My first M83

[BruceG (Bruce)]

Hi all, I persevered with gusty winds last night to get a couple of hours on M83. The winds were playing havoc with poor old PHD all through the session.
Anyway, tonight I started to process what I have got and had to cull quite a number of my subs due to wacky shaped stars.
Perhaps I should have culled some more as I have lost some of the detail I could see in some of the individual subs.
Imaged 35 x 3 minutes and 5 x 5 minutes. I culled 15 of the 3 minute subs so the total integration used in the image was 95 minutes.
The poor little galaxy looked so small in the frame, I cropped it quite heavily.
The result makes me think it is worth another go on a still night. Higher resolution image here: http://www.astrobin.com/full/106367/0/

[cometcatcher (Kevin)]

Looks really nice Bruce. This galaxy likes lots of time. I have yet to image it with my new setup.

What is your scope again?

[BruceG (Bruce)]

thanks Kevin. It a Williams Optics Megrez 90. I am happy with the result but not so happy about the star shape. Wondering if it was the wind now. After drift aligning I was able to get 2 minute grabs without significant trailing so it isn't polar alignment error. Only a stll night will tell. Cheers,
Bruce.

[cometcatcher (Kevin)]

I'm having trouble getting round stars myself. I think it's turbulent air.

[jsmoraes (Jorge)]

Nice image. We can see many details of galaxy. And curious, I am having problem with shape of stars, too.

But I have had some problems with PHD2, and winds.

I did M30, but the stars were very bad. The PHD2 graphic was well full time, with only 0.5 or 1 arcsecond. As in all others works, including the M 70 and M 55.

The shape of stars in M 30 killed the capture. With appearance of drift to the same direction in all 20 frames. It is not normal, and I didn't undestand it.
Maybe focus... flexion of OTA ... collimation ... But I did M 30, M 70 and M 55 at the same night !

Mistery and ghost ! Exorcism ? ! ... Easy solution: try again !

[astronobob (Bob)]

Look pretty good Bruce considering wind and loss of subs and Id say you have chosen very well with which subs stayed and which were dumped.
Nice going and well done

[BruceG (Bruce)]

Thanks Jorge and Bob. Appreciate the encouragement. I will have another go at this one as soon as I get another quiet Saturday night. I do hope I can get more clarity and round stars on the next attempt.