Failures still teach...

[bloodhound31]

I was out under crystal clear skies until 3am last night and got a whole hours worth of light exposures at ISO800 on the horse head and flame nebulae. Tracking was beautiful, conditions were good. Got all my darks and offsets. No flats. Don't usually use them anyway.

Last time I tried ISO 1600 and it was too grainy. I thought halving it would fix the problem. The resulting image was so bad, that no amount of stretching histograms would bring it out.

I would have to conclude that the ED80, simply does not have enough light gathering ability for the really dim DSO's.

I will try ISO400 next time and see how I go, but I think I am going to have to get a focal reducer on the C11 instead and do it that way.

I will let you know how I go then.

Baz.

Image details
Canon 400d unmodded ISO800 12x300sec exposures. 6x Darks and 19 offsets.
Imaged through Skywacher ED80.
Guide scope Nexstar 11 GPS wedge mounted, manual guided.

[[1ponders] (Paul)]

I don't know what went wrong Barry but you should easily be able to get the HH with those exposures with the ED80. Your shot looks like it has been washed out with skyglow.