After a couple of months of tweeking and trying to get my setup right, I think I'm finally getting somewhere. Here's a shot from last night. I wasn't really trying to image last night, just test out the autoguiding, but I'm happy with the image anyway.
5x120sec ISO400
2x180sec ISO800
1x240 sec ISO800
Stacked in Reg3 and Slight levels and curves in PS
Very nice Paul, with tight, round stars. Your image graphically illustrates the difference between 47 Tuc and Omega Centauri in terms of the dense central concentration of stars in the core of 47 Tuc compared to the unruly splash of stars in NGC5139.
The AN is going great guns David. I've gotten the new dovetails etc for the mount now and its dropped the error way down. It's pickin' out for me loads of things I would never have tried before, free hand.
Its A nice shot Paul ! that NGC104 Glob is hard to keep the core from burning out. I'ts nice seeing tight stars ! looking forward to seeing more from you.
Very nice 3D effect Paul. Very well framed also. Good composition you might say.
Excellent focus. Did you use & have you mastered DSLRFocus yet?
Cheers
Always use DSLR Robby. Don't know about mastering it though. I need to make up a serial cable to run to the JMI focuser for that. Though by luck I fluked it last night and DSLR just couldn't get back close to the original no matter how I tried. I manually focused then took my first focus shot, then adjusted the focus and couldn't get closer than 20 to the original focus.
Looking good Paul I wish I new what you guys were talking about when you start talking your DSLR lingo !
Anyway I had to put on my shades to look at this shot
Louie
DSLR Focus is a program by Chris Venter to assist in focusing Digital SLR cameras Louie (specifically Canon 300D and 10D, though it can work for other brands). I have a real problem normally focusing through the view finder because of astigmatism. DSLR Focus takes a lot of the guess work out of it. There can still be a bit of mucking around at times especially in nights of mediocre seeing, but it makes it much easier as the focused image is seen directly on a laptop screen and not through the viewfinder.
I still do at times Louie. it depends on what I'm trying to image. I used to mainly use the Hartman mask for focusing for planetary imaging and I would focus on my computer screen anyway. For DSO I find it slightly different.
Sometimes I'll just do a quick rough and ready focus and then slip into DSLR Focus, or sometimes I'll initially focus using the hartman mask the then use DSLR Focus. It also depends on the seeing conditions at that time, and how good my eyes decide to be at that time. Plus how good my dark adaption is at the time. When I'm imaging I'm not too worried about it and tend to wander in and out of the house, have the computer screen turned up too bright (even though it will be on nightvision settings). So when it comes to focusing on a new image if my DA is poor I'll use the Harmann mask, then DSLR Focus. If its good I'll wing it with a rough and ready first. Though I do use the mask when it comes to focusing the ToUcam through the scope I'm using for autoguiding.
Still got a couple of teething problems using K3CCDTools in sub-pixel guiding mode but I'm getting there. I'm finding that in that mode the DeadZone, K, Q, Interval factors and FFT setting are a bit more critical than using non-sub-pixel mode. With a bit of luck I'll get out again tonight and give it another go.
It may be Tony, but the first image was uploaded at only 25% quality while the second one was around 40% quality, so that might have make a difference too.
Just had a bit of a check on the originals and the only shading difference seemed to be a bit of "glow" around the glob in the second one extending out about halfway to the edge of the frame. Otherwise they looked the same. So likely to be compression factors
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