I set out last night (early this morning actually) to capture M78 which I have always noticed in my widefield shots of Orion. I wanted to get a bit closer to the subject and used my Esprit 100 to achieve that. The aim was to get M78 and some of Barnard's Loop in the one shot, which I was successful in doing. Unfortunately, that was where the success ended.
A warmish night with below average seeing didn't help my focussing error on this one. I had perfect focus using the Batinov mask initially, then when I rotated the camera to reframe the shot I forgot to refocus. Just that few turns of the camera mount on the draw tube was enough to put the focus out and cause my stars to bloat slightly. One hour of exposure wasted!
If it wasn't for the ClsCcd filtered shots that I took where I had to refocus after removing the camera to insert the filter, none of my subs would have been in focus. Something else to remember to check next time!
So here is the result, modded Canon 550d, 40 x 90 secs (out of focus) unguided subs 1600iso. 6 x 300 secs (focussed) guided subs 800iso with ClsCcd filter. The ClsCcd filter basically did nothing to enhance the image other than help sharpen it!
