M16 (Pillars of Creation) in Ha

[lazjen (Chris)]

I've been lurking in this forum since my last post in Nov 2014, looking at all the images being presented (drooling over some ). Now, at last, I've got a chance to submit something of my own from my now functional backyard observatory.

I started on this last night, but only got 3.5 hours before the clouds stopped everything. I plan on getting more Ha before moving on to OIII and SII. As I get star blooming, I'm going to try rotating the camera for the next set and see if I can process out the blooms. I was reading some details on the technique on the PixInsight website that I hope to try.

Any comments, etc, welcome.

Astrobin with better picture and details: http://astrob.in/195475/0/

[RickS (Rick)]

A great first light for the new obsy, Chris!

[Rex]

Some really nice detail in there Chris. Well done for a first light mate. Can't wait to see the finished result.

[DJT (David)]

I like the detail in this Chris.

I ended up buying Maxim DL as a way to deal with blooming and also dithering as they have a good software solution over CCDSoft. A bit of overkill but overtime I have been leveraging the many other features in that software from acquisition through to telescope control and plate solving.

PI haven't really focussed on a solution for blooming prefaring using techniques such as CCD rotation rather than destroying data which is fair enough. But if you are short of clear skies...

[lazjen (Chris)]

Thanks Rick and Rex. Yes, I'm itching to get out again and get more data to add to this project.

Originally Posted by DJT

I like the detail in this Chris.

Thanks David. I'm quite happy with the results so far. The observatory is making a real difference to the data I'm getting. I should go attempt some analysis of the exposures with and without the observatory to be sure, but just eyeballing it, the observatory based images just seem to be a bit higher quality.

Originally Posted by DJT

I ended up buying Maxim DL as a way to deal with blooming and also dithering as they have a good software solution over CCDSoft. A bit of overkill but overtime I have been leveraging the many other features in that software from acquisition through to telescope control and plate solving.

My signature shows the software I'm using. While I'm doing this project using software on Windows, eventually I'll be switching over to a Linux based system to do everything (it's not that far off). The PixInsight I use is on Linux.

So I try to avoid using software that I can't run on both systems (unless it's really cheap like APT or BYEOS). Even when I get the Linux system fully operational, I'll be keeping the Windows version going as well (I find it handles the DSLR better than under Linux at this time).

Originally Posted by DJT

PI haven't really focussed on a solution for blooming prefaring using techniques such as CCD rotation rather than destroying data which is fair enough. But if you are short of clear skies...

I am of a similar mindset to the PI team in that I'm going to try very hard not to destroy data as much as possible/feasible. So, to that end, I'll probably leave the blooming in there if I don't get enough data.

While clear skies seem rare, at least there's a lot of time left for this year, and I suppose there's always next year as well.