Horsehead

[spearo (Frank)]

Hello,
not sure that it's worthy of posting but here is my latest
I have to wait until it clears a massive tree which leaves me about an hour and a half to work with , which isnt much time really, before the morning sky glow calls it anight.

I'd like to take more lights to stack and longer exposures at a lower ISO but given that there's always a "certain" percentage of bad shots I have to cull, given my tight time frame at the moment I cant take the risk.
So I concentrate on perfecting my focus, tweaking the autoguiding.

I'll have more time to image later on obviously.

I could have processed this a bit more but i found that it increased graininess and so I didn't push it too far, preferring the smoother, truer detail.

cheers
frank

[JohnG (John)]

That is one good photo there, Frank, as good as any I've seen here. Excellent guiding, nice round stars.

Big thumbs up

Cheers

JohnG

[spearo (Frank)]

Thanks John,
I hope to get beter detail at lower ISO in future and greater contrast and brightness of the red when i can stack more shots and thus get a better spread of the histogram
but I;m glad aI got something out of last night...earlier shots of Sculptor were ruined because I forgot the crucial step of centering the target after using my precise GOTO function... not sure what I was thinking...I'll blame our cute new puppy for disctracting me!
:]
frank

[asimov (John)]

Extremely nice shot Frank!

Well done.

[RB (Andrew)]

That's a beauty Frank.
I have the same problem as you atm, I've got trees in the way which only leaves 1.5 hours of exposure before sunrise.

You've done very well mate.

[Striker (Tony)]

I really like it Frank....you have a nice signal to noise ratio and everything looks great.

What exposure times and settings did you use.

[seeker372011 (Narayan)]

Frank: that is a great shot

I'd be happy to get one like that one day..only been trying for years !

[spearo (Frank)]

Thanks everyone,
RB I thought i'd noticed you have a similar problem in one of your posts
it really focusses me i can tell you, not a second is wasted!
Tony the image is stack of 1X 604 seconds and 1X 906 seconds at ISO 800
hopefully the next one I post will be nicer even

it's always a "work in progress" isn't it?!
:]
f

[EzyStyles (Eric)]

that is a stunner of a horsehead frank!. i like it alot.

[spearo (Frank)]

Thanks Eric
f

[Adrian-H]

very nice shot , thats one really detailed close up there

[Octane (Humayun)]

Frank,

That is a pearler! One of the best Horsehead Nebula's I've seen on here; perfectly round stars and the definition is fantastic.

I can't wait to see what you'll pull out by stacking a whole heap of those long exposures together.

Well done and kudos to you!

Regards,
Humayun

[spearo (Frank)]

Thanks Adrian and Humayun,
Well...it's 3:17 AM and I am at this very moment trying some 20 min exposures at ISO 800.
I'll only be able to pull off 3 or 4 I think but this means that odds are, I'll be very lucky to salvage a couple to stack.
I'll post if/when I manage a better shot of this beautiful nebula
Thanks again, all your encouragement motivated me to image this target two nights in a row!...good thing it's a long weekend! I'll need it to catch up on sleep
:]
frank

[Garyh]

You have done a nice shot there Frank and with only 2 frames. Look forwards to the next one!!
Cheers Gary

[astroboy]

Wow!!
Great shot Frank , no doubt about it your systems working.

Zane

[matt]

Very nice Frank.

You're doing some great work with that 9.25

Gonna have to have another get together with you and JohnG and see if you guys can start me down the long and slippery path of DSO astrophotography

[richardo (Rich)]

Ver nicely done Frank!
I agree, there's always a compromise between too much processing and looosing data, finding the balance is the secret, and/ or less is best.

Nice work, lots of detail and good colour.

cheers
Rich

[h0ughy (David)]

Very nice. Looking forward for more later!

[Calin]

Nice one Frank, it's all good ..

I'm still buying stuff for the wife's new house, one day I might save enough to get a real camera ! You know there's an answer to that tree line, with 17 acres ... move the scope or use that chain saw ... only make sure you don't loose the chain again


Time to get crakin' on that observatory, at least now the weather is warming up, you can stop sticking your tongue on the scope to see if it gets stuck ...

[spearo (Frank)]

Thanks everyone,
I've beeen away for a couple of days hence the tardiness in replying, my apologies.

I do plan on an observatory but i have a couple things to fix on the house yet...
Zane: I still havent got the system working quite right, I tried 5 shots of 20min ISO 800 the next night but all showed some weird trailing, despite good tracking and my staying clear away from everythhing (i wanted to rule out my moving wires etc...)
could be the drift alignment-fieldrotation, counterweights or some odd dirt in the worm gears? I need to be 100% sure it's not just the ToUcam slipping a bit causing the problem...
too bad I couldnt use those 20 min shots, the color would have been so much nicer...
oh well
I'll sort it out in time
Paul: priorities 1) finish landscaping (one or 2 weeks), repaint ceiling (another couple weeks) then the observatory...

thanks everyone for all the good feedback
cheers

frank