It seems that last night, my suburb in Brisbane was right on the edge of the dividing line between good seeing and "can't even focus mush".
From the 101 AVI's there is one so far that stands out where the seeing seemed to hold up for most of the capture, at 22:44pm. I'm still in therapy with AA (Avi's Anonymous) from the previous Jupiter rotation effort, so I just can't face the daunting challenge of crunching my way through the remaining 100 from last night!
We did have some nice seeing last night, but it shows me how far I still have to go....and I was going to give up after my first try I know you have probably done it before, but could you indicate the scope / camera you were using?
We did have some nice seeing last night, but it shows me how far I still have to go....and I was going to give up after my first try I know you have probably done it before, but could you indicate the scope / camera you were using?
Hi Andrew
A 60mm Tasco refractor and a Kodak box brownie camera.
Just kidding! Celestron C9.25 XLT with TeleVue x2.5 PowerMate (Barlow) and the Philips ToUcam 840K.
oh my god you are incredible Dennis! That's an amazing shot.
You really, really need more image scale! please buy a 4x powermate!
I can understand not wanting to go through another 100 avi's! My 17 from last night is already doing my head in.
Hi Mike
Thanks for those nice words. I'm not sure if I'm being an old stick in the mud by staying with my current set up/formula which seems to have served me well, but on the night of 4th Feb when the seeing was better (read longer spells of steadiness), I did try the x5 PowerMate and the image just broke down.
I may have just hit that sweet spot where all the elements have just come together for optimal results. When I’ve tried to tweak (e.g. up sample, RGB split, use the x5, etc), the results haven’t been too pleasing.
RobertT has been far more successful with the x4 PowerMate – maybe his technique, C9.25 optics, processing, etc are better?
Also, when I am having a good run and getting pleasing results with the x2.5, it would take a brave man to re-configure the system with the x4 and loose that slice of time if it didn’t work out!
However, the door is not yet closed, I’m considering that x4 PowerMate….
brilliant, your avi from the other day is being discussed as we speak on other forums, you must have submitted to k3ccd group and from there it is on the UK astro site.
look, extra image scale would be great, but as you say, you are happy at the moment with the setup. The results are simply breathtaking.
brilliant, your avi from the other day is being discussed as we speak on other forums, you must have submitted to k3ccd group and from there it is on the UK astro site.
look, extra image scale would be great, but as you say, you are happy at the moment with the setup. The results are simply breathtaking.
Thanks Dave - yes, I was trying to drum up business for IIS, so I posted the IIS http link to the K3CCDTools, ToUcam and C9.25 Yahoo groups, hoping they would come on over and join us, to see what we boys and girls down under are doing.
Yes, another awesome image Dennis! This one is hit with the waveletts in your normal fashion I assume? (heavy on 1 & 2)
Great stuff mate, I love it.
Thanks John!
This one was wasn't quite good enough for the full treatment, but it survived Wavelet 1=40 and that's all I did. As I have said previously, I just haven't been successful in getting good results, unless the original data itself is really nice and clean, so my approach really depends on getting a good capture in the first place.
Dennis. I think you need to work a little harder if you're to get the best out of that 9.25!!!!
But seriously, that is just freakishly good.
There's not much else I can say other than I'm still sitting in front of my computer screen shaking my head in disbelief.
Awesome.
Thanks Matt!
Actually, my success rate is appalling, this time less than 1% as this is the best avi from the 101 of last night. If I had to restrict myself to the meagre 10 to 30 avi's of the other guys, I may return empty handed!
RobertT has been far more successful with the x4 PowerMate – maybe his technique, C9.25 optics, processing, etc are better?
Also, when I am having a good run and getting pleasing results with the x2.5, it would take a brave man to re-configure the system with the x4 and loose that slice of time if it didn’t work out!
However, the door is not yet closed, I’m considering that x4 PowerMate….
Cheers
Dennis
Dennis, I'm running out of superlatives... I thought I told you it was time to retire. Let's see, this is better than better than really good
The 4x is a nice to have, but must confess to only being able to use it about every 4th imaging session and not at all for a month. I'm wish TV made a 1.25 in powermate around the 3.25-3.5x as I reckon that would hit the sweet spot for me!
It's all been said Dennis. Absolutely awesome mate.
Thanks, Paul!
I had to bale out from our internet chat, as the wireless connection kept dropping out. Today, I ran a 30m length of Cat 5 cable which I can now connect to from the back garden, adjacent the "super seeing" swimming pool.
The seeing did improve at various times, but I had the strange phenomenon of focus changing between adjacent avi captures, something I haven’t seen before. All the knobs, clamps, grub screws, etc were nice and tight so I’m not sure what was going on.
Also, the focus was incredibly sensitive and critical, such that a short micro-stab on the moto focus button, either way, would turn the image to mush. All in all, a bit of a weird night with the seeing. I guess if I was right on the edge, being further north, you were actually speared by the jet stream.
As I chug through the avi’s, I am finding a few good ones which I hope to post some time later…..after therapy.