I received this a while ago and then it took a while to sort out the adapters needed to attach my camera and filter wheel. It's all working now, perhaps a tiny amount of adjustment still to do.
First light image is the famous Horsehead Nebula. Most of the data was well under 2 arc secs FWHM and a few around 1.32 arc secs which is the tightest data I have ever gotten. I out it down to the resolution of the scope and the good seeing I get down here at Sussex Inlet on the south coast of NSW (the ocean is only about 3 kms from me).
38 x 5 minute exposures. Bit of reflection happening from the filters. These filters are my earlier Astrodons as my other filter wheel needs the USB port replaced. It has the series 2 non reflecting filters. I expect those reflections to go once the correct filters are used.
Manually focused and piggy backing on my CDK17. Its 110mm aperture F6 native and with the tri compressor/corrector it gives F5 as used here.
Virtually no vignetting, I did not use darks, bias or flats. Subexposures were dithered.
I'll be adding colour to this soon.
Very happy with the scope. Check out the crop - can you believe that was taken with a 4 inch refractor?
Greg,
You should be happy with the new rig , a great start , excellent image of the Horsehead. Some excellent fine detail with nice contrast too.
I’m trying to capture more Lum plus RGB to complete my Horsehead from 3 weeks ago ( HaLRGB )
My Obs Dome at Narrawallee ( 150m from the beach ) is powered up but that pesky cloud cover from the east just won’t move away. There is another band of cloud from the south due to arrive at 11pm so tonight might be a no go.
Monday night is 70/30 but Tuesday will be the pick , clear all night until the early hours. Fingers crossed !!
Cheers
Martin
Greg,
You should be happy with the new rig , a great start , excellent image of the Horsehead. Some excellent fine detail with nice contrast too.
I’m trying to capture more Lum plus RGB to complete my Horsehead from 3 weeks ago ( HaLRGB )
My Obs Dome at Narrawallee ( 150m from the beach ) is powered up but that pesky cloud cover from the east just won’t move away. There is another band of cloud from the south due to arrive at 11pm so tonight might be a no go.
Monday night is 70/30 but Tuesday will be the pick , clear all night until the early hours. Fingers crossed !!
Cheers
Martin
Thanks Martin.
Yes the clouds have been an issue for a while.
It can be annoying that it’s clear all day only to cloud up after dark.
Hopefully we are due for a decent run.
In the meantime I have a large number of images to be processed.
Spent a lot today getting all my software tools up and running on a laptop.
Excellent result Greg,
it is such a wide field and all sharp from corner to corner.
The AP110 GTX is a magnificent scope.
Would you be willing to share your processing details?
Hard to critically asses without knowing the processing but yeah, looking good ... of course, given the pedigree of the scope, we wouldn't expect anything less
Hey, just had a squiz at your equipment album too, you've sure had/have some purlers of scopes over the years awesome collection there, love'em all!
Certainly looks befitting of its pedigree! Will be very interested to see it with some colour added.
I recently threw together 24x300s Ha subs of IC434 with my 120mm APO and it kind of blew me away. I've shot the target a LOT, with 3" refractors and 8~11" reflectors, but there really is something about the way a 4~5" APO renders the night sky that is truly breathtaking.
Excellent result Greg,
it is such a wide field and all sharp from corner to corner.
The AP110 GTX is a magnificent scope.
Would you be willing to share your processing details?
cheers
Allan
Thanks Allan. Minimalist processing. No darks, flats or bias just dithered. Some Photoshop. Less is more.
The scope has virtually no vignetting. Although I probably should apply darks. Bias are not very workable with CMOS so I tend to stay away from them -even flat darks seem touchy. CCDs work well with callibration in comparison.
Quote:
Originally Posted by strongmanmike
Hard to critically asses without knowing the processing but yeah, looking good ... of course, given the pedigree of the scope, we wouldn't expect anything less
Hey, just had a squiz at your equipment album too, you've sure had/have some purlers of scopes over the years awesome collection there, love'em all!
Mike
Thanks Mike. Yes I have some nice scopes. Sometimes I think I should thin them out but nah!
Quote:
Originally Posted by Bodon
Crikey that's a photo! I think this week 'we' are in for a bad run of weather at night...
Thanks very much. It is a fabulous area to image. A tough one too with those super bright stars. I'd say these are the brightest stars in the night sky for imaging.
Quote:
Originally Posted by AlexN
Certainly looks befitting of its pedigree! Will be very interested to see it with some colour added.
I recently threw together 24x300s Ha subs of IC434 with my 120mm APO and it kind of blew me away. I've shot the target a LOT, with 3" refractors and 8~11" reflectors, but there really is something about the way a 4~5" APO renders the night sky that is truly breathtaking.
Looking forward to more!
Yes a good 4 inch has a fair number of targets that look great in that format.
I am also looking forward to using it visually. My 130 is superb visually, very engaging for Milky Way cruises! I have read the 110 can take a lot of magnification without breaking down. I have yet to look through it visually but I will soon.
Thanks Allan. Minimalist processing. No darks, flats or bias just dithered. Some Photoshop. Less is more.
The scope has virtually no vignetting. Although I probably should apply darks. Bias are not very workable with CMOS so I tend to stay away from them -even flat darks seem touchy. CCDs work well with calibration in comparison.
Thanks Greg,
it's hard to know if you could squeeze some extra quality out of your images
by applying: darks, flats and bias frames.
It's been a matter of great controversy for many years now as per here: https://www.cloudynights.com/topic/7...ither-instead/
I suppose all you can do is try it and see if it's any better?
It would also depend on your stacking algorithm.
Your results are very impressive without all that mucking around.
Thanks Greg,
it's hard to know if you could squeeze some extra quality out of your images
by applying: darks, flats and bias frames.
It's been a matter of great controversy for many years now as per here: https://www.cloudynights.com/topic/7...ither-instead/
I suppose all you can do is try it and see if it's any better?
It would also depend on your stacking algorithm.
Your results are very impressive without all that mucking around.
cheers
Allan
If I get a large enough stack because they are dithered and each
Image does not have a lot of noise the stack is very clean.
But if my stack is not as large definitely darks work well.
I am finding flats to be a bit tricky and with virtually no cignetting not a lot of gain. Flat darks are hard if you do sky flats at dusk as the exposure length is constantly changing.
Darks are easy enough to apply. CMOS and bias don’t seem to get in too well.
Greg
If I get a large enough stack because they are dithered and each
Image does not have a lot of noise the stack is very clean.
But if my stack is not as large definitely darks work well.
I am finding flats to be a bit tricky and with virtually no vignetting not a lot of gain. Flat darks are hard if you do sky flats at dusk as the exposure length is constantly changing.
Darks are easy enough to apply. CMOS and bias don’t seem to get in too well.
Greg
Thanks Greg,
it seems you definitely know what you're doing
and you're getting top results.
Not to argue a point too much, but from what (little) I know about CMOS cameras (my Player One Poseidon is quite new) there are more than a few guys over at CloudyNights that say the flat-darks are quite unnecessary with the newer CMOS cameras and that just taking flats in the normal way (just subtracting bias) will work just fine. I've done it both ways with my camera and so far I cannot see any difference.
awesome collection there, love'em all! 
