First try at M83

[codemonkey (Lee)]

Nowhere near as good as raymo's over there, but it's a start. I didn't really expect to draw anything even identifiable out of the images I took so I'm pretty stoked all the same!

[raymo]

Your first try is better than mine was, plenty of detail. Great job. Don't forget to post
your image acquisition details.
raymo

[blink138 (Pat)]

blimey lee get it in the middle next time coz that is showing good detail, focus will be a bit sharper too when your subject is centred correctly
pat

[codemonkey (Lee)]

Originally Posted by raymo

Your first try is better than mine was, plenty of detail. Great job. Don't forget to post
your image acquisition details.
raymo

Really? Cool! Thanks raymo :-)

Details are:

31x30s @ ISO4000
1x30s @ ISO6400 (it was there, why waste it? :p)
Skywatcher ED80
Celestron CG5GT
Nikon D5100 (unmodded)

I really wish my intervalometer was here so I could start doing longer exposures at lower ISO.

Originally Posted by blink138

blimey lee get it in the middle next time coz that is showing good detail, focus will be a bit sharper too when your subject is centred correctly
pat

Thanks pat! :-) It was actually fairly well centered in the original images. This is cropped to about half the original resolution, and when doing so, the old terrestrial photographer in me came out chanting "rule of thirds, rule of thirds!", thus the placement in the image above.

[Astroman (Andrew Wall)]

Nice work with 30sec subs. Done very well, you must be very happy with that.

[codemonkey (Lee)]

I certainly am; thanks Andrew! :-)

I had another crack at the processing on this one. Managed to get the colours right this time.

I've done all the processing with DSS / Photoshop. I've got a trial of PixInsight which I'm going to play with now to see if I can get a better result, particularly in the area of noise reduction.

[cometcatcher (Kevin)]

Looks good to me Lee. This is another object I've yet to get around to with digital. Looks like it needs a bit of focal length too and I'm a bit short until I get one of my longer newts going.

[codemonkey (Lee)]

Thanks Kevin :-)

I shot that with an ED80 (600mm) so you should be ok unless you've got some really wide gear. Admittedly the above is cropped, maybe to half the original frame though.

[cometcatcher (Kevin)]

My ED80 is only 440mm. I have longer f/L refractors but they're achromats. I need more ED / APO scopes.