[LucasB (Lucas)]

Originally Posted by h0ughy

fantastic image - well done

Thanks h0ughy, much appreciated! Hoping to get some more practice in soon...

Originally Posted by MortonH

Nice!

Thanks MortonH.

Originally Posted by Quark

What a great result for your first attempt Lucas, very well done.
Regards
Trevor

Thanks Trevor! Your images have definitely inspired me to tackle the planetary side of astrophotography.

Originally Posted by Screwdriverone

Simply excellent for a first attempt Lucas.
keep at it!
Cheers
Chris

Thanks Chris! I think the DSLR can produce results that are quite good which you have demonstrated.

Originally Posted by jjjnettie

excellent first image.
Hey, do you recommend getting the 550D modded?? I'm thinking of booking mine in for surgery.

Thank you jjjnettie! Hmmm....550D mod is a tricky one. It depends on a couple of things I suppose. The reason I went down that path is because my wife still wanted to use the DSLR for daytime photos but I wanted the Ha sensitivity. When I changed the filter inside to the Astrodon, I also bought the Hutech VLC daytime correction front filter which restores perfect white balance but is just unscrewed to give me my astro cam. I have the best of both worlds to an extent but.....as you know the small pixels are great for image resolution but can be noisy for long exposure work. It is warmer where you are so this will be (and has been) even more of a problem. I have overcome the noise to an extent with dithering and darks but cooling would be great. The Ha sensitivity after the mod is fantastic but if it was purely going to be an Astrocam maybe a QHY9 OSC or SBIG ST-8300C would have the distinct advantage of cooling. Cost also came into for me too. Because I did the mod myself I only had to pay for the price of the filters. I do love the Ha sensitivity from the mod so if this is more cost effective than the dedicated astrocams then go for it! Plus you get video with the 550D which is pretty good for planetary and will become better with firmware and software updates. Also still perfect for Daytime shots with the Hutech VLC filter (which is far superior to Xnite CC1 filters or custom white balance IMHO)
Like everything with this hobby there is always a lot to weigh up. Never easy...what to do

Originally Posted by spacezebra

Brilliant Lucas! Great capture.
Cheers Petra d.

Thanks Petra. Appreciate it

Originally Posted by Matt Wastell

Looks great!

Thanks Matt.

Originally Posted by von Tom

Hi Lucas, nice image with plenty of colour depth.
Cheers,
Tom

Thanks Tom. Also really like your latest three image with the sharp Saturn.