M20 with GSO 10"RC and QHY10

[allan gould]

Finally managed to get all my equipment in order with all the required software and as a test image I did 27x5min subs on M20. From the suburbs its difficult to get all the nebulosity etc surrounding the object so I may attempt this at Astrofest with this scope. Im pleased with the camera which has a few idiosyncrasies. The major one is that bias frames must be taken at the time of imaging due to the way that the chip downloads the colour wells to different sides. If this is not done correctly then a colour gradient results which is difficult to remove with flats etc. I found that I have a tilt in the chip and must check this with another camera as Im not sure whether this is from the chip plane or the scope itself. The field is quite flat apart from the tilt as I used Als Collimation tool to check a defocused star and that shows really good collimation. Thanks again Al (Sheeny) as I find your programs really helpfull.
I must add a note here that Theo of Gama Electronics went to hysterical and heroic efforts with some initial issues with the camera. I cannot recommend nor praise his attention to the needs of the amateur more highly.
Thanks again Theo but you need a public acknowledgement from me.
Comments welcome.

[jjjnettie]

Very sweet Allan. Looking forward to seeing more from this combo. :)

[cometcatcher]

We the viewers are blissfully unaware of how tricky some of these wonderful photos are to take. It's a great shot from the burbs.

[cventer]

Nice Allan

This is tough to do well from light polluted area but you have done well.

Interesting info on QHY10 and bias frames.

[cybereye]

I hear you Allan regarding light pollution!!

Not only do we have to deal with the bright lights of Brisbane reflecting off the particles in the air but there's always the danger of the neighbours turning on their outside lights!! The best thing I ever did was get the UHC-S filter to combat the dreaded light pollution.

A nice Trifid you've got there,
Mario

[cometcatcher]

My latest neighbours, they don't turn them off. They leave them running all night long the rotters. I hope their electricity bill is 1 billion dollars. :mad2:

[TheDecepticon]

Great shot and shows good potential from you and your equipment.

Colours could be a bit stronger and better framing would make it way better. :)

[astronobob]

Top result from the Burbs Allan ! I must look into dealing with LP, bit of a pain driving out wst ? ? Great to hear your up and running ?

[batema]

Hi Allan,

It looks fabulous. Did you do any layered masking to get the stars in the center of the trifid. Also can you tell me what mount you are using as I love the look of those GSO 10 RC and I have a EQ6Pro and wonder KNOW that I would be really pushing the weight aspect as well as using a QHY-9 how did you go with attaching the camera to the scope. Did you upgrade to the feathertouch focuser?? Sorry for another question but where did you buy the scope from and service from this place??

Mark

it

[ozstronomer]

Great shot Allan, nice star colours and the tracking looks spot on :thumbsup:

Is that full frame or cropped?

Geoff

[allan gould]

Thanks JJJ - see you at Astrofest but this time bring a cash box for the passing trade.

Glad you liked it Kevin but I have no options but to do it in the burbs.

Thanks Chris.


Once I fix the tilt in the system then Ill be really happy, but thanks for the comments but have yet to use a filter as most of the neighbours are pretty good.

[allan gould]

Graham, I try to process minimally as too often I see images of M20 with psychadelic colours that I dont like.

Thanks Bob.


Mark, when I process I generally generally just do levels and curves and then a little sharpening and leave it at that. I just made sure that on the final stretches I pinned down the Trifid central stars so that they didnt blow out on the stretch. I regularly use a Meade 10"SCT and the 10"GSO RC on an EQ6 mount with a 72mm guide scope on top of that. The EQ6 can handle the weigh as both scopes come in at the same number of Kg. You need four counterweights to balance with a bar extension as well.
I have a Moonlight focuser on all my three scopes with DC motors and find they all lift thw weight of my cameras with no problems. Ive found that the best focal reducer for both the Meade and GSO scopes is the o.67x reducer/flattener from Astro Physics (CCD67).
The camera just goes straight into the 2"opening at the back of the focuser.
I got the scope from Andrews Comms and they were great to deal with (Luke) as I have purchased a lot from them and they are consistently good from my point of view.. Hope this helps
Allan

[allan gould]

Its the full frame of the 10" GSO with the 10MP QHY10 camera which is quite a large chip. The native Fl of 2000mm covers it nicely and the CCD67 Fr also gives a nice field of view.

[batema]

Thank you Allan.

[alpal]

That's a nice shot.

I would like to see a larger version.
It seems that there is a little star elongation in the top right hand corner -
is that the tilt you refer to?
I probably would have turned up the blue a little when processing.
You have split the 2 bright stars in the center so your focus was good.

[atalas]

Looks great!well done allan....Ok,so I was considering a QHY10 for wide field lens shot but I'll be thinking twice about It now....bummer.

[peter_4059]

you'd have to be happy with that. Nice sharp focus.

[allan gould]

Allan
I don't have a site for showing the larger size unfortunately as the condensation into a 200kb jpeg really drops out a lot of the subtleness in an image. You are correct as CCDinspector shows a lovely flat field although with a tilt in it which showed as slightly elongated stars in the right of the image. Have ordered a special spacer from telescope-de which will take care of this.

Louie
The QHY10 has small sized pixels which would suit wide field work and the well depth is good for sucking up a lot of photons. In what area have you discounted the camera? Once I got used to it I found it easy to use with Nebulosity and I wouldn't be put off it.



Thanks Peter, we are both getting there and I really liked your 6188

[RobF]

Thanks for sharing Allan. Great shot for starters. Look forward to seeing where the journey takes you :)

[allan gould]

Allan
This is the profile CCDInspector shows. As you can see the tilt is mainly in the x-axis with a fairly flat field.

[allan gould]

Thanks Rob, me too! But like all journies just spend more money.

[RickS]

Very sharp image, Allan!

I haven't noticed any problems with colour gradients on my QHY-12 and I don't take new bias frames each time I image. I do find I get much better results from a mono camera though, but that may be due to limited skills at processing OSC images...