First Mono CCD Image NGC3372

[barx1963 (Malcolm)]

Hi all
I have made the jump into a mono CCD camera. It arrived yesterday and so tonight was the first attempt to use it. Anyway between dodging drifting cloud, a couple of thunderstorms and unfamiliarity with the gear, I only managed one small set of useable data.

So here is the grand total of 9 minutes (3 x 3mins) of luminence data on NGC3372 (aka Eta Carina Nebula)

Details are:
Scope: SW ED80
Mount: Orion Atlas AZ/EQ G
Camera: Atik One 6.0 running at -10C
Guiding: Orion SS Pro on an Orion ST80 with PHD
Captured with Atik Artemis software and processed in DSS and PS CC2015. No Darks Flats or biases applied (haven't had time to collect, only had the camera 24hrs!!)

I hoped to get some colour data but just ran out of time!! I am fairly happy with the result, stars look OK and it seems fairly noise free.

Anyway, hope to get some more data soon.

Malcolm

[Atmos (Colin)]

Nice that you were able to get out with the new gear so quickly!

The ICX694 is a wonderfully clean sensor, mine arrived a bit over a month ago and I am more than happy with it. Would be nicer if it was 4x the size!

Not sure if either of these are from image compression or processing or not but it appears like you are getting haloing around the brighter stars and two strange diffraction spikes heading south east from the main central star.

[barx1963 (Malcolm)]

Thanks Colin
The seeing was not good, it was quite windy, there was drifting clouds and a couple of storms so the halos are probably to be expected. Not sure aboutthe diffraction spikes. I will have to do some tests on some bright stars try and track down the cause. When I did the initial setup I saw some spikes on some bright stars while doing alignment but they were angled differently to the ones from Eta C. I am guessing that means it is not a camera issue, more likely in the adapters I have used to connect.

Anyway, it is start!!

Malcolm

[RickS (Rick)]

Welcome to the mono club, Malcolm

[Atmos (Colin)]

Halos are certainly to be expected with passing clouds, bad weather
The diffraction spikes only appear to be on that single bright star and they are by no means intrusive. They may even be able to be stacked out with a large dither.

Looking forward to a good night to see what you can really do with a decent data set

[Shiraz (Ray)]

pretty impressive for a very short first up.