Got my camera working properly last night and had to have a go at this months DSO challenge.
The flat field did not work to well so I will have to work on that one again.
20 x 4 minute autoguided exposure's at ISO800 on the 10" LX200R at F8
Cooled modded Canon 350D.
Ambient was 15°c
Relative Humidity 80%
CMOS temp 4°c was set to its warmest possible temperture..this is done by the way of slowing down the fan making cooling less efficent...I was worried if I turned the fan up to max then it would have easily gone below -5°c...I dont want that condensation again.
You have transformed an object of interest into an object of beauty. Congratulations on getting everything up and running - a superb image and yes, I like very much.
No lester...that's from the camera and should not be there but thanks for pointing it out..lol
The outer neb can be seen faintly lower left but due to my poor efforts with flats I had to darken the image too much reducing the small but visible signs of the outer ring.
Nice one Tony , the outer loops are pretty clear on my LT screen, but I maybe my screen settings are burning out the section of the ring from 2-3 oclock.
OMG, tony that is simply beautiful. Well done and congrats on working out the camera. Is there any way some dessecant bags could be introduced to help reduce the humidity, or go bush! That is an amazing image mate, going for a malin award next year Eh!
Nice image there Tony.
I've used the Noels Astro Tools spikes before in PScs(presume that's what you used) if only to clean up bad tracking on my reflector before. One thing that's good about Noels actions is that you can tone done the thickness and extent of the spikes so they don't look too un-natural from within the action itself.
It's quite tweakable if you have a mess.
Perhaps these detract a little from the image a bit.
Humbley, JIMO of course.
Imaging gives us all an artistic license so it's a personal thing.
Very good result Tony. How do you take your flats? I now always point the lens or telescope to the zenith of a twilight sky when taking flats. Make sure the Sun is below the horizon and there are no thin clouds. I have found any where else that the sky has gradients which show up even worse with wide lenses. This makes the flats almost useless.
Get rid of the ersatz linear diffraction artefacts and it will be even better.
This cooling mod looks extremely worthwhile.
I will sit on the fence regarding the spikes....I kind of like them but everyone to their own...saying this I will probably not use them again...or maybe I will...lol.
I bet if I didn't tell you all they were fake knowone would have known.....alot of people use a single defraction spike(string) then add the extra spike in photoshop with similar results.
Bert I did the flats this morning before the sun come up but it was cloudy...will do some more tonight when the sun goes down.
Stunning Tony, that will make the pain of the camera cost all worthwhile no doubt, Beautiful, simply beautiful.
I can do without the spikes, but that is me.
Gary
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, the outer loops are pretty clear on my LT screen, but I maybe my screen settings are burning out the section of the ring from 2-3 oclock.
Tried to talk him into it one day Geoff, but he's a SCT man to the core. That is until someone makes a 10" Tak refractor 
