The AZ GTI Forum

[low mural]

Nah I just extracted the red channel from the sv220 stack

Then I aligned them all in siril

[rugged jackal]

Right, so if I had more data and used the right filter to get the Ha signal my galaxy images would show a lot of Ha regions too.

[low mural]

Yup!!

[potent turret]

Can wind make my Guiding go from 1,5 arc second to 4

[rugged jackal]

I believe so, wind can cause your rig to vibrate which will effect the guiding as it is moving your guide scope away from the guide star.

[potent turret]

so ill only use calm nights

[rugged jackal]

yeah - another thing to stop a hobby, along with, clouds, rain, snow, hail, haze, fog, fireworks, moon, city lights, police helicopters...

😆

[tough scaffold]

trying to do hubble palette for first time

[tough scaffold]

https://www.amazon.com/SVBONY-Megapixel-Monochrome-Astronomy-Astrophotography-dp-B0C33NN9FQ/dp/B0C33NN9FQ/ref=dp_ob_title_ce

450$ for 533 mono

[azure solar]

What's going on with those prices? That's absurd for a mono cam

[modest nebula]

wow

[low mural]

Why can't they bring the price down on triplet apos 😂

I keep finding myself "window shopping" 😅

[rugged jackal]

I wish they would bring down the price of Pixinsight

[low mural]

I reckon never, price will just go up with inflation 😂

You should download the free trials

[rugged jackal]

Yep - I suppose we are spoilt with free software, NINA, Stellarium, Siril, GIMP etc we have forgotten that software development costs time, effort and money, But I wish it was reasonably priced like Affinity Photo, BTW so many people are recommending this & at £68 Affinity Photo is tempting, looool. 😆

Met office says all cloudy but I have just been out and I can see stars but I think it is a mirage - I'll set up and the clouds roll in.

[low mural]

Its a trap!

[rugged jackal]

it was, luckily i was lazier than cuiv and did not bother... and the clouds rolled in.

[tough scaffold]

Does someone use this tripod? Do you have all 3 rubber nozzles? My tripod got only 2

[rugged jackal]

one of mine ripped so i only have 2...

[low mural]

Yeah when I had it, one of the rubber things ripped off. Seems like a normal thing 😂

[modest nebula]

yeh the rubber is typical cheap fake rubber that you get everywhere these days. It rapidly deteriorates & crumbles into nothing

it annoys me when I replace rubber parts on my car that have lasted almost 40yrs and the replacement lasts barely 2

[tough scaffold]

I have found out that i need to extened 1 leg of tripod for 2 cm to level it. Will see how leveling will help with guiding

[rugged jackal]

I just had a thought - Is it possible to replace this tripod with a photographic tripod? I have a 'spare' carbon fibre tripod.

[tough scaffold]

makes sense , if it's sturdier

looks like leveling tripod helped a bit

[rugged jackal]

Has anyone ever ordered anything from AliExpress - what was your experience?

[azure solar]

bought a dovetail, a uv/ir cut and a filter drawer, shipping is quick and I save quite a lot buying there

[lament lion]

Eqmod cable for the gti was the only thing as of now that was through ali express for me perfectly fine

[rugged jackal]

When you say it was quick, ofc we cannot expect prime delivery of next day, How long do they take?

[azure solar]

a week or so

maybe closer to 10 days

[modest nebula]

I bought my camera from there. The experience was quite good

"When you make a payment with AliPay, the money is held until you receive the product and confirm that everything is in order." so it's in the vendor best interest to make the transaction go smoothly. Of course, after-sales support is a different matter so choose your vendor wisely

[azure solar]

I prefere to just use paypal, extra layer of protection

[lament lion]

Pay and pray 😂

[rugged jackal]

Hahaha

[azure solar]

just pick a decent seller and you won't have issues

[modest nebula]

I bought my sv220 from AliExpress too, from the svbony store

that went fine

[rugged jackal]

I ordered filters around 20th Jan and still on the way - transitting so many points... lol

Must be the slow plane from China... 🤣

Not that I have any need for them at the moment or for the forseeable future.

[azure solar]

They have holydays right now so everything is delayed

[low mural]

Yeah the lunar New year will deffo be holding things back. What filters did you go for?

[rugged jackal]

The Askar Colour Magic C1+C2 duo filters:

[azure solar]

oh cool, curious to see if they're any good

[rugged jackal]

Well you convinced me to go for it (along with Cuiv) lool

[azure solar]

I'm still sort of skeptical

[rugged jackal]

The C1 is the poor man's L'Enhance and C2 might be a good bonus, I am hoping to tame the light pollution and enhance the HA and Oiii at least.

[azure solar]

the c2 is the only one I'd be interested in, even tho Idk how to merge the sii and oiii data to the rest

[rugged jackal]

Yeah I have no idead of merging the two datasets - something new to learn.

[azure solar]

prob gotta start to learn pixelmath

[low mural]

Pixel math would deffo be the best way, but you could start by splitting the channels and then assigning the the data that way in SHO.

It would be cool to get some Sii data on some nebula. I'm not a huge fan of HOO but like the look of SHO pallets.

[rugged jackal]

Dammit I can't even do basic maths!!! 😆

[modest nebula]

I find narrowband data is best mixed with broadband as well to get decent stars and background. I often deliberately clip blacks for starless Ha and OIII & mix it into an RGB session

[queen thicket]

@rugged jackal good choice. The Askar set looks good.. I think if expectations are kept in order then I believe thay will perform great. Looking forward to seeing the results.
Have fun.

[low mural]

Go through the #1021002743080558642 channel and find other people's narrowband data to practice on. That's what Im doing with galaxies at the moment on prep for my next project

I need to shoot M44 first though as I have an ongoing pattern on my Instagram. I need to get a fairly quick shot of M44 so I can post the "heart" nebula in time for valentine's

As you can see .. a symptom of my autism

The blue startrail reel is upsetting my brain though haha

[rugged jackal]

I think I'll be needing a lot of help when we get the chance to ever see the skies again

[rugged jackal]

Thank you @queen thicket appreciate the vote of confidence, waiting on the delivery of the filters and more importantly some clear skies 🤣

[rugged jackal]

What a good idea, thanks for the suggestion, I'll do the same and practice on available data.

[rugged jackal]

I am sure the missus will appreciate the heart, and another good idea!

[modest nebula]

This is my stacked Horsehead narrowband and RGB. I've also included my Gimp save file for the processed layers so you can see how I layer them. https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/17r2t2q7PIDyuZwB3UQ34c1Y6EFyrv5nb?usp=sharing

your challenge is to align, extract background, extract stars/background, stretch, pull into gimp with a similar layer structure, and recreate, all whilst keeping noise low

or of course, do your interpretation 🙂

[rugged jackal]

Great home-work thanks buddy

[modest nebula]

btw the layer called "visible" is one that I create by "create layer from visible" after I've mostly processed the layers below. I use that for final curve adjustment. Hide that layer and you'll see what I mean

you'll also see that I merge stars + background in Gimp. I usually stretch the RGB star mask in Siril before saving as TIF, tweaking in Gimp

[lament lion]

Ok I found the light leak, not the camera at all it seems, was coming from the filter drawer mini, there are these screw holes, it seems even with a filter inserted inside there the little lip that suppose to cover them have been letting some light to leak in, I put everything back together, took the tape off the camera put some tape to cover those 2 screw holes in a dark room and a vary bright flash light I didn’t see any difference when the light was on or off so that’s a relief

*yes I used a US dollar bill, I didn’t have anything around me to show what I’m talking about with the screw holes so took money out my back pocket lol

[rugged jackal]

So I don't want to be that guy that says 'told you so' but I did say so - loool, but the main thing is that it is not the camera, yay, , now I will need to be extra careful when I get my filters setup.

[lament lion]

Ok I was mistaken there are a total of 6 of those little screw holes 2 of which go over where the insert goes and when I taped it up I don’t know how but I missed the other screw holes, thank god I didn’t do a nice tape job and wanted to make the tape look good and noticed that on the bottom all 6 holes let in the light even still the 2 that should be getting covered up with the filter insert

All 6 of these let in light

Without the flashlight inside the filter drawer mini to show that it’s not outside light doing that

[rugged jackal]

Is this the ZWO filter drawer? A bit shoddy of the manufacturer to design & build equipment that is all about filtering and controlling light!!

[lament lion]

No that’s the player one filter drawer mini, the filter drawer for the Uranus c pro

I sent player one a email with pictures and letting them know

[rugged jackal]

Oh OK, I was about to say that you need to inform Player one and get a replacement unit.

[lament lion]

So then that would explain why light was getting in when it was shining from behind the camera and not anywhere else from the other day when I was testing it out, light was bouncing backwards from the telescope back to the filter drawer and getting in through there

[lament lion]

Ehhh not concerned with a replacement I put electrical tape on all the holes and that seemed to take care of it

[rugged jackal]

Pretty good detective work, I would have given up and put a bin liner over it - loool.

even though it is not light proof

😆

[azure solar]

aren't the tiny holes to screw the drawer directly onto the cam?

[lament lion]

I wanted to give up but then I keep looking at my picture that I did with it on the only night of clear skies I had and it was bothering me, I wanted to look at absolutely everything and test everything and if it didn’t work I was going to send the camera back and just use the uncooled till I got something else cooled

[lament lion]

Ahhh well crap

I have a little adapter that just treads in to the camera and so I can thread it on the filter drawer

Had no idea you could do that honestly, it came on the filter drawer to then thread into the camera, player one website even has a picture of that on the filter drawer

[azure solar]

that threaded part can be removed, the two notches are to make that easier

on their site:

On both side of the Filter Drawer MINI, has 6 M2.5 screws holes. Screw holes on telescope side used to connect the FHD-OAG MINI, Screw holes on camera side used to connect cooled cameras.

[lament lion]

I’ll be darned, I had no idea, that would have solved my problem from the vary start, but since it says it’s 0mm spacing and I got it taped up now I think I’ll just leave it for now and maybe in the summer when I’m actually going to get some clear skies I’ll give it a go, hard to do in the winter and spring time vary rarely do I get clear nights

[rugged jackal]

Sounds like Birmingham.

[lament lion]

It’s that time of year where it teases me, the sun is out during the daytime but in the evening and all of at night it’s cloudy

[azure solar]

same here for the last couple of weeks, only got 2 nights

[lament lion]

That’s 2 nights more than me 😭

[rugged jackal]

£££ worth of equipment for that one night in a month! 😥 🤣

[azure solar]

worth it

[rugged jackal]

👍

[lament lion]

Ok I’m off to bed, I have to get up in 5 hours for work…..

[lament lion]

^yeah that was a lie, called off didn’t get to bed to late last night anyways, on another note clouds let me get at least an hour of a test run and the live stack in sharpcap wasn’t showing any light leaks like it did the last time but currently getting the pictures off the mini pc so I’ll find out here shortly

[lament lion]

Ok that was the problem, just stacked with just flats as usual and nothing like the last time oh thank goodness for that

[rugged jackal]

Cool,good to hear. Good result. Now for some clear skies.

[lament lion]

Yeah but now I’m trying to fix graxpert not working in pix

[rugged jackal]

My news - the filters have not been delivered yet even though the suggested timeline was 3-7 Feb 2024, the AliExpress tracking is confusing and repetitive - the tracking timeline is the longest ever so I fear it has taken the long way round to get to Birmingham

[lament lion]

Yeah it usually isn’t the fastest and it seems like it’s always off for delivery time but shouldn’t be much longer

[low mural]

Yeah I would give it until Friday and then follow up

[rugged jackal]

OK, seems like a good idea.

[lament lion]

I am so frustrated!!! Last night problems with slew and center no matter what I did I was having a problem, went to andromeda Galaxy and it kept thinking it’s below the horizon, even though nothing has changed and i had no problems the last time, I tried synscan app and syncing everything, I also switched to green swamp and still nothing, I went back to synscan and it then worked, then dss changed settings somehow, and the bayer matrix wasn’t correct on auto so I put it back to rggb and now it’s back to doing what it needs, like nothing has changed since December when I tested it out till last night and challenges everywhere

So then that got me thinking I’m wondering if the problem I had with that last bodes with that blue noise was because the bayer matrix was changed back then even though I didn’t change it it should have been the rggb I did a test stack and no longer see that at all but if I switch it back I’m seeing that same blue noise in almost the same pattern

Switched the bayer back to where it should have been and the test stack shows nothing back to normal, so I’m re stacking last nights data and do a quick update

[rugged jackal]

I have been there too and discovered that opening synscan and other software such as NINA gave me weird results and pointed the scope into the ground, I had the same issue when using Stellarium and doing some framing in NINA and the slewing pointed the scope into the ground, once I stopped using Stellarium it was back to normal, not sure if this helps you but may have some similarities.

[lament lion]

Don’t use planetary software, I use the offline framing assistant and I never had a problem before then last night all of a sudden it thinks that everything is below the horizon and wanted to point at the ground, tried doing bodes galaxy again points down switched to andromeda pointed down, it’s like I had to quickly stop the slew when it started so it can plate solve again and that seemed to help last night but like what’s going on nothing has changed and all of a sudden it’s like absolutely everything has changed and giving me a headache

[azure solar]

are you sure your time, date and coordinates didn't reset or something? the only time I had something similar happen was when my utc offset was wrong

[lament lion]

I doubled checked everything looked the same, I went back and closed everything re entered the cords and everything restarted and idk next clear night I’ll try again if it doesn’t work I might just uninstall Nina, sysncan, and gss and reinstall and set up everything again from scratch

[azure solar]

did you try to manually plate solve too?

[lament lion]

I plate solved, it knew where it was pointing and everything

I went on google tried almost every suggestion that I was seeing double checking everything was matching up in all the software and still had that problem so i might have to do more testing next clear night or just redo everything and see

[rugged jackal]

Again I may be off the mark but I had weird issues when I was using a USB hub and had the camera, mount & memory stick connected to it, it was causing GSS to either crash or work oddly, the memory stick would come up, and the camera was displaying weird temperatures. It might be worth checking your your USB hubs, connections and even cables.

[tough scaffold]

Had some problem with synscan windows app. It was not able to update coordinates. So I had to use smartphone synscan with gps on, so telescope get right coordinates and after that i connect nina.
Also had some trouble with sync when telescope turned on not in home position. So if it's too far nina will show some error and it will not sync.

[lament lion]

Let me just screen shot that so I don’t forget to give that a try

Also 28min of data from the other night when I was testing and trying to get mount to work, I have to rotate the camera so it’s not sideways but didn’t bother since it was only testing, and maybe a bit to much editing too but I wanted to see if the stacking in the correct bayer pattern and not on auto would fix some weird banding

[lament lion]

Also this is coming tomorrow so I can finally use the evoguide, still waiting on the starizona field flattener but decided to get the normal one on Amazon cannot use filters but that’s okay for now

[low mural]

Yeah me and Beezer got this bar for the eboguide 👍

[lament lion]

Oh no kidding that hilarious I didn’t know

So it fits guide cam and mini pc?

[low mural]

Just about balances 😂

[lament lion]

Oh perfect that’s kinda a relief

[rugged jackal]

I had to get this same bar too, lol, from amazon...

[lament lion]

Hahaha let’s go!!

[modest nebula]

can we rename this forum to "The Neewer Dovetail Club"?

[rugged jackal]

hahaha why not or the az-gti or 858 or neewer club

[lament lion]

Wait it’s the same company too neewer hahaha I didn’t catch that

[rugged jackal]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C3ItH2dkyic

[modest nebula]

so the end result is he clipped the blacks?

[azure solar]

pretty much

[modest nebula]

I wonder if a variant of that would work if you imaged an empty area of the sky for a few hours & used a starless version of that for your black layer?

[low mural]

Yeah bad idea in my op

What I used to do before Graxpert was duplicate the file and do a "noise reduction, dust and scratches filter" then apply that image to the main image and use the subtract tool in Photoshop. Both methods would essentially destroy any signal in the backgroundm DBE has a better chance of removing gradients and retaining that signal

[rugged jackal]

Just got hit for £47 VAT, duty and handling fee, WTH, so no point in buying from AliExpress - same price if not worse than buying from FLO with delivery in 2 days not 19 days!!!! 😕

I wish these import charges are clearly outlined so can make better choices.

[azure solar]

What did you buy?

[rugged jackal]

The Askar filters

[azure solar]

Mh that's weird, I've never had to pay any kind of tax when buying from ali

Usually when you have to pay vat they subtract it from the checkout price

[rugged jackal]

It seems if you the value of the item is above £135 then there is VAT and Duty and ofc royal mail always has to charge for handling fee but surely the cost of postage is the handling fee!

I have bought from TEMU but none of the package were above £40 hence no charges. IN this case I think this will be my first and last AliExpress purchase.

[azure solar]

I wonder if the taxes I had to pay when I bought from flo were due to royal mail rather than something else

[rugged jackal]

You had to pay taxes when buying from FLO? I thought FLO is based in the UK?

[azure solar]

I'm not in the uk

[rugged jackal]

And to rub it in - they won't deliver until Monday ! lol

[rugged jackal]

Oh OK, sorry.

[azure solar]

It was quite upsetting, I paid 26€ the item, 8 for shipping and when it arrived I had to pay 13 more

Shame that part is only sold in the uk

[rugged jackal]

Yeah I know the feeling ! I thought I was getting a discount, unfortunately the C filters are sold out FLO so I thought Ali would be ok and save some money in return for a 10 days delivery, delivery will be 22 days and charges on top.

[azure solar]

Must be an issue with uk customs? I always received my stuff a week to more earlier

[rugged jackal]

No UK customer was sorted within hours it was a really long supply chain.

so many hops including landing in Holland transit then to the UK then to heathrow and on and on...

[modest nebula]

you got away with taxes on your camera though didn't you?

[rugged jackal]

Yes but I think Player-One pay the charge towards import - I believe @low mural did not have to pay any charges either.

[low mural]

Yeah I didn't pay anything. Either the shipper paid the taxes or it was declared as something under £135..

I mean the import charges would have probably been around £150 so huge saving tbh. £450 paid for a imx585 cooled cam!

I put aside the money incase I had to pay it so now I have £150 to play around with 😂 I keep looking at new scopes. Similar focal range but perhaps a triplet or something I might save for. Then again I wanna get a planetary scope too. Decisions!

[rugged jackal]

Well I've paid the £47 - which I think is silly amount to have so many charges inc RM fee, this was annoying but then delivery is not tomorrow but monday and I might have a few hours of clear skies on Sunday, though Tuesday looks better.

[tough scaffold]

Got some problem with az-gti last night. It disconnected few times while slewing. So it disconected while flip at night and nina also freezed. Looks like was cable problem. Hope superglue will fix this

[tough scaffold]

Any way to stop guiding pulses while clouds? It tries to guide with SNR 15

[low mural]

Are you connecting via WiFi or cable?

[tough scaffold]

cable

[low mural]

Hmmm weird.. yeah the only thing I could suggest is a cable problem. Assuming there's no snags?

[tough scaffold]

I did eqmod cable myself. Did not want to wait from china, so I crimped it with screwdriver, so not the best quality) So some glue at right place should help) Works fine for now

[azure solar]

could be power? if it disconnects while slewing it could be asking for more power than it has available

[tough scaffold]

Yeah it acts like low power, but when I jiggled eqmod cable it started work better last night. Only disconnected again by morning. Will see today how it work

[lament lion]

Look at this nerd, congrats on the role

[lament lion]

Why not Amazon for something like that $23

[tough scaffold]

I had parts to do cable, and synscan wifi lagged as hell. Min delivery was about two weeks, so did it myself. Worked good for year.

look at this beauty

[modest nebula]

similar to mine, except I used heatshrink

[rugged jackal]

I am doing my homework, I am on step 6 in Image Processing, using the stretch - modified arcsinh transform, stretch so that stars look nice but is also exposing the nebula, then save as a stars tif (I assume with the nebula?)

[azure solar]

I usually make the image starless before stretching

color calibration, graxpert, green noise removal, star removal, stretch

[rugged jackal]

I am following @modest nebula image processing steps in https://astro.wheep.co.uk/tutorials/workflow/ and I have this so far

[azure solar]

not that you can't stretch before going starless but considering that starnet has a prestretch option to avoid artifacts it's more efficient (Imo) to go that way

[tough scaffold]

so my mount turned off at night again while flip and it was power cable problem. Resoldered it

[rugged jackal]

Great you found the issue and fixed it. Well done.

[rugged jackal]

Need help to understand how to get back focus in anticipation of the filters being delievred soon. I have decided to add a manual filter wheel but cannot understand how to get the BFL of 55mm.

My current setup is this:

The filter wheel i have purchased is 22.8mm without the adapter in the image and 27.8mm with the adapter, what is the best way to attach and get the required backfocus - 55mm?

Thanks

[azure solar]

which filter wheel is it? 22.8 is a weird size

[rugged jackal]

https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B08LMTRZTS?psc=1&ref=ppx_yo2ov_dt_b_product_details

[azure solar]

ah it doesn't even have a brand?

[rugged jackal]

No it does not but seems to be a generic design that branded ones are also using. full metal construction and feels pretty good bar the brand badge

[azure solar]

you're probably fine even with a few mm off, especially with a sensor that small

but you'll need a new set of extensions

[rugged jackal]

Correction the depth without the adapter is 22.5mm

[modest nebula]

so you'll need a 15mm extender then?

filter wheel to replace the 20mm extension, then 15mm extension to replace the 17.5

[low mural]

Filter drawer is tempting. But can do without for now 😂

Like a 10% chance of clear skies tomorrow

Might be enough for me to capture M44 perhaps

[rugged jackal]

Which extender would work?

[rugged jackal]

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Extension-Extending-Astronomical-Telescope-Photography-default/dp/B0BQJLTPCW/ref=sr_1_4?crid=1132I89E111C4&keywords=15mm+m42+extender&qid=1707606286&sprefix=15mm+m42+extender%2Caps%2C453&sr=8-4

[azure solar]

If the telescope takes m48, it should would

That's scope to fw m48 and fw to camera m42 right?

[rugged jackal]

Would this set work - take the 15mm tube from the set above - my idea is to add :

(m42 - m48 0mm adapter) then (m48 15mm extender) then (filter wheel m48) then (m42 camera)

[prime spire]

hi guys. I am looking for a really compact take it and go style system and want to have Az-GTI for myself. I have a question

i already have fujifilm dslr with extra raspberry pi and powerbank so i want to build a kind of smart telescope instead of buying seestar s50. the question is

do i really have to have tracking/goto scope and camera to use it properly or can i use my fujifilm both for tracking and taking a photos

[azure solar]

by tracking do you mean guiding?

[prime spire]

yes

[azure solar]

then no, you'll need a separate cam

[prime spire]

Still with 10s exposure with azimuth style ?

[azure solar]

I don't think you can guide in alt-az anyway, but no. The guide exposures have to be quicker, like 2s

and phd2 can't read the same image that's being saved as light frame

[low mural]

Anyone imaging tonight? I am shooting M44. Poor Guiding and a possible backspacing issue, but I will look into those after the session. I do not expect it to be clear for long tbh

[azure solar]

Terrible weather this week and possibly next week too

Took the time to setup a decent minipc today, now I can put aside my old and slow laptop

[low mural]

Which mini pc did you get?

[rugged jackal]

clear tonight but had a function to attend so too late to setup... hoping tomorrow is fairly decent too.

[low mural]

Fingers crossed

Trying to get some m81 data but dithering close to zenith is chaos 😂

[low mural]

15 min stack. Not looking bad already!

[tough scaffold]

not so bad guiding. I usually get 1.1-1.5 arcsec. And 1.5-3 when I am close to horizon

[tough scaffold]

nice. Had the same target tonight

[lament lion]

I don’t know what I did but it’s now slewing and centering perfectly again…..

Just have to wait for phd2 and I’ll start m101

Took the evoguide field flattener off and just used the regular extension tube and perfect focus so idk what’s going on with the field flattener when it’s the same size but oh well guess I’m stuck with nothing till starizona gets more, even though the lady said late January of this year and we’ll still nothing

[lament lion]

Nothing like hooking up the laptop to the tv and having a bigger scream to view

[tough scaffold]

Synscan? Btw i found setting that not allowed to sync if you are too far. It's was Sync Limit at gss

Also turned on encoders. Interesting will it use encoders data while slewing, or it will rely on motor rotation

[azure solar]

I just took an old zotac with n3150 that my father had laying around

[azure solar]

Fyi the encoders on the azgti aren't very accurate, I would stick to plate solving

[tough scaffold]

I will plate solve, just want to test will it make any difference when slewing from one target to other

[azure solar]

I always read to keep them off, I'm not sure if they can interfere in some way

[tough scaffold]

Yeah, read that thread at cloudynights. Some have problems when they on.

What flattener do you use with your 72ed?@azure solar

[low mural]

Never easy shooting stars with poor seeing and a refractor, but I prioritised colour during the process. Another one for my catalogue 👍

[modest nebula]

That's so that when you release the clutches and move the mount manually, it will still know where it's pointing

[tough scaffold]

Yeah, I know. It tracks my manual moves now. I wonder will it use encoder data, when slewing. Usually slew and center takes 2-4 plate solves to center target. Want to test will it change somehow with encoders.

[azure solar]

The 1x skywatcher flattener, it you're in the uk it's called ovl field flattener

[tough scaffold]

Same. Do you use standart 55mm backfocus? I got a bit of elongation in corners with 55mm.

[azure solar]

I think I'm like .5 or 1mm short but since I use a 533 I can't notice any elongation

[low mural]

Yeah I have noticed some elongation. I am 55mm so may have to mess about with it. Could it be tilt? Look at the bottom left of my M44 image

Or was it just poor seeing lol

Cannot see anything drastic in the other corners 🤔

[azure solar]

Use astap to check for tilt

[modest nebula]

siril also has a tilt checker

[low mural]

Cool I'll take a look

[tough scaffold]

that what i got. Is it tilt?

didn't see astap writes tilt below image. i got 27%

[tough scaffold]

So i checked encoders. It can't slew to target at all with encoders on)

[tough scaffold]

i have tightened screw under focuser. looks better

[tough scaffold]

any ideas why nina do dither at first frame?

[azure solar]

no idea, nothing seems wrong there

for dithering I prefere to use the trigger rather than the smart exposure

[queen thicket]

Sorry for interrupting.. I also don't use encoders.. Just Platesolve and tien them off in gss.

[queen thicket]

I also noticed this.
Previously I never had an issue.. But the last few month's it's being dithering and the reporting that it can't ON THE FIRST FRAME.
I know it's going to happen so I just ignore it & all seems fine after that.

Maybe a bug in the latest nina update.

[tough scaffold]

I had several targets at list, so it dithered only at first frame of first target, then no problems. I got no reporting it just dithers. Will enable logging tonight to see what it says.

@azure solar How do you connect ovl thread or nosecone? Do you have rotator? I am using nosecone, so i can have ability to rotate, as i don't have separate rotator.

[azure solar]

I bought an adapter from flo that screws in, to use it you remove the nosepiece and the part on the focuser where you tighten the screws

I rotated the whole scope in its rings to get the angle I wanted, I can't buy a rotator now

[tough scaffold]

Yeah, got this adapter too.
Found thread at stargaze The guy has almost same setup 72ed + ovl ff + asi294 and he ended up with 64.6mm back focus

[azure solar]

You need to be blind to add that much extra backfocus

[vocal talon]

Who from there use evoguide 50ed with sk field flattener?

[low mural]

Most of us evoguiders have the starizona one

[vocal talon]

did there was a big deifferent bettwen starizona and sk flattener?

[vocal talon]

I live in poland and get starizona is not that simply

[azure solar]

with the sw flattener something like a dslr can't reach focus iirc

[vocal talon]

well

I have dslr

[azure solar]

you'll need the starizona then

[vocal talon]

well sh1t

[low mural]

Yeah the starizona is the only one that will work with a DSLR

[vocal talon]

that's gonna be expensive

[azure solar]

it's like 30€ more expensive than the sw flattener

[vocal talon]

yeap + shipping

and 23%vat

[azure solar]

where are you buying it from?

[vocal talon]

I need to buy it from other country then poland and when you buy something to poland you need to pay 23% of the price

[azure solar]

skypoint has it for 155€, being in the eu you shouldn't have to pay extra vat

[vocal talon]

Welcom in poland XDDD

[vocal talon]

If i want to don't pay vat I need someone who buy it in geramny and get this to me

and that's how I buy my heq5 for 10% less than In poland

think zwo am5 in us cost 8000zl in poland it cost 12000zl

[lament lion]

Still waiting on my starizona field flattener since December, originally they said to me was end of January of 2024 now it’s mid march so we will see definitely need it so I can use filters again

[modest nebula]

I thought my Flame & Horsehead was good until I saw this one https://www.astrobin.com/full/o5lc9o/0/ 😦

[azure solar]

To be fair he's using a mono cam with an esprit

[modest nebula]

I think my next cam will be mono. I kinda wished I got mono this time

[vocal talon]

taht's look like 2-3h of exposure

[tough scaffold]

It was good frame untill 8 sec spike

[azure solar]

A bit more than 12h, it's on the technical page on astrobin

[azure solar]

That's my plan, by buying touptek and getting filters from china I'm expecting to pay around 2.7k

[rugged jackal]

Wow, that is one hell of a Horsehead image! 12 h of integration - helps to be in bortle 1/2 with lots of clear skies and nice equipment and the skills to process it all. I am not at all jealous!

[modest nebula]

TBH it's one of the things I find most frustrating about this hobby. One moment you're really quite pleased with yourself that you've got something that looks nice, then you see something like that & you realize how far away you are from anything impressive

[rugged jackal]

If you feel like that, then imagine what I must be feeling when I see the quality on this forum vs my crappy images. However, the biggest pile of dung for all of us is the sheer unending depression of clouds that blots our souls.

[azure solar]

yeah coulds are more depressing than making bad images

I can't improve as much as I want if I can't even get enough data

[modest nebula]

this is true

[rugged jackal]

Absolautely spot on, the mild weather is good for us to stay warm but terrible for the amount of clouds it produces.

[rugged jackal]

I guess this guy's filter set alone is worth >2x more than my entire rig!

[modest nebula]

RGB filters are comparitively cheap compared to narrowband. They were "only" £365

but can I just add an extra dose of jealousy that he got that image using RGB without narrowband filters. His sky must be very clear

[rugged jackal]

I am really jealous - clear skies, good seeing, low Bortle and great processing. Perhaps we should all move to Spain.

[modest nebula]

I would move abroad except the wife keeps bleating on about wanting to see her kids/grandkids

[azure solar]

Great when the minipc when in standby it lost connection to the mount

And I didn't realise

Lost 3h or so of data

[low mural]

Mono puts me off purely because of integration time. I have not got time to get 3 hours with a OSC cameras let alone 3 hours in Red, 3 hours in Blue and 3 hours in Green on Mono 😂

I personally think the scope would be my next limitation. I am starting to look at different scopes but have not made my mind up yet. I'm still undecided between a triplet, SCT or Newtonian. They all have pros and cons 😂

[rugged jackal]

With modern OSC cameras, if you can get 9+ hours of data, the results should also be fairly close to mono and without the very high cost of mono cameras, filters, wheels, mounts etc.

This is our biggest problem, looool, when is the next clear day?

[azure solar]

Tbh I've seen enough of mono to say that 4h split between ha and oiii end up looking much better than 4h of dual narrowband osc

I'm already planning a mono setup, should come around 2.7k €

[rugged jackal]

Nice, what is your time frame for the upgrade? & I guess you will be upgrading your mount too? If I may ask but where are you located?

[azure solar]

Time frame, depends. I should star working next month and since I live with my parents I would be able to save up quickly

I've already upgraded the mount an year ago, went from an azgti to a umi17

And I'm in italy

I'm buying the camera and filters from meow and the filter wheel and oag from touptek directly

It's the only way to get a mono setup for "cheap"

[low mural]

Damn I need to move back in with my parents, it would free up like £1700 on bills, I could get so much astro gear 😂

[rugged jackal]

A harmonic drive, nice! and Italy is even nicer, perhaps I can move in too - save money and get some Italian sun - seems like a win/win to me 🤣 . On a more serious note have you considered the Player-One options? They have decent mono cameras, with OAG and nice EFWs?

[azure solar]

Buying from meowastro I save enough to not make me consider player one, the touptek stuff is really cheap in comparison

My plan is to have the cam, efw and oag all bolted together so I can avoid all the issues with tilt and stuff

[rugged jackal]

Look forward to seeing the results.

[modest nebula]

btw there's a thread in Share Your Data with some stunning mono narrowband data in case you want to practice https://discord.com/channels/794642864218439681/1145601464778113065

[azure solar]

second "clear" night according to forecast and right as I start shooting it switched to cloudy

and is in fact getting cloudy

what a waste of time

[lament lion]

yeah had a clear night but way to windy and looking like that was the last clear night for the next 2 weeks but hoping the all the weather apps are wrong lol

[lament lion]

Glad I did this, was having a look around again and man was the early stages was rough but I know in a few years I’ll be saying the same thing to even the most recent images

Doesn’t help looking back on processing, only just recently been saving the stacked images and keeping them on pc so as I’m getting better at processing I can go back to old data and re process it a little bit better still not really good at it but slowly getting better

[modest nebula]

@rugged jackal perhaps you should lobby for this in Birmingham https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-york-north-yorkshire-68305317

[rugged jackal]

If I was president of birmingham I would remove half the street lights, and install downward reflectors to reduce light pollution of the heavens. Force everyone to install blackout curtains and no security lights unless they are red.

🤣

Oh and no one can drive a car/transport unless an emergency or need to get to a dark site.

[rugged jackal]

Not one spot in the UK free to image! 😥

[rugged jackal]

Anyone doing any astro tonight, the skies are clearish with some haze for now but 3/4 moon overhead, met office show clouds moving in later.

[low mural]

I knackered tonight 😂 hopefully some more clear skies in the coming days

[tough scaffold]

about 1 hour m42. Will collect more data

[tough scaffold]

2.5 hours

[rugged jackal]

Lovely shots, esp the 2.5 hours. Which camera/filter?

[tough scaffold]

sv405cc + uv-ir

[tough scaffold]

Tonight's target list

[modest nebula]

for me, tonight's target list is "<<cloud>>" 😄

[low mural]

With no clear sky date in sight 😂

[rugged jackal]

😥

[modest nebula]

and my wife thinks I'm crazy when I stay up to 3-4am on the one night of the year when we get perfect sky

[low mural]

Non astrophotography enthusiasts will never understand!

[rugged jackal]

wait till our families find out how much we have spent on our rigs while waiting for that one perfect night; they will call the police and the ambulance 🤣

[tough scaffold]

3h 40 min. Need to redo my flats

[azure solar]

looks great, so much dust. What bortle lvl?

[tough scaffold]

bortle 5 according to lightpollutionmap.info

[azure solar]

that's pretty good, I can see why you got that much data with that little time

[rugged jackal]

Lovely capture. I am so envious!

[low mural]

Currently clear outside, but the maps are being unpredictable 🤔

More unpredictable than usual*

[rugged jackal]

half clear for me but I have trust issues so I have the little one doing some work instead...

[rugged jackal]

Was supposed to be fairly clear tonight but back to reality and clouds!

[low mural]

ZWO are finally joining the cooled 585 camera hype

Skies are clearing up. M81 does not come onto view until about 10pm for me, so I will be keeping an eye. Will be shooting HA today if clear 🌕

[azure solar]

a bit late to the party

[rugged jackal]

ZWO have the advantage of many agents and sellers in the UK, USA & Europe something Player One, Touptec do not have at the moment.

[modest nebula]

Touptek have Altair in UK

[lament lion]

On player ones website if you go to dealers there is some from Europe and there is a usa dealer

[low mural]

Skies didnt open up for me in the end

Decided to start streamlining my website instead haha https://www.astrobenn.com/

[modest nebula]

That looks pretty good now

[low mural]

Thanks Beezer! When I created my Messier catalogue and put it on Etsy back in like summer last year, I didn't realise I would making £15 a month from it 😂 bit of pocket money towards astro gear haha

[rugged jackal]

Last night around 11pm the skies looked clear with the full moon shining like a beacon illuminating all around me, so bright I could see the grass in the garden and the shadows were sharp. I loved there are no clouds but the moon, oh lovely moon. I went to bed.

[rugged jackal]

Tried my hand today, setup, everything connected except for the az-gti checked and found the ac/dc power adapter's power light was off, changed the fuse but still no life, looked for alternative adapters but nothing suitable, this power adapter also powers the camera hence not using batteries, any suggestions before I pack in?

ofc clouds are also rolling in, so a pretty miserable session so far! lol,

[rugged jackal]

Packed up.

[rugged jackal]

I need to replace the ac/dc adapter - 12v 5a generic adapter. I am thinking of getting this to power both my mount and the uranus-c ? please let me know if this is the right thing to do?

https://www.amazon.co.uk/12V-8A-Power-Supply-Transformers/dp/B0CKN91BJ1/ref=sr_1_82?dib=eyJ2IjoiMSJ9.JesCWceCdD48HD3C4B03zAXzSAx9MxzSPBJpF3xNVC6p9cNApqiiGVusGmpNaQ-MFi_JGh9K1ALWEijiCuOuzwKZGb5OedQ3uvwxDQKFjX42oxxLL_10tgHM2lPhHsQcT4BMVRBahz7g60hQiI2NLmlsqts1Zd64AmQbBu_02f0RBpe41POvcpHqunQ-kirNmUIvTmrr1Zpd9N8PJuauuryjw9KCeLA246StI5IAQzkrjDqqDUGxUS75dHJ2j-kMX2-5QZvG4DMdvQ8Y5wTdOdhkQN252uy7vBVt7-aqAR0.e0iX8WaLutNAbY7WgPtBQkQfmS1uDGcvz6zdraJGaRE&dib_tag=se&keywords=ac%2B220-240v%2Bto%2Bdc%2B12v%2B5a%2B60w%2Bpower%2Bsupply%2Badapter%2Bto%2Bpower%2B2%2Bitems&qid=1708811329&sr=8-82&th=1

or this one:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/12V-5A-Power-Supply-Adapter/dp/B09H2ZB17H/ref=sr_1_17?crid=5RPWTNXRTO5D&dib=eyJ2IjoiMSJ9.wSaoclYK5sLQSbJR45kOCjD0H1-926BTMdQffMbBVz5p-0ShfUZMmY86X5wZcepsOkzPt_PyHiN6MQ-DJZi37z7dkbzH8o1EtskllsRRPgW7eSIk3mM69WkaCLZDFl3P7NO92990wBmNi3ZCq7uAejkP2nRh-XbrMcP1h_kLMl3RwuKFnHFtBu0yvkfINKoTovs5WcLDH52pqqLTBPKeSmwea3uUXX4q-MLCJ9vOk0MEhtpY88486UMBr2prjQmWpUHB4xXDyhxa-c4-wiO9fllSR4rDL_mbR24GAVR8EJA.9hEaZb0nfpW31RxtRbxv6iEBvXS-uh6DrvIBjecw67c&dib_tag=se&keywords=ac%2B220-240v%2Bto%2Bdc%2B12v%2B5a%2B60w%2Bpower%2Bsupply%2Badapter%2Bto%2Bpower%2B2%2Bitems&qid=1708810442&sprefix=ac%2B220-240v%2Bto%2Bdc%2B12v%2B5a%2B60w%2Bpower%2Bsupply%2Badapter%2Bto%2Bpower%2B2%2Bitems%2Caps%2C83&sr=8-17&th=1

[tough scaffold]

It should work, but motor drivers can couse some interference at power line.
Don't know about az-gti, but i have used cheap esp32 camera with servo and i got a lot of noise at camera, when servos moved camera.
I use mobile phone charger and usb cable with power delivery trigger with 12v output for az-gti, so it can also be powered from power bank

[azure solar]

I would get a good psu like a meanwell

[modest nebula]

this is the one I got https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/265251853088

[sweet mantle]

Is the GTI the best mount to EQ-ify, or will the Go2, GTE etc work fine as well?

[azure solar]

Which one js the go2?

I'd stick to the azgti, it's the one with the most features and has plenty of guides about tuning

[sweet mantle]

https://skywatcheraustralia.com.au/az-go2/

This one

[azure solar]

No that wouldn't work

It needs a new firmware to work in eq mode

Which the azgti has

[sweet mantle]

Ok. Is it specifically the "Az-Gti" or the mini az GTI? Because I can only see the mini on the SkyWatcher website

Given prices here I might just get the EQM-35. That way I have a proper EQ and can put my SkyWatcher 120/1000 achro on it

[azure solar]

There's a mini azgti?

Or are you thinking of the star adventurer gti

[sweet mantle]

https://skywatcheraustralia.com.au/product/mini-az-gti-mount/

[azure solar]

Ah no idea why it's called mini, it looks like a normal azgti

[sweet mantle]

Must be a regional naming convention

[azure solar]

Yeah maybe

[sweet mantle]

Which just makes things confusing in the age of global instant connections y'know?

[azure solar]

Is there another azgti without the "mini" in the name?

Or are they just trying to confuse people

[sweet mantle]

I think confusion. Because the sku for the Australian mini is "SWAZGTI" 😂

[modest nebula]

https://www.cloudynights.com/topic/912472-nebunoise-a-new-ai-noise-reduction-tool/

[modest nebula]

Initial results promising. This is on 60% strength

[azure solar]

downloading it now, let's see how it goes

[modest nebula]

I processed this with it https://astro.wheep.co.uk/assets/images/resized/horsehead-final2_processed_40_20-cropped.jpg

[azure solar]

where's the ai model supposed to be? it doesn't seem to be included in the downloaded folder

[rugged jackal]

That is a great capture, very well done!

[modest nebula]

It's a separate download link on his website

[modest nebula]

We might be on for some action on Sunday

[azure solar]

it does make everything quite a bit smoother but some stars are weird

[modest nebula]

Did you do sharpening as well as denoise here? It might also be worth putting your feedback on this thread so the author can tune his AI https://www.cloudynights.com/topic/912474-nebunoise-beta-questionsproblem-reporting/

[azure solar]

very light sharpening

[modest nebula]

yeh I've been doing 10 or 20% in my tests as well & it's seemed ok

[low mural]

Tonight still kinda looking promising

[modest nebula]

what's your target tonight?

[rugged jackal]

Had a nightmare start, mount was slewing all over the place even after TPPA, finally got it to work pointed at M42 - trees, now going for the Horsehead...

[modest nebula]

I didn't start yet. Still some cloud here. Perhaps in 20

[rugged jackal]

Hoping horsehead would be high enough to avoid the tress but the tree is getting in the way!

clouds too

[low mural]

I'm too tired to go out 😫😭 after all these cloudy nights!!

It's been clear here since 7pm. But had a long day at work today 😂

Some possible clear skies throughout this week. Hopefully I can stacking up on the M81 data!

[modest nebula]

it's still not clear here, and according to the forecast I might get an few hours, so I'm going to wait for a better opportunity. I mean, I've waited over a mth so far so I guess I've learnt to be patient 😄

[rugged jackal]

clouds here! 😥

[rugged jackal]

gonna give up, mostly cloudy.

[low mural]

It's not giving us much hope for the spring and summer this year is it 😅

[low mural]

Looking clear for me at the moment, not sure whether to chance it!

[low mural]

I got about 30 mins of data before the clouds rolled in. It is just becoming laughable now 😅

[rugged jackal]

I chanced it and clouds then trees then city centre pollution

[rugged jackal]

Last night the mount was erratic again. I used to see this when I came on this discord last year, I fixed the issue by adding mains power and eq-mod cable.

Recently I had to change my PSU due to a malfunction and ever since the mount is behaving like last year.

After TPPA I targeted Horsehead and the mount slewed pointing to the ground then exposed the grass, I had to power off the mount, set to North again, this time setting home position in GSS, it slewed correctly but would not centre it properly.

Any suggestions?

[low mural]

I'm not too sure, I remember having that issue but it was due to the WiFi azgti connection..

Are you able to playesolve? And silly question, is your telescope mounted the right way?

Thanks neighbours for installing 10 bright lights to make your driveway look fancy.. horrible gradients 😂

Guiding settling at 0.7. the best I have had in a long time!

[modest nebula]

nice

[low mural]

Anyone else have any luck imaging?

[sweet mantle]

I haven't even been able to go visual 😭 almost continuous rain, or at the very least total cloud cover.

[low mural]

Yeah the weather has been really rubbish

I have only 3 hours of M81 data so far. My plan was to get 30 hours in total. I think I may nudge that down to 20 hours. 15 RGB and 5 Ha. Let's see how it goes.
Going to have a go at processing my 3 hour stack shortly

[sweet mantle]

Nice. I haven't done any data so far. I was going to get the AZ-GTi, but I'm going to go with the EQM-35 so I can use my SkyWatcher 120/1000 on it too, as well as my 130PDS for imaging. If the weather ever clears 😂

[low mural]

Still a long way to go, but it's a start!

[low mural]

I have the EQM35! Sold my Azgti for it. Fingers crossed for some more clear skies soon!

[sweet mantle]

🥹

[rugged jackal]

I am able to plate solve, though sometimes astap fails and will use a blindsolver. Is there a setting in NINA that when I am framing the target it plate-solves from it's starting point then slew to the target. In my case, it slews to a point nearish the target and then plate solves and slews to the target.

I managed to get out last night - got a window for about 3 hours! After TPPA - it slewed to Horsehead without any issues, But only managed about 40 low quality subs before it was too faint in the city centre glow. I have been moving my tripod in different parts of the garden to find the best location because of the trees. (A colleague did suggest getting a chainsaw and hopping over into the gardens and quietly removing the offending shrubbery !) When I stacked the subs from 3 sessions and locations, the stacked image was skewed. So now I know I have to find the one best spot for the horsehead when we next get some clear skies.

[low mural]

Is this since you got your new filters?

[rugged jackal]

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1eg-m4MhcPJmLSu0BtiaFPRO6Ti2zteMX/view these are Siril scripts which includes a script to megastack substacks from different sessions, filters, exposure etc and there are a few others too. These were developed by Alan Burgess for the Dwarf 2 and seestar community but could work for other data too.

[rugged jackal]

Yes - been attempting to get some decent data but failing due to poor placement, and incessant clouds coming in to photobomb the sky.

[scarlet stump]

@rugged jackal
In the advanced sequencer you can plate solve from the current position and the slew to the target

[azure solar]

if you add slew and center in the sequencer it will slew to where it thinks the target is and then will plate solve

[scarlet stump]

There is also the one i mentioned where you can sync what the mount sees

[rugged jackal]

I have just about managed to get to grips with the legacy sequencer

[azure solar]

that's done manually in the imaging tab

[scarlet stump]

There is also as an option in the advanced @azure solar

[azure solar]

let me check

ah right, solve and sync

never had to use that

[scarlet stump]

I use it just to be sure that it knows where it is pointing

[rugged jackal]

My WF is: Carry out TPPA, go to Sky Atlas, find a target, set for framing assistant, adjust the framing then Slew and center - and it is here that the mount will slew to the target or thereabout, platesolve then move to target and keep centering until it matches the framing. Recently that initial slew has been erratic - and would be better if it plate solved in situ then moved to the target it would be far more accurate in my opinion.

[azure solar]

you could do framing and instead of doing slew and center from the assistant just prepare the sequence with solve and sync as first instruction

[rugged jackal]

Any chance of a screen-shot to show me what I need to do please?

[azure solar]

this is what my current sequence looks like

if you just add solve and sync here it will do that before slewing to target

[rugged jackal]

Thank you, much appreciated, any chance of a cloud-away-instruction set?

[azure solar]

I'm afraid to shoo clouds you'll need some other kind of ritual

[low mural]

I know I had issues with platesolving when using narrowband filters the first time. But I think just extending the Exposure times helped tbh

[azure solar]

I fixed that by increasing the gain in the plate solver settings, safe for tppa to be able to do shorter subs

[low mural]

Yeah I think I still have issues with tppa and narrowband tbh. I use APT polar alignment when I'm using the l-enhance.

[rugged jackal]

I have a filter-wheel and hence plate solve & TPPA on the uv/ir cut filter before moving to the Askar C1 but my C1 captures have been poor and I've not had the chance to go to the C2 yet. At this rate Orion will be long gone for this season!

[azure solar]

fun fact, I've been using the wrong gain value

what I assumed was unity gain was just the lowerst setting

[rugged jackal]

another fun fact I have no idea what a unity gain is?

[azure solar]

where 1 photon equals 1 electron on the sensor

[modest nebula]

unity gain isn't anything magical. On a modern cmos sensor, you want to pick the point at which noise is low whilst still getting a decent FWC. There'll normally be a sweet spot

[azure solar]

I think they match most of the time

[rugged jackal]

Love the stars? why not take up astrophotography and impress your family and friends, influence world leaders and bring peace to the world they said, 2 years later, why the flick did I choose to do astro during climate change, 2 wars, no one is impressed, world leaders have dementia or worse, and at this rate we are gonna need to build an ark of some sort!

[modest nebula]

think of this as a character building exercise. Will you make it out the other side or will you give up? 😄

[low mural]

Hang in there! I'm desperate to get out too! I was really hoping to have at least 10 hours of M81 by now. Silly me for being optimistic!

[rugged jackal]

I think there is no choice, in effect the cloud Gods have forced us to give up looking into the universe, but yeah I am full of character now, just could do with a little window to let some of that character out 🤣

[rugged jackal]

I've invested in some fairly decent and expensive equipment and nowhere to play. 🤣 , I am hanging on - just need a few weeks of uninterrupted clear skies to make up for the last 6 months. Please.

[azure solar]

managed to get a clear night to test out the newt with the new focuser

seeing seemed terrible, the eaf struggled a lot

[rugged jackal]

The rig looks cool, how is the mount?

[azure solar]

handles the newt pretty good, the weird weather made the tracking a bit worse than usual but other than that it runs perfectly fine

this week I should receive the new guide cam so hopefully guiding will improve

[rugged jackal]

Brilliant, pity the weather is being such an ass!

[azure solar]

yeah it's been so weird, like no clouds and forecast said 4/5 seeing but astap was having so much trouble to plate solve

[rugged jackal]

I have found ASTAP to be fairly fussy and esp if the focus is a little off. I had a similar issue last time I did some astro, I checked with a Bahtinov and certainly was a little out of focus but made a big difference to ASTAP.

[azure solar]

focus wasn't an issue, other than running an eaf I also checked manually the hfr

I think there's enough haze in the air to not be that easily visible but more than enough to mess up with astap

[rugged jackal]

Yeah, just not getting the kind of clear nights we need, haze has been an issue all year so far! Like you said the weather is weird, mild but gray.

[queen thicket]

Not holding my breath. Sad times ya'll!.

[scarlet stump]

Which camera?@azure solar

[azure solar]

touptek 533c

[azure solar]

Managed 3 nights in a row on m101, all with that weird weather

[low mural]

Looking forward to seeing the result!

Possibly clear night for me from 10pm-2am. Not keeping my hopes up, but will be getting the gear ready!

[azure solar]

won't be good, massive tilt on my focuser, no coma corrector, haze

but it's still 14h of data so we'll see

I don't have high hopes anyway

[azure solar]

man, last year m101 with 1/3 of the data and taken with a dslr looked better

[modest nebula]

that still looks better than my sky

[low mural]

And the forecast has changed 😭

[low mural]

There is a decent amount of detail there! I know I always ask you guys, but could you send the data? 😅 I need to process something lol

[azure solar]

sure, I'll upload it in a bit

but don't comment the stars, weather + 30% + tracking not being great made them terrible

[modest nebula]

my sky teased me this evening. It got dark, I saw stars. I also saw cloud on the horizon and the wind was blowing from direction of the cloud. I decided to go buy beer and on the way back, the cloud rolls in, so, it's beer instead of stars 😄

[low mural]

Beer + stars would be better though!

[modest nebula]

well probably not, or I'd almost certainly fk it up 😄

[azure solar]

https://we.tl/t-DnT0BTJepJ

[azure solar]

This is what I managed to get, not a huge fan tbh

[low mural]

There is a decent amount of data and detail in this! The stars are questionable but other than that, good job! Did you collimate properly? @azure solar

[azure solar]

yep collimation was checked right before shooting, it's the focuser that has so much tilt I can see it by eye on the tube

I'm uploading another version with deepsnr applied if you want to try it

https://we.tl/t-TAefu6zoFK

[azure solar]

I like this version a bit more but I can't seem to pull out the dark parts and the yellowish core like you did

[low mural]

Pulling out the yellow core allows you to bring out the Ha regions too.

Once you get your starless image. Run a small Asinh transformation stretch in Siril. That helped with the core colours for me

[azure solar]

I'm trying to process in pix with curves, I'll see if I can do the same there

[low mural]

Decided to pump the saturation right up, to bring out the Ha colours.

[modest nebula]

I prefer the muted colours

[low mural]

Yeah me too, but it goes to show there is colour in the image. Gives me hope for when I can finally get some more data on M81. I started the project over a month ago and have only got 3 hours of mediocre data. It oasses the meridian at about 10:30pm now. Before I get a chance to image, it'll be too close to the horizon 😂

[modest nebula]

I've been looking at lightpollutionmap.info and the ratio number they give is interesting. A ratio 0 is natural skyglow at zenith like you'd get with zero light pollution. My local ratio is 7.72. The ratio at a local dark site I scope out previously is 1.69. I think I'll actually go there next time we get some sky

[low mural]

This is mine

[azure solar]

oof, my ratio is 30

[modest nebula]

just looking at taking a short holiday in Scilly later this year. Not been away for years now.

[lament lion]

The starizona field flattener for the evoguide finally arrived

[modest nebula]

is that a redesigned version?

[azure solar]

it's the ff made for dslrs

[modest nebula]

yeh I know, I have one. But I thought the reason it was out of stock is because they were redesigning it

[azure solar]

ah I didn't know that, mb

[modest nebula]

Friday night looking clear \o/

[modest nebula]

Looks like a Scilly holiday is out of the question. It's insanely expensive

[rugged jackal]

Yeah right, pull the other one, this one has bells on it!

[low mural]

The one night I am not at home 😂

[modest nebula]

gosh I thought you were committed to the cause 😮

[low mural]

https://tenor.com/view/old-boomer-history-84years-many-years-ago-gif-18534104

[low mural]

It has been clear the last 2 hours here.. not sure whether to chance it 😅

[low mural]

Managed to set up. Let's get some Ha data (for now 😂)

[modest nebula]

mine was clear until dark, then cloud

[low mural]

Yeah here is the cloud 😂

[low mural]

20 mins of Ha data is a start I suppose 🤣

I'm going to stack it in as an experiment

[lament lion]

Has anyone else seen the altair tri rgb filter i seen one video and bought it immediately before the store for the USA ran out of stock mine should be here soon

[low mural]

I wonder how well it performs on Galaxies. Shame it does not come in 1.25

[low mural]

Then again... Why am I even considering purchasing anything

[lament lion]

It says for broadband targets and galaxies so we will see I guess, yeah only 2” at the moment that was a bit disappointing but fortunately my filter drawer is already set up for them, and at least with the starizona field flattener I can use it again

[modest nebula]

ok Scilly was too expensive, but I found a nice glamping site in Llŷn Peninsula in Wales. Looking to go there in August \o/

https://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/visit/wales/stargazing-in-wales

[low mural]

Adds to list when passes test

Next week I am finally looking for some test dates, hopefully around July, august. Will be a game changer for astro and camping!

Driving that is 🤣

[sweet mantle]

Was looking at the AZ-Gti, but now I'm thinking the Star Adventurer GTI. I'll be running my 130/650PDS and (when I get it) a SV503. Thoughts?

[low mural]

I think the 130pds is going to be too heavy for both tbh

[sweet mantle]

It's 4kg, payload on the GTI for AP is 5.... Hmmm. I'd mainly be doing eaa anyways, but I can leave the PDS on its Goto AZ tripod I spose. Hmmm

[low mural]

Yeah but factoring in its size, the mount would have to work hard to balance as well as cope with the weight being close to the limit.B the time you have added the camera and guidescope, you would be closing in on the weight limit. The 5kg weight limit is advertised for astroobserving rather than photography, it's always best to keep below 4kgs.
My Evoguide setup with a guidescope, cameras and mini pc is closing in on 4.5 kgs which is why I upgraded to the EQM35.

[azure solar]

I wouldn't put a newt of any size on the azgti/sagti, it's just too light

The eq3 would be able to take it but I think that the sagti isn't reliable enough for that

[rugged jackal]

Might take a punt tonight, is the Horsehead worth chasing consider how low and how little time I will get in the dark?

Telescopius shows this:

[rugged jackal]

Guess what it is cloudy

[modest nebula]

wow that's unusual!

[rugged jackal]

WIndy too

guiding is very poor

Looks like I am the only idiot in the ag-gti village tonight.

in my defense I need the practice.

I was polar aligned within 20 mins tonight.

[modest nebula]

I'm still waiting for sky

[rugged jackal]

my hopes shot up as I saw the guiding error drop but they were put back in their place rapidly as the error has gone back up.

[rugged jackal]

I feel we should sue the government.

[rugged jackal]

The skies were fairly good but my session was pretty bad, 85% moon high in the sky and wind made guiding painful, results were rubbish.

[rugged jackal]

This is a typical type of subs I was getting:

[modest nebula]

trying Lunar tonight

had to dig out my moon filter (0.8ND)

[modest nebula]

now to process 12GB of moon pic 😄

[low mural]

Looks like you all had a rough time on Friday then? I was in Brandon which is Bortle 4 and it was clear, but no telescope 😭

I was at my brother's. I am convincing him to invest in a observatory so I can inage remotely 😂

[modest nebula]

my first cousins grew up in Brandon. I spent much time there as a kid

[low mural]

How did you get on with your moon pic?

[modest nebula]

not fantastic. I missed focus slightly. I can "fix" it with some wavelets transforms but then it leaves artifacts when I try to stretch the saturation. I was trying for some colour. I guess I'll try again some other time

[modest nebula]

woohoo my Wales holiday is booked for August. I bet I get a week of cloud

[rugged jackal]

What are the chance we are not going to get clear nights?

[modest nebula]

what, ever?

[lament lion]

Goodbye gti, hello heq5

[azure solar]

oh damn, that was quick

I thought you were going to get it like next week

congrats on the upgrade

[lament lion]

No she contacted me and it was okay to go get it today

[modest nebula]

nice! I would like to get an old EQ5 or similar and go with an Onstep

preferably an eq5 clone with all bearings like an EXOS2

but I can't justify it at the moment when we have cloud all the time 😄

[lament lion]

Will need to get the tripod for it since it’s only the mount

[azure solar]

did you ask why she was getting rid of it or why the price was so low?

[lament lion]

Nope, brand new everything still in the bags, she said she just never used it but she has 2 of them and only $600 for a brand new mount that can hold way more than the gti I couldn’t let it pass up

I don’t want to ask questions brand new it works I gave her the money and dipped out, i did see that she raised the price on the 2nd one by the time I got home so I saved an extra $200 lol

Trying to find just a tripod is a bit hard

[azure solar]

just a generic eq5 tripod shouldn't cost much

it's like 130€ here

[lament lion]

I’m in the states and trying to find just a tripod is a bit of pain

[azure solar]

isn't it available new?

[lament lion]

I cannot find any

Oof I’m smooth brain I was looking right at it

[rugged jackal]

well this long weekend but possibly ever.

[modest nebula]

looks like I have some sky tonight \o/

[modest nebula]

although it might be too windy 😦

[modest nebula]

guiding going well

almost too well. I wonder what will go wrong

I also dug my old Astromaster 130eq telescope out of the loft & tried it on my Az-GTI with my old guide cam. I managed to reach focus and the fov looks great for galaxies. It desperately needs aligning but I might give it a try at some point

[rugged jackal]

I am also having a go, TPPA done, now selecting targets, Please suggest something interesting

Cloufs!

[azure solar]

lol, not even the time to select a target

[rugged jackal]

I decided to go for the Bodes/Cigar galaxies and yeah clouds

I am feeling a bit sweary.

[modest nebula]

I have clouds now but apparently they'll clear in 20mins

[modest nebula]

I'm grabbing some more of the last nebula data of the year, then later will change filters & get some galaxies

probably pick somewhere in markarians chain that looks interesting

[rugged jackal]

Unfortunately for me, my wishlist - the horsehead and orion is now too far west into the glow of the city center, so going for the Bodes galaxy.

[modest nebula]

clear again now

[low mural]

I had about an hour of clear skies, I'm glad I didn't set up in the end! How did you all get on?

[low mural]

Just got a new tablet which I am going to run remote desktop on for my mini pc. Going to set up tonight for testing purposes in the hope of getting some data 😂

[rugged jackal]

It was a mixed bag for me - haze and clouds but also some clear areas, have some sky tonight so I am setup, done the tppa - now deciding whether to add to my data from last night or go for a new target. Any suggestions?

[modest nebula]

Tried to get some more Jellyfish for my final nebula before I start on galaxies, but I couldn't get enough time on it. It's still photon-starved.

ideally I'd need 10hrs on that at least, but not much chance of that now

[rugged jackal]

Decided to add to my data from last night.

[modest nebula]

I did discover that if you set debayer option to "LMMSE" in Siril, you get slightly better results at the expense of a more intensive stacking process

[rugged jackal]

I'll try that option - if I remember it when I come to stack my images

Thanks for the heads up.

[low mural]

This tablet sure is handy, just need to get a little stand for it to slot into the tripod

[rugged jackal]

Which tablet is that, and how are you connecting to the mini-pc?

[low mural]

Just a cheap galaxy tab A9+

[low mural]

And I am using the Microsoft remote desktop app on play store

Yay clouds 😂

[low mural]

Clouds cleared pretty quickly, got about 2 hours of data tonight

[low mural]

Got a total of 5 hours on M81 now. A lot more to go but will have a go at processing tonight

[rugged jackal]

I have stacked my recent attempts on M81/M82 - putting up the Siril stack:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1802-UUBLMS3SA7G-S0uADU-DBWwInYB6/view?usp=sharing

[modest nebula]

@rugged jackal Cuiv's latest video is perfect for you

[rugged jackal]

thanks, i'll have a look.

[lament lion]

So I finally have the cables and everything working now and set up a different profile so in case I switch over to the evoguide or the 70ed, also cables and eqmod kinda confusing, I had the cables one way wouldn’t recognize the com port, then it recognized the com port but only moved in dec only no ra watched and followed along multiple videos and still couldn’t figure it out, then re did ever connection and nothing changed from the other times and now it works, I disconnected from eqmod and Nina and reconnected and still working I have no clue as to what I did but nothing different than the 100+ other tries but this seemed to do it

Next up is finding screws for the long dove tail I had on the evoguide and have that on top so I can put the mini pc and finally be able to do something with my poor cable management

[rugged jackal]

Looks like a nice rig! Clear skies.

[lament lion]

I need to figure out how I can have both this and the gti going at the same time doing 2 different objects one wide field the other not so wide field

[rugged jackal]

I may be wrong but in windows you can only run 1 remote desktop connection at a time. @low mural has managed to connect his android tablet to his mini-pc - so using a combo of a tablet for rig 1 and your remote pc for rig 2?

[lament lion]

Oh that should work

[rugged jackal]

Ideally it would be cool to have more than 1 remote desktop connection so we can control more than 1 rig from the same remote station.

I think that option is availble in the enterprise edition of windows 11.

[azure solar]

You can use both chrome remote desktop and the normal windows remote desktop

[azure solar]

If you're using ascom to control the mount I'd recommend switching to green swamp server

[lament lion]

Have it, wasn’t a big fan of it but never got rid of it

[lament lion]

Heck I might try it back out, was watching a video about setting up eqmod and the guy was saying once in a blue moon some settings will change in eqmod and slewing wouldn’t work with plate solving or something like that and I don’t like that so more than likely will give it another go

[potent turret]

dont use eqmod, i used it and my az-gti went crazy, slewing to ground, ignoring mount limits and more, ir even crashed into the tripod! I switched to GSS and it works great!

[lament lion]

Ok I’ll give it a shot, yeah I don’t want my camera to hit the mount or tripod but to balance it I had to have the camera facing down, and at least the synscan app does its job for both my az gti and the star adventurer gti, at east it was stable enough for me but now with bigger mount and bigger telescope im a little cautious so nothing breaks

[azure solar]

Ah you were using the synscan app for the heq5?

[lament lion]

No, synscan for the both the gti, I didn’t think the synscan would work on the heq5 so I downloaded the eqmod

[lament lion]

Ok for future reference, gas doesn’t like it if I connected to the mount with another program before switching over to gss, had to restart the mini pc and then I didn’t open eqmod instead I opened gss and connected and no problem, so I’ll stick with gss eqmod already gave me a problem as soon as I got home from work and tried to test everything in case yesterday was dumb luck

[azure solar]

yeah you have to connect to gss directly

[rugged jackal]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sMmqgROsSGA

[azure solar]

Feels like his video on how to setup remote desktop but for a phone

[rugged jackal]

Yes it is exactly that - he seems to have read our minds considering @low mural had mentioned the same thing and @lament lion was looking for a solution to control more than 1 rig.

[rugged jackal]

This is the result I am getting - not sure if I have a focus issue - though I make sure I get focus before each session. Please advise:

[azure solar]

doesn't seem out of focus to me

[rugged jackal]

Oh, just seems a little soft to me - esp M82 perhaps not enough data and high clouds/haze.

Was hoping for clear skies tonight but even if it is clear it is very windy.

[lament lion]

Yeah I already use my phone, I use chrome Remote Desktop and all that’s needed is you download it on all the devices you want to use it on and download from the App Store, when setting it up you log in to your google account and set it up on the mini pc and now all I have to do is turn the mini pc wait 20 seconds and then Remote Desktop into it and off I go

Cuiv video just to much to do using that method, got to change this setting this one and this setting and so on chrome remote just download on all devices sign in to google account on them and that’s it

[low mural]

There is a Microsoft remote desktop app for android which I find much better than the chrome one

I think there is a way to create a virtual desktop and essentially run 2 PC's from on pc.

It would require you to distribute the ram and hard drive space, along with installing another OS.

[low mural]

I like this. How much data so far? I have about 5 hours and it looks like you are pulling more detail than I am atm. I guess the larger focal length helps you

This is the remote desktop app I use

[rugged jackal]

This is about 4 hours of data 2 min subs using my askar c1+c2 filters and uv cut filters.

[rugged jackal]

@low mural if you have the time is there any chance you can do a quick process so that I can get an idea of what my data can look like? So I can process better. Please. Thank you.

[lament lion]

I gave it a whirl still practicing the editing part of this hobby

I think I went to dark on the last one it changes so much from pc to phone

[rugged jackal]

thanks, that gives me a good reference point to aim for.

[lament lion]

Setting up and first time using everything including this filter

[lament lion]

60 second test exposure didn’t worry about framing wanted m81 and not really needing m82 with it right now

[lament lion]

Yup I’m smooth brain, got a bit to excited about everything and forgot to focus, I’m not going back out there I’ll get what I get a bit unfocused but oh well

[lament lion]

46min later clouds and this is the result

[rugged jackal]

That is really decent - only 46 mins of data!! Better than my 4 hours.

[modest nebula]

anyone imaging tonight?

[azure solar]

currently shooting m106

second night in a row

of course there's a very very thin layer of clouds that comes and goes

[modest nebula]

Makarians Chain for me. It was a bit cloudy earlier but been good now for 45mins

I'm doing short broadband exposures with no guiding this evening

dithering every frame with the direct guider so I hope to get some good drizzle 🙂

[rugged jackal]

how did it go?

[low mural]

Why no guiding?!

[modest nebula]

I wanted to keep exposures short & my polar alignment is spot on, so no point in guiding for 30sec exposures. In exchange, I can do very quick dither for each sub

[low mural]

Will have a go tomorrow!

[modest nebula]

Not great. Need much more integration. Next time I'll turn guiding on and do longer exposures

[low mural]

Close enough 😂

[potent turret]

there are no full eclipses for my location in europe for longer then i live 😦

[lament lion]

Waiting for autostakkert

Had to use evoguide to get the full sun

[modest nebula]

I stacked my Markarians data using Siril it did such a better job than DSS but took literally hours. I also solved it in Siril & annoted. Look how many galaxies in this one shot!

[lament lion]

Always wanted to get markarians chain, love all those galaxies

[lament lion]

Eclipse

I’m kinda upset, in sharpcap I had everything in frame was able to get the full eclipse in autostakkert it’s like that and cropped into the sun and moon, am I missing something

[fallen gyro]

That’s coooooooool!

[low mural]

Same! I need to shoot it next season!

[low mural]

Jealous! Next one in the UK, I will be 95 years old 😂

[modest nebula]

I remember the last one in 1999. I was working in London at the time. It was almost total.

[low mural]

It's a very vague memory for me, I was 4 years old 😂 my mum did say she has it on Video tape somewhere!

[lament lion]

Time to bring out that old vhs tape, and remove the dust off the vhs player

[low mural]

Potentially clear tonight l, hopefully I can get some more m81 data!

[modest nebula]

mine doesn't clear up until midnight

I'll see how I feel later & then perhaps get another few hours on Markarians

[low mural]

Skies are clear and windy has settled, just waiting for some stars to pop out for polar alignment and focus 👍

[low mural]

Winds picking up so had to half my Exposure time. Will probably have a fair few dud frames to dump too

[modest nebula]

yeh sky is relatively clear here, but it's really windy. I'm not going to bother. Opened a beer instead

[low mural]

Yeah honestly I wish I didn't bother either 😂 having loads of issues. I have about 20 mins of data so far and I started imaging 1 hour and 45 mins ago 😂

1 in 3 of my images are looking like this!

[low mural]

Going to try sirilic to combine this data set. Any recommendations @modest nebula ?

Does Sirilic allow you to see the overall integration time?

[modest nebula]

what I do is go into Siril and set preference to debayer LMSSE, then set Sirilic up like so. I load at least light & dark frames

remember though, sirilic is nothing special. It simply creates Siril scipts

[low mural]

Cool, I'm going to compare it with DSS and see whats best

Last hour and a half was decent. That's 2 hours of data tonight to add to my current 5 hours. I'm still yet to capture any Ha data though haha

[modest nebula]

I found that Siril takes MUCH longer but tends to give better results

on my recent Markarians chain, I had hundred of subs and it took literally hours where DSS took 10s of minutes

[low mural]

7 hours so far. Really need to work on my stars, there are probably some bad frames and need to clear out tbh. Man I need so much more data. 😂

[modest nebula]

looking good so far

[low mural]

Having real problems with starnet on this data though. Keeps eating half of M82

[modest nebula]

try the upscale option

[low mural]

Yeah I did that and it looked like I just gave my image shingles 🤣

[azure solar]

how's this looking? 10h of m106

can't tell if the bg is too dark

v1 was like this

[low mural]

So it seems to be when I have drizzled the data

[low mural]

I prefer this black point, but the gradients seem to let it down. Perhaps add the stars back in a bit more? Looks like he galaxy is missing some

[azure solar]

like this or more

I can't do much about gradients, my flats failed and the weather when shooting was bad

[lament lion]

Can you upload the stack would love a crack at it

[azure solar]

sure, I'll upload the blurx-ed version. The stars were terrible

https://we.tl/t-wP9MY70YlY

[lament lion]

Ok thank you

[fallen gyro]

Beutiful

[lament lion]

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1SAjOg_rbhl5zfRRCZ5gzfkttEM7QWtSW/view?usp=drivesdk

TIFF file just in case, I had to create a artificial flat frame to get the background neutralized and then my standard galaxy editing although I didn’t do any sharpening

*all in all I’m loving that data, if you have pix I can send you the link I used to create a artificial flat frame

@azure solar do the stars need any saturation I cannot tell on my end

[azure solar]

I like them that way they are

[azure solar]

I have the pix trial

[lament lion]

https://youtu.be/vxj_HDYlNG0?si=CZPQZDG7FWG9LpHG

[azure solar]

I'll take a look thx

[lament lion]

I had to follow step by step and took 2 or 3 tries, because the person has it as a mask at the 3min mark but then when he goes to do the multi scale medium transformation the mask wasn’t applied and then it worked

[azure solar]

I don't have the adv starmask, where's that from?

[low mural]

That process is killer. Is this pix?

[lament lion]

Yes it’s pix

[lament lion]

Go to script, then utilities and it should be the 3rd one down

[azure solar]

I literally don't have it

[lament lion]

Nani

[azure solar]

🤷‍♂️

[lament lion]

Ok brb there was another YouTube video that the guy was actually talking and said something about if you don’t have it where to get it from hold on

[lament lion]

Ok all the guy said was go to google and search pixinsight advstarmask and download it

https://youtu.be/Hnx3zOjzukw?si=dACCY82jLR7bJAQL

It was around 8min 15sec mark

[azure solar]

I think I got it

[lament lion]

Ok

[lament lion]

Make sure to save where you are at, after you download it and get it into pix it’s going to want to update and restart the app

[azure solar]

btw how do you stretch the image w/ pix? I've been using the soft stretch script and curves but I can't seem to be able to make the Ha show up like you did

[lament lion]

I don’t do the screen transfer I do just histogram, select the image you want to stretch and then bring that middle slider to the left and apply you have to reset the histogram after everything, then go back move that slider back, then bring the black point slider so where the curve is on the histogram have it around that first set of vertical lines on the left

So it should be like this

And each time im brightening the image but before i will apply it im then moving the black point over to where the curve goes to the same little area in the histogram and then im applying it, and you will tell if you did it 1 to many times

Just trying to get the back ground flat and could then extract the lum from the color and use it as a mask invert the mask then go into curves and drop the background down without affecting the galaxy data

@azure solar https://youtu.be/QSupE-iEyF0?si=3Ag7FlMfsdVYg6I3

At the 4min mark is him talking about how to stretch it that way, I really like doing it like this since I have control and I have been getting better results by doing that

I do the same steps for any galaxy I’m doing

[azure solar]

I see, thanks

will try it out

that luminance trick seems nice

[lament lion]

Also sorry, I have been off of work for 6 hours waiting on my wife to finish her physical therapy since the hospital told her the wrong time and I’m just wanting to go to bed my thoughts are all jumbled

I just wanna sleep

[azure solar]

don't worry all you said made sense

thx

[lament lion]

Yeah all good

Who needs to take flats when you can just spend an hour in pix fixing it anyways lul but no still take flats 👀

[azure solar]

in my defence I did take flats

[lament lion]

I’m only messing around, it happens

[azure solar]

but for some reason they turned out with weird artifacts and some random pixels in parts of the image that I can't explain

[lament lion]

Well at least we know how to kinda fix it now

[azure solar]

yep

well that turned out a bit darker than I expected

[lament lion]

Yeah but add the stars

[azure solar]

still kinda weird

[lament lion]

Make sure you select create a new image in pixel math

Nvm

Yeah a bit dark

[azure solar]

could be because I started with an already stretched image? I used what I was working on to do this whole thing

or maybe because I didn't extract luminance...

[lament lion]

Idk maybe not bring over the black point as far or if you did so the curves don’t go as extreme

[azure solar]

I'm not sure what the point is with the defect map part, the range selection covers everything anyway

[lament lion]

Yeah I have no clue I just followed along lol

[azure solar]

fair enough

Idk, it keeps turning out incredibly black

I'll just keep the bg as is

at least the galaxy is looking nicer

yeah much better

time to reprocess my m101

[lament lion]

oh looking good

[azure solar]

Idk why but with galaxies I always make a fried verrsion, then look back and it and go "ew", then process it better

[low mural]

This is me with all my images 😂

[modest nebula]

Yeh me too. I always struggle with galaxies but I'm getting better

[low mural]

Yeah, at this point, I will be happy with 15 hours of M81. But that still means finding another 8 hours of clear skies 😂

I'm going away to Greece on Wednesday, wish I could bring my gear there. Would have a better chance of clear skies 😂

[modest nebula]

I bet you wish you still had the az-gti? 😛

[low mural]

My az-gti was one of the naff ones and averaged guiding at around 3.00

On a good day I got like 2.2

But I do miss it's lightweightness haha

The EQM35 is a right pain in the a** to carry in and out of the house 😂

[modest nebula]

if ever I got a bigger mount, I'd make a permanent pier in the garden & then just move the mount on its own

tbh I was considering doing that anyway

[azure solar]

a permanent pier is my dream

or a pier at all

[modest nebula]

and a fibre-glass dome with a motorized roof 😄

[azure solar]

I wouldn't mind one of those super compact observatories I see online

something like this

[modest nebula]

that's easily buildable, but looks pig ugly

[azure solar]

yeah this one in particular isn't good looking

I have some saved from a fb group

[modest nebula]

those look better

[low mural]

This would go nicely next to my flying pigs in my 10 acre garden.

I rent so I am not sure what my landlord would say about a pier being concreted into the ground 😂

[azure solar]

could make one out of cinder blocks like some people do, easier to remove in case you have to

[modest nebula]

Tell him it's a pole to chain your bulldog to that you're not meant to have

[low mural]

I do have 3 platy fish I'm not supposed to have. Maybe it's to chain those 😂

[modest nebula]

you are such a rebel 😄

[low mural]

I know right, my 5 year old now knows to stand in front of it whilst the inspection takes place 🤣

[modest nebula]

so get her to stand in front of the permanent pier 😄

[low mural]

Perhaps I need to have another 😂 1 to stand in front of the fish tank and the other to stand in front of the pier 😂

[rugged jackal]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uDtIbU2j3uM

[modest nebula]

so it's not a scam then 🙂

[rugged jackal]

No, he likes it a lot at 1/2 the price of a L'extreme.

Clear for me tonight, done my TPPA, now cannot decide what to target!, again please suggest some interesting options.

[modest nebula]

look for galaxies around markarians chain

e.g. m90

virgo galaxy

m58

m59, m60, etc

there's a TON there

m88 or m91 look cool

[rugged jackal]

Thanks, I'll try your suggestion, much appreciated.

[modest nebula]

blowdrier, virgo pinwheel, etc.

all in the same area

[azure solar]

Second night lf m63 but the weather is once again "clear"

Usual weird layer of haze that's making a mess

[modest nebula]

yeh it's kinda clear here, but will be truly clear for an hour or two later

I tried my Celestron 130eq earlier with my old cam. It's a 650mm f5 newt. Horrible stars. I guess it's not collimated properly

somehow I think it'll never be good though

[rugged jackal]

pretty hazy at the moment, guiding is rubbish yet again,

[modest nebula]

guiding is not great here, but my HFR is still good on my images, so I'm continuing

I figure I'll throw away some subs

[rugged jackal]

Pretty crappy here:

The gradients are clouds and haze

[rugged jackal]

I reckon I will be throwing all the subs I have obtained so far - 22 currently.

[bright vale]

could be worse I guess

had this last time I imaged

[rugged jackal]

too cloudy, no point in taking any subs at the moment, cannot see a break in the clouds, loathed to pack because as soon as i do it will be the clearest sky since the melazoic epoch.

[bright vale]

typical ap curse

[low mural]

Looking clear tonight for me

[low mural]

What did you decide on in the end?

[modest nebula]

yep looking well clear tonigh from about 10pm to 4am

going to be a late one

[rugged jackal]

m91/m88 but in reality nothing because i got teased till i was blue in the ... then went home. not one useable sub...

[rugged jackal]

yeah i heard that one before...

[low mural]

The gear is out.. hazy as hell at the moment, let's see what happens when it gets dark.

[rugged jackal]

good luck, i m not sure if i should be out considering last night, nice blue skies in the north, nice haze/cloud in the south/east

met office cloud cover shows brum is perfect for all clouds/haze travelling from, north, west, south

berkshire looks clear though.

[low mural]

Yes I'm in Berkshire and it's pretty clear. Shame about the moon. I am shooting in twoghlight too because I need all the subs I can get 🤣

The best guiding I have had in a long time!

Finally braved auto meridian flipping too. Was always uneasy letting it flip without watching cables etc haha

[rugged jackal]

that is great guiding, must be pretty clear.

[rugged jackal]

i always have anxiety when it flips...

[low mural]

Same, my pc power cable is quite loose and short too. One tug and everything powers off 😂

0.51 guiding now, at this rate I'm going to up my exposure times!

[modest nebula]

same

[low mural]

I tried a 10 min exposure but the amount of satellites on that region is insane. Not forgetting 2 planes also flying by 😂

Plus the core of M82 was blown

[modest nebula]

I'm sticking with 60 secs. it's enough according to the numbers & it'll get me good dithering

[low mural]

You still shooting markarian's chain?

[modest nebula]

yeh final night

[low mural]

I'm doing 90s subs at the moment. Seem to be getting some really nice stars tonight which should counterbalance my rubbish subs 😂

[modest nebula]

so tempted to move on but I've learnt that you need time on any target to do it justice, or at the end of the season you end up with a bunch of crap pics

[low mural]

Yeah I get what you mean. I'm quite happy to keep pushing on with M81 until it gets too low on the horizon.

[modest nebula]

I'd love to do Leo Triplet next

[low mural]

Yeah I really enjoyed shooting that last year. I only had 4 hours on it though

I'm going to go for dumbbell next and gather a shed load of data with the L-enhance. I shot it last year but broadband

[modest nebula]

that Hamburger galaxy is something else!

dumbell is way below the horizon

[low mural]

Yeah I plan to do M81 for at least another month

I will start dumbbell in June

Then I want to do a target I haven't done before

Need to start bringing that Messier catalogue up

[modest nebula]

I still got to plan for Wales. I don't want to waste my time there

[low mural]

Could always do Andromeda 🤣

[modest nebula]

what, with my smartphone? 😄

[low mural]

I have incoming clouds in about an hour according to the radar..

[modest nebula]

mine's about 40mins I thjink

[low mural]

Very thin cloud here at the moment. Will hold off for 10 mins and see if it passes. I have almost 2 hours data tonight so not complaining

Yup, that's a wrap

[modest nebula]

mine's ok for a little longer

and I think that's it

[low mural]

ignoring the stars as I did a quick stretch lol. The detail on M82 is looking promising. 9 hours of data here. I am looking to cut off some dead subs and process properly tomorrow

[modest nebula]

I have almost 450 subs to stack 😮

[low mural]

I just can't get starnet to work properly on this image

[modest nebula]

well last nights session increased SNR a little. I feel I still need more though, but I might just call this done for now. It's an interesting wide-field but it's hardly the most impressive target

[low mural]

It's looking good! How are you getting on with starnet and these small galaxies?

[modest nebula]

nah it's lookingn crap compard with others in "deep-space-pics". There's some stunning ones in there. However, my 4hrs from b6/7 can never match 14hrs from b4

I don't run starnet on galaxy images unless the stars are obnoxious

[azure solar]

doesn't look bad Imo, about 14h

fun fact, I wasn't home 2 days ago so I asked my brother to take the cap out of the newt so I could shoot remotely and he only removed the small cap that's used for solar viewing

so I shot like 4-5h at f/20

[modest nebula]

lol that's funny 😄

[modest nebula]

wow it just got VERY windy here

[low mural]

This is great!

14hours wow rub it in

I have 9 hours which has taken me 2 months. Plus 2 hours of the data is questionable 😂

[azure solar]

thanks

[low mural]

I wish I could brave a newt, but collimation still scares me 🤣🤣

[azure solar]

I got incredibly lucky with 3 nights in a row, shame that I sort of wasted one of them

[low mural]

I tried it once I'm a cheap newt and was getting obsessive over perfecting it

[low mural]

It's clean and sharp though! Well done!

[azure solar]

I just try to get the doughtnut at the center of the cheshire and I call it quits

[low mural]

Newts are fairly reasonable priced too...

Which one do you have?

[azure solar]

deepsnr and blurx lended from lux surely helped

[azure solar]

an old 8" f/5

[low mural]

Yeah this is it 😂 you need these plug ins 😂 might post my data into #1021002743080558642 and see if anyone has a go with it

[low mural]

The band's around the core looks great

[azure solar]

Idk how much time left I have with my pix trial but I'm dreading that moment, it's light years ahead of siril

[low mural]

Yeah I enjoyed using it. Just could not justify the £2-300+ cost 😅

The most advanced plug in I have is noise X for Photoshop haha

[azure solar]

I think I will get it as soon as I can, makes the images so much better than what I could get for the same money in terms of equipment

and having a functioning workspace instead of the single image you get with siril is great

[modest nebula]

I just bought a 2nd hand laser collimator for mine. I doubt it will help make it usable for astrophotography though

[modest nebula]

also just bought another SSD to speed up my stacking 😮

[modest nebula]

I just restacked with flats & shock horror, most of my vignetting & weird gradients are removed

[low mural]

https://discord.com/channels/794642864218439681/1229488874875519002

If anyone fancies the challenge!

[low mural]

Damn.. After processing and experimenting all day, I am genuinely considering ditching this data set. Feels like a right waste of time lol

[modest nebula]

what's wrong with it?

[low mural]

The stars are rubbish and I just cannot get the result I want 😂I was really expecting to see a better result at 9 hours tbh!

I'm going to do something drastic and look at Newtonians. Maybe add them into my basket in hope of an end of year bonus next month 😂

Kinda hungry for more focal length now 😅

[lament lion]

Yeah im already wanting an 8” now, its a trap didnt think i would get sucked into it since i didnt care about being super zoomed in now after the 6” im like yeah more fl please

[lament lion]

14 hours! Yes!!!!!! It’s coming out so good

[lament lion]

And I’m imaging

[lament lion]

Ehhh 3hours and 30ish min

[azure solar]

what's going on with those colors?

[lament lion]

Struggling lol

Made a mask, didn’t realize I messed it up till I needed to add the stars back in, and was struggling to edit it, gave up said the heck with it didn’t feel like starting over will try again maybe tomorrow, i need to get to sleep

[rugged jackal]

i know that feeling.

[modest nebula]

you're not done until you edit it 47 times over a 6mth period

then, when you discover some new software or new technique, you'll start over

[lament lion]

Only 47 😂 but yeah that’s why I keep my stacked data so I can always go back and re edit with progress and new tricks to do

[fallen gyro]

Guys is the gti supposed to turn or not cuz mine isn’t turning to a different direction when I goto

[modest nebula]

no it's not supposed to

[azure solar]

are the clutches engaged?

[modest nebula]

are we back to talking about az-gti? 😄

[azure solar]

sagti this time

but yeah it's a back to the origins moment

[rugged jackal]

I am a stuck record - wet cold windy cloudy!

[modest nebula]

tomorrow night well clear for me, apparently \o/

[low mural]

Been clear everyday in Crete haha.. but no scope 😭

Hopefully some clear skies when I'm back!

[rugged jackal]

Wow clear for me too - now imaging M101, but getting stretched stars even though guiding is good:

Please advise/help.

[azure solar]

some bumps in guiding maybe?

how's you pa btw? dec is constantly correcting

[rugged jackal]

my polar alignment was pretty good around 00-00-18

lots of satellites too

[azure solar]

what was your resolution? with that guiding no wonder it's trailing a bit

[rugged jackal]

Sorry I do not understand what you mean by resolution?

[azure solar]

pixel scale