Lagoon (M8)

[Jazza (Jay)]

Hey All,
After what seems like years of cloudy weather and being sick etc etc I finally got to drag the scope out last night.

Was aiming to try and set up autoguiding but no luck with that, need the moon I think to try and get the off axis guider close enough to focus on the guidecam that I can see anything!

So rather than waste the whole night I pointed her at the lagoon and told her to go image while I watched the world cup!

Reasonably happy with tracking considering these were 5 min unguided subs... Focus looks a bit soft but I am guessing that's cause the tracking is a-wobblin? Was a bit windy too.

Comments, critique and advice welcome, be kind I'm still new at this

Meade 10" rcx-400
AP 0.75 Focal Reducer
Unmodded 350d
20 x 5 min unguided

Clear Skies,
Jay

EDIT: Added a reprocess. I'm loving the high pass filter Darren!

[peter_4059 (Peter)]

Jay,

It's a great result for unguided 5 minute subs. The tracking seems very good - how is the mount configured?

[Jazza (Jay)]

Thanks Peter!
It's sitting on a meade giant field tripod. Roughly level, polar aligned by eye (I find it quicker than drift alignment and it usually works pretty well).
The previous owner did some drive training and I haven't touched those settings... wisely it seems
What bothers me is that the final image isn't much nicer than the subs, maybe I am expecting too much from stacking.
Jay

[desler]

Stacking increases signal to noise ratio.

The more you stack the better the signal, to a point where you get diminishing returns, where that point is I suspect is different for every scope camera combination, although wiser ones than me my suggest a premium total exposure time.

How did you stretch the final image, ie what software did you use.

Darren


Attached is a quick curves, noise reduction and High pass filter in CS 3. see what you thing, Hope you don't mind.....

[Jazza (Jay)]

Nice Darren, thanks!
I'm really going to have to practice processing it seems!
I was using cs3 but not that well heh!
Jay

[multiweb (Marc)]

Very nice.... and it's unguided. Amazing!