Well, did the mad thing and got up early this morning at 3 am. Looked out side to see Saturn nearing my Neighbours tree even after it had the limbs cut off. I also noted some high cloud around and thought I would go back to bed.
Then I could not get to sleep so I quickly got everything together and went out to the scope which had been sitting since 10pm. I had already precooled the scope with the cooler.
I did have some trouble with this imaging session. First, the clouds got thicker to the point where I could not see anything on the screen, then I only got three minutes before it hit the tree. The second thing is that the scope was just ever so slightly out of collimation. I have the screws just snug at the moment and I accidently taped the scope and this caused the fine collimation I had the other night to shift slightly. I fixed this later but had no time then to do anything about it. I knew the second I tap the scope collimation would shift. So as a result of the above the image is slightly out of focus and looks a little blurry. Not an ideal way to open my account for the Saturn season but I felt I had to produce something given that I got my A out of bed at that time.
Lessons for next time. Check collimation well in advance, i.e before going to bed and make sure that I am up early enough. I should have stayed up instead of going to bed. Hopefully tonight will be better and I can sleep in tomorrow as I will be on holidays.
Anyway here is the aweful image. You can just see CD, totally over processed.
Just disappointed in myself, more than anything guys. With the skills that I have now, I have come to expect more than this. Although I take heart from the fact that I managed to do the focus and imaging in 5 minutes. Chance favours the prepared mind. Next time if seeing is good and I check my collimation first, I know I will get a better image. I know many here would be happy with these results, and 18 months ago I would have been stoked.
Next time!!! Thanks for the kind words guys. Appreciated.
Don't feel too bad Paul, there are nights where I've spent hours getting everything done, including collimation, drift alignment, align the finderscope, etc etc and then when I come back out at 4am ... it's total overcast :-)
