Hello Forumers, I emigrated here to Cleveland - Brisbane beginning of April and have now setup my rig after shipping finally arrived.
My scope is a Newtonian SPX350 from OrionOptics in the UK close to where I lived. They make scopes to the highest optical standards my scope is 1/10.5 wavefront, pity I can't match it with my skill.
I have been viewing this forum regularly for last 5 months and this site consistently produces higher quality images than the other sites in the UK. Many here have RC scopes and produce near professional quality images. I'm in AWE.
Just a quick image of part of the Triffid nebula I cannot see from the UK. The Mintron is the same camera as the GStar-Ex, very sensitive with 2.5sec exposures in 8bit.
HN40 looks really well resolved and the detail in the central dust lane is pretty good as well. Try your Ha filter for luminance instead of the UHC, you'll get really pin point stars out of that
My ears pricked up when you mentioned the Mintron.
There's a few of us on the forum who have the Gstar-Ex.
Brilliant little cameras. I don't use mine often enough.
But your shot there has inspired me to dust it off again. Thanks.
Great shot John. Super narrowfield, you'll be best mates with Fred in no time!
Orion Optics makes some great scopes. I checked them out extensively when choosing between a Planewave Dall Kirkham and their Dall Kirkham.
He is slow to produce though and the wait times are long and uncertain and that ended up being the deciding factor.
Great to see some new imagers in the forum and welcome.
John
Welcome to the south. If you ever move back to the UK, then you have to promise to sell you scope on the forums here before you depart!
Great image btw.
James
Don't know whether you've noticed but on that dust/gas tower at the bottom of the piccie, there's one half of a bipolar jet streaming out of it. It's faint but quite noticeable. That's excellent imaging for a camera like the Mintron/GStar
So, somewhere inside that tower is a pre-main sequence star with a very active accretion disk
Thanks guys for the comments and welcome, it took 14 weeks for shipping to arrive a very long wait. I image deep space lunar and planetary.
I used to go and see John and Barry at OrionOptics a few times in UK and they are on an industrial estate near the Crewe train station in very cramped premises with too few trained staff hence the long wait times for their corrected Dall-Kirhams but they are great guys and every scope is hand made including the optics.
I do have a cooled ATK-16HR but I am on a balcony so hope it is stable for long exposure.
I did manage to get the M16 Pillars and The Bug nebula with the Mintron which I will post when finished, I always wanted to get The Bug but from UK it does not make it above the horizon which is roof blocked anyway. I love Freds Planetary Neb close ups and like Hi-Res close ups of everything and his narrowband work is wonderful with sensational detail.
Anyhow thanks for welcome, its nice and cool in Brissy now (like UK Summer) but I think Summer temperature here will kill me in Dec/Jan. Our AirCon needs fixing but am told we will get used to it and wont need the AirCon after a year or two.
Thanks Carl for the extra info, I noticed that shown on the Hubble image - I love The Hubble.