Greg. I love the detail in the darker parts of the nebula. Awesome!

:thumbsup:

[browndog]

That is a seriously excellent image :eyepop:.

Great image to open the account - perhaps one of the best shots I've see. :thumbsup:

[renormalised]

That's not just APOD material, that's "APOY" (Astronomy Photo of the Year) material!!!!:eyepop:

Sure you weren't flying past there and took the piccie from close up!!!:P:D

Excellent, excellent piccie and a great job:D

[Hagar]

WOW, The detail is magnificent. What a grasp on light. I can't wait to see something quite delicate like Crab Neb.

Lovely detailed image.

[gregbradley]

Thanks mate, I've fixed it now.

Greg.

[multiweb]

:eyepop:Amazing details. This is a really nice picture. :thumbsup:

[strongmanmike]

Yep, great first light Greg :thumbsup: :thumbsup: :thumbsup:

Although it is a good image, with so much data it looks like you have rushed the processing just a tad (nothing a repro wont fix :D) but never the less....you have a great scope there I can see and as I predicted already, I recon you will do lots with this scope and the big 16803 chip now ;).

By the way what was the effect of bright Alnitak? Did it cause rays in the image that you had to work on?

Aaaaaand how do get to do sooooooooooooooooooooo much imaging mate?? Sheesh :doh:

Mike

[Garyh]

Awesome Greg! love the crop! a very noble subject for first light! :thumbsup:
But like Strongman guy above...where did you steal all that clear dark sky from to image? huh huh?..lol ...darn gets cloudy every evening here lately!
cheers Gary

[alan meehan]

BRILLIANT,right tools for the tradesman well done greg

[jjjnettie]

Awesome! Such detail.

[Lester]

Outstanding image Greg, the resolving ability of your instrument is really bringing a lot of detail into view.

Good on ya.

[bloodhound31]

I just want to give up now and see what you come up with.....

[AlexN]

Greg.... Daaaaaaaaammmmmnnn!! The detail is immense.. I love the faint detail in and around the horsehead.. little tendrils of dust and cloud...

That scope is a MONSTER!!! The pics of it that you showed earlier on the floor, and in its case just did not do it justice... Up on that NJP its just MASSIVE! I love it!

Ps - Faaantastic first light mate... Absolutely stunning in every respect.. As Doug said, I cant wait to see something very delicate from this scope...

Despite saying so much in this post.. im rather speechless ! :)

[gregbradley]

Thanks Mike. Not rushed, I did 12 versions and from the ground up twice.
You can always change something around. I sat on it for a while until it wasn't improving so I am happy with the processing at this point.

My dark site has reverted back to its former weather patterns which is clear skies all night 8 out of 10 nights. Last year it went through a wet and cloudy period where it was cloudy in the no moon week 8 out of 10 times.

So for example last weekend I had 3 and half clear nights where Sydney probably was cloudy all night.

Greg.

[strongmanmike]

Only 12 versions, com'on you can do more :rofl:



Hmmm? sounds familiar :P

Sheesh sounds like you live in the Andes :eyepop:

Lovely Horsey

You didn't say how Alnitak behaved in your image..?

Mike

[gregbradley]

Hi Mike.

You're right, I actually did 14 versions but whose counting!

Alnitak wan't a problem at all. Perhaps the baffling in the scope handled that. I did have a few subs where the framing shifted a bit during focusing and I didn't pick it up and it showed Alnitak starting to cause a small reflection. I was surprised by the lack of light rays and I put it down to the excellent baffling as well as excellent anti reflection coatings and extremely black absorbing paint. No doubt the fluorite element has an impact on that as well with less scatter.

Yuri uses this extremely black super absorbing paint to paint the interior of the tube. He researched what was the blackest most absorbing paint around. It is blacker than both my Tak scopes and the AP.
He posted images of it compared to other black paints and it is really black.

Greg.

[strongmanmike]

Sounds pretty good.

When you use the bigger chip it might be a different story though..? Hope not. While not usually a big issue in the scheme of things, off field flares are a pain really. I never had them with my small SXV-H9 chip (9mm X 6.7mm) and the Starfire but the bigger chip seems to pick'em up much more often. Might be the inner surfaces of the extension pieces I use though..?

Mike

[gregbradley]

Perhaps.

I installed a aperture mask over the CCD chamber that Apogee provided. If you look into the CCD chamber you can see most likely lots of shiny aluminium parts and soldered connectors that could easily cause reflections.

These then bounce off the flattener that you must use for large chipped cameras and you get your reflections perhaps.

Your AP scope undoubtedly has excellent baffling and coatings so perhaps making a mask out of black thin cardboard that is about the same size as the chip and putting it over it may help.

There was a long thread about this on the Apogee group that culminated in Apogee issuing a free mask to U16M camera owners. The guy there who pioneered it showed images with and without his black cardboard mask and it definitely made a difference.

Another thing that may help is to blacken the edges of your filters.

Time will tell Mike but I haven't seen significant reflection problems with the U16M yet on any scope. It is one main reason I chose the Baader filters as they had the best results on reflections on big chip cameras.

Greg.

[marc4darkskies]

Well done Greg :thumbsup:- looks like that 180's a keeper!! 15 hours is well into mega data territory too - hats off to you.

Can't help feeling though that with 450 mins Ha you should be able to bring out some more contrast in the streamers without adding noise/artifacts. How are you blending in your Ha?

Yes, I'd say the baffling is pretty good not having to deal with flare from Alnitak. Interesting what you say about masking the chip and blackening the edges of the filters - haven't heard that before. My Tak showed 4 greenish semi circularish refection flares - but they were fairly easy to process out.

Again, well done - look forward to more!

Cheers, Marcus

[gregbradley]

Hi Marcus,

The Ha didn't turn out that well. I am not sure why. Perhaps this camera isn't that sensitive to Ha - too early to tell. I have done a lot of Ha before with an STL and RCOS 12.5 inch and that was equally dim if not dimmer.

How did your Ha turn out for similar exposure time?

The clear filter images had tremendous detail. I notice Russell Croman's Horsehead doesn't use Ha at all. I was planning to not use it but it did add some detail to the dark areas and more richness to the red coloured areas.
Clear filter or no filter at all is the way to go.

I blended it using screen mode and about 50%.

Greenish flares are probably from your green filters which if they are Astrodons tend to reflect most in the green filter I noticed with mine.

Greg.

[AlexN]

Not having to deal with Alnitak is definitely a sure sign of an awesome telescope.. :)

In my very limited experience with imaging the horsehead.. I've found that Ha data does more for the outer nebulosity, and the darker dusty areas below and surrounding IC434, and the tonal differences in B33 itself, however IC434 seems to respond well to a no filter (by no filter, Im referring to the UV/IR filter on my QHY8)..

I dont know if thats the normal experience or something unusual in my system... But yeah, Ha definitely strengthens the dark dusty areas, where as just UV/IR filtering and RGB imaging brings out the most detail in IC434..

[gregbradley]

I agree. That's how it worked out with this image. It was worthwhile but not a lot of bang for your buck so to speak.

Greg.

[gregbradley]

Thanks very much for your kind comments Alex, Marcus, Barry, Lester, Louie, Jeanette, Alan, Gary, Marc, Doug, Renormalised, Ian, Matt, Bert and Leon.

Cheers,

Greg.

[Alchemy]

lovely image.

your remote imaging location, 8 nights out of 10 clear for imaging..... it sure isnt located here in melbourne:lol:

[Paul Haese]

That is without a doubt superb work Greg. So much detail in the mane and the head. Incredible detail in blue area below and to the left. Excellent work. Definitely and APOD submission.

Very nice work.

[peeb61]

Hi Greg,
I'm speechless! Just beautiful....

15hrs and 20min....omg

Paul

[gregbradley]

Hehe. Yes clear skies can be a surprisingly rare thing at times.




Thanks Paul.

Greg.

[beren]

:thumbsup: Congrats Greg on the TECs first light image, top image must be very exciting using a instrument of that class and size, look forward to many more.

[gregbradley]

Thanks Beren. Yes it has made the whole game of imaging exciting.

Greg.

[Virgs]

Simply one of the best HH taken from Australia..

[gregbradley]

Wow, thanks Virgs.

Greg.

[bluescope]

Well you get what you pay for in this business and that is one fine scope and camera combo Greg .... well done.

By the way what is your occupation to pay for all these goodies ... doctor ? lawyer ? golfer ? :lol:

:thumbsup:

[gregbradley]

Thanks Steve,

The camera/scope are working out very nice.

Apogee makes a version of this 8300 camera as well for US$3995. I hear it cools quickly and also gets -50C below ambient. So that camera would be similar. Still a lot of money but in the CCD camera world that is "cheapish".
Hopefully the Aussie dollar will recover ground again one day in the future.

Greg.

[CoolhandJo]

One word comes to mind. Glorious!

[gregbradley]

Thank you Dr Paul!:)

Greg.

[richardo]

Great 1st light with this huge hunk of scope.
And just the perfect object to see how the CA correction performs. (pretty much spotless I would say)
Also you get emission, reflection and dark nebs all in the one area.

Some wicked detail to the Horses dark column and to the base area, with detail normally reserved for Hubble.:eyepop:

I was really looking forward to see what this scope could do.... mmm, I'm impressed to say the least.:thumbsup:

Mikes point about how it handled Alnitaks rays was a good one. When I've imaged this with my Newt, leaving 'nitak outside of the fov, I always had the ray traces entering into the image.
In this image of yours, not a trace. (no pun)

Great stuff Greg. I bet your really pleased... Well if you aint... jeeeez man :)
Look forward to all the great stuff you're going to do with this brilliant piece of kit!

All the best
Rich:thumbsup:

[gregbradley]

Thanks Rich.

I am very pleased with it. I've always found APOs very alluring pieces of equipment.

I hope to do some more imaging with it this weekend if the weather permits.

Greg.

[AlexN]

QHY Also make a KAF8300 based camera.. The QHY9... Cools relatively quickly, and can go to -50c from ambient... They are priced at ~$4400Au or there abouts with a 2" filter wheel...

Thats probably the cheapest way to get into the KAF8300..

[AlexN]

Oh, Greg, I was meaning to ask, whats the cool down time like on a 7.5" APO? It would have to be pretty slow I would have thought, and the optics would shift some during this time causing focus problems would it not?

[2020BC]

Simply amazing. Excellent, beautiful stuff. :eyepop::thumbsup:

[Bassnut]

Excellent image Greg, exceptional detail, especially on the Alnitak. ummm, just a tad noisy for 15 hrs though. Im being picky, but your in the league now where thats allowed :D. I suspect processing now will now give you that last extra mile, the hardware is certainly about as good as it gets :P.

[Ric]

Wow, amazing stuff Greg.

Talk about value for money.

[Peter Ward]

Greg,

Been away for a bit, hence I missed this one. A fine image to be sure, but I agree with Fred, low surface brightness objects need fast optics + serious aperture.

Some of the stars are a little weird in shape as well (minimum filter? selective processing? ) ..but we are in *really nit-picky* territory here...

That said, this is a really superb piece of kit, and clearly capable of producing images most punters would kill for.

Well done!

Peter

[gregbradley]

Cooldown time I am not familiar enough with the scope to say for sure but I allow at least an hour beforem using. It may be less.

Focus shift with temp changes so far don't seem to be as sensitive as the FSQ but I would refocus if temp was more than 2 or 3C.

Greg

[gregbradley]

Thanks Fred. Ha wasn't that flash for 7.5 hours. Not sure yet about Ha performance of the camera. I remember imaging with the RCOS 12.5 inch and an STL and it was also extemely dim but Marcus seemed to get better Ha response than I did although his was wider field.

Another couple of hours would certainly get rid of any remaining noise.
Especially with the clear filter which seems to be a winner.
Greg.



Thanks Ric.



I did use a version of luminance I did not intend using due to not labelling the file clearly enough. This had a bit too much deconvolution. I redid another version with the luminance I did intend and the stars are better. In the crop though the stars are fine.

The scope is a work of art by Yuri and his Ukrainian (I think or Russian) opticians.

Greg.