Redcat 51 + IMX533 Users

[faint plover]

Oh shit that reminds me

I’m gonna be able to do visual

Rahhh

[subtle sorrel]

They got a shed here with scopes

[faint plover]

I never realized that

[faint plover]

Cool

Oof

I expect that with there too

[subtle sorrel]

Thats going to be unique

[faint plover]

But maybe not

[faint plover]

Yea

[subtle sorrel]

I saw a ton of things tonight that blew my mind

[faint plover]

I have only ever done visual in b9 and b5

[subtle sorrel]

I probably saw half the messier catalog

[faint plover]

Woahhh

What u brought for visual

[subtle sorrel]

And only half since the other half is behind the sun

[subtle sorrel]

My 8" dob

I saw flame nebula visually too

[faint plover]

HOLY MOLY

[subtle sorrel]

Oh and I saw Rosette using my SV220

[faint plover]

https://tenor.com/view/the-voices-meme-cat-gif-23917781

[subtle sorrel]

I could see the spiral structure in M51

[faint plover]

FUCCK LIGHT POLLUUTON

[subtle sorrel]

Although admittedly, I should probably visit more often

[faint plover]

Yeeee

[subtle sorrel]

I can tell my full dark adapted vision isn't as good as it can be

[faint plover]

🔥

[subtle sorrel]

Supposedly the spiral structure is supposed to be pretty obvious with an 8" dob but I couldn't make it out without averted vision

I could see then entirety of M42

I could see M43 and structure in it

I saw half of running man REALLY easily

This was seriously something else

Brings another level to my hate for light pollution

[faint plover]

Woahhh

That’s amazing

Nice mate

Congrats for finding such a good place then

[subtle sorrel]

Definitely have tilt

[faint plover]

Brudda

Why is the corner like that

[subtle sorrel]

Phone lens distortion

[faint plover]

Oh lmao

[subtle sorrel]

Cause

[faint plover]

I got scared for a sec

Understandable

[subtle sorrel]

If you look at when I focus on it

It looks good again

But to the left and top it looks bad now

Thats the downside of trying to use a phone to photograph a screen

Even stars on a fuqing screen get forked by the camera lens on my phone

Just like the stars in my phone ap pics

There's the first red sub of Markarian's Chain

The first Lum sub was slightly out of focus because the AF run it did was not right

[faint plover]

Holy frick nice

What’s that red?

[subtle sorrel]

A reflection on my computer screen

[faint plover]

Ah lol

I got scared

[subtle sorrel]

Dude

I saw the Milky Way core too

That was the cherry on top

I wouldn't trade this hobby for anything else.

[subtle sorrel]

a 5 minute sub

[inland matrix]

Yeah :(

Someone sells the touptek for 550 euros. I cant miss that

toupteks is a great camera as well. Basically has the same specs has the Ares-C Pro

[subtle sorrel]

the luminance will carry this project

my color data, though i got slightly more than i got in lum, is still weak

[urban ridge]

Mono is cheating

[subtle sorrel]

yes it is

i need to figure out how to correct this gradient better, but this was the best i had time to do rn

[faint plover]

HOLY SHIT

HOLYYYYT

[faint plover]

Woahhhhhhhh

Stop flexing

[subtle sorrel]

I love this hobby

No questions asked

[faint plover]

Ral

Real

[subtle sorrel]

Absolutely no complaints or regrets

[faint plover]

Like Fym a no brain idiot 13 yr old can photograph cool space object shi from his bortle 9 balcony

[faint plover]

Real

I dont care about the money take my money astrophotography 🙏🙏

[subtle sorrel]

Exactly

Best part is, young folks like you and I can make discoveries too

[faint plover]

🙏

[faint plover]

I can’t lol

Not with my bortle

And my shitty ass integration times

[subtle sorrel]

Because the professionals are drowning in the pressure of needing to stay relevant, therefore are only doing scientific research

[faint plover]

Yea

[subtle sorrel]

Leaving discoveries here at home to us

[faint plover]

Yup

[subtle sorrel]

[faint plover]

Its my life mission to discover a object

Will prolly never happen but

It’s a cool mission

[subtle sorrel]

Didn't think about that

[faint plover]

U can defo

Just put a lot of data into sum

In summer

Summer is way easier than winter for that stuff

Sooo much nebulae

I can’t tho

No real dedication lol

But to be fricking fair I just started basically so

I can’t expect to even do an amazing job, I need to have patience

[subtle sorrel]

this galaxy in Markarian's Chain has way more definition

also can i say

RedCat sharp as hell

jfc

okay i cant proces this until later tonight

[subtle sorrel]

you need to dedicate more time per target too

[faint plover]

Yea

I have such an issue with doing that cuz

Doing multiple nights always makes something go wrong

And it’s always on my main taregts

Like nothing happens with Thor helmet

And with Orion I get some weird unfixable gradients

Like wtf

Same with horsehead

It’s so weird

[tranquil mountain]

45min vs 5h30min lum, some nice progress so far

[faint plover]

Amazing

[faint plover]

Cool, try drizzling

[prime matrix]

it is but it needs blurX

[faint plover]

Sure

[subtle sorrel]

https://tenor.com/view/reginald-angry-eating-angry-eating-monster-house-gif-20013301

[tranquil mountain]

11hs totals

[subtle sorrel]

Did you have to denoise it heavily?

[tranquil mountain]

Why?

[subtle sorrel]

I'm asking to see if you had to do what I had to do to my data

My Boogeyman was very noisy

[tranquil mountain]

I did Deepsnr 0.75% each on the LUM and combined rgb, then after all the processing i did a non linear denoise again with like also 0.75% (not the smartest thing to do but eh when i get more data i wont need to do it)

Send the boogie man data

I could try it

[subtle sorrel]

Ah that's basically what I did but with noiseX

[subtle sorrel]

Gimme some time

I'm trying to setup tonight

Get official Quattro first light

Also my redcat may have a problem

I'm either capping or it's out of collimation somehow

Subs and stacks from the last 2 nights I used it show tilt, and the unfocused stars look exactly like how an uncollimated RC6 stars look.

I'm nervous, I'll probably star test it again with my DSLR to see if maybe it's an issue with just that filter or maybe the imaging train in general

[tranquil mountain]

slight touch up

[subtle sorrel]

https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/19ATRXHhpKic9-2ymlqvvLj-Nrq250cQj?usp=drive_link

@tranquil mountain

there Boogeyman

now i have to make sure my RedCat isnt out of collimation somehow

[tranquil mountain]

What

[subtle sorrel]

yeah something is wrong with my redcat

that or my imaging train, not sure atm

i need to do more testing to determine what exactly i was seeing last night, but my redcat had coma across the entire field

like tilt and that's what Pixinsight shows it as being, but i attempted to resolve it with the tilt adapter plate on my camera to no avail

it made no impact on the shape of the defocused star

i just now remembered that earlier i suspected that it could possibly be the luminance filter but i do recall seeing the issue universally across all filters meaning that its unlikely

[tranquil mountain]

looking at the data it is kinda out of focus it seems

[subtle sorrel]

it's not

its some kind of issue with the optics

this is what the defocused stars look like

theyre not supposed to look like this

[tranquil mountain]

so you got a bad copy

[subtle sorrel]

dont think so

i think the road trip knocked it out

i dont recall seeing this in the past ever but i also didnt have a mono cam forever

[tranquil mountain]

hm, the corner stars on it looks pretty odd

[subtle sorrel]

i had OSC

[subtle sorrel]

yes

that too, like back focus is off

somehow

oh fuq

no

i see the issue in my Ares-M first light

god

i thought the issue was tilt this whole time, for almost a year

maybe it never was collimated

it wasnt really possible to tell with my OSC camera because it was so bad and not sharp

but the mono cam brought the issue out

so i need to contact someone somewhere to see if they can adjust the optics

yay...

[subtle sorrel]

it's looking increasingly like this is the case

i can remember doing an airy disk check when i first got the scope but didnt see anything off when going through focus

Tilt issues at least as far back as when I shot NA neb

"tilt"

the coma and miscollimation presents as tilt in an eccentricity analysis but you cant tell without an incredibly sensitive camera, say a mono camera...

Whooptie said this isnt surprising 😭

im incredibly upset and even a little depressed rn

i love this scope

[subtle sorrel]

the fact that this thing is this sharp with bad collimation means it will be razor sharp if it does get collimated.

that certainly explains why all of my OSC images looked out of focus no matter what i did

[tranquil mountain]

Look at my images, they are all proper focused

If they look sharp to you then the redcat is sharp

[subtle sorrel]

your corners arent perfect

[tranquil mountain]

Huh

Nah all my data is fully focused

The corners will never be 100% perfect

But my fwhm is really low

[subtle sorrel]

the middle is definitely way more focused

what was the FWHM?

[tranquil mountain]

I usually average a 1.3-1.4

Which is focused for our setup

[subtle sorrel]

mine is ~1.75

[tranquil mountain]

These are all focused with the fwhm of what i said before.

[subtle sorrel]

holy fuq

[tranquil mountain]

What’s wrong?

[subtle sorrel]

tasty

[tranquil mountain]

Which one

[subtle sorrel]

all of them

although the M42 is noticably sharper than mine

not even comparable actually

that just wins

[tranquil mountain]

Wish i wasnt in bortle 5 right now

[subtle sorrel]

i wish i was back at the bortle 3 rn

i dont think i will be needing to shoot Markarian's Chain anymore this season

this data probably cant be topped, even with the issues.

[tranquil mountain]

Send full image

[subtle sorrel]

im just going to send a screenshot for now

i havent started working on this yet

too tired and now upset over this collimation ordeal

[inland matrix]

@subtle sorrel have you found a solution to your tilt/coma issue?

Ive got the same problem. I have a full frame Canon 6D on the redcat. When I bought the scope I had no coma at all (even at full frame). Then suddenly, a two months ago I had crazy coma. I tried to adjust the tilt plate and when I apparently had no tilt anymore (according to Astap and Siril) I still had coma. I still dont know what the problem is :(

Btw. I probably wont get the touptek 533mc bc the seller only does PayPal and direct payment. I dont have PayPal and direct payment is too risky

[subtle sorrel]

No

[inland matrix]

:(

[subtle sorrel]

My optical train shouldn't have any tilt now but the coma in my images is presenting as tilt...

I might have to play the gear lottery which I'm not excited about

[inland matrix]

oh

[subtle sorrel]

these are what the stars looked like with my OSC cam

they were giant, bloated, and always oblong regardless of my guiding...

the FWHM of this stack is almost 2

my M42 was worse at a FWHM of 4

the stars in that picture were really bad

[subtle sorrel]

High Point got back to me

They said I need to contact William Optics and that I'm still in the warranty.

I believe I got mine in late May or very start of June last year.

[subtle sorrel]

I just confirmed the worst case scenario with it...

it's 100% out of collimation

I put my DSLR on it, no filters, still have an uneven airy disk...

[subtle sorrel]

The other thing I shot from bortle 3, Markarian's Chain

there are blue irregular galaxies all over the frame

there are a couple of high redshift galaxy clusters

lots of detail all around

[faint plover]

This worries me that even my scope may be out of collimation

Tbh my scope was never as sharp as yalls

And it confuses me

Maybe I just got a bad copy

[subtle sorrel]

well you have a helical focuser right?

I think that could just be down to how hard it is to reach sharp focus with one of those

anyway, you can test the collimation by focusing on a star and then defocusing it inside of and outside of focus to see what the airy disk of the star looks like

since i know what im looking for, if you want to send some test images of a test like that I can take a look

[tranquil mountain]

8h, more progress, getting even more tonight should be up to 10-11hs by then

[subtle sorrel]

now i can see why you dont like your B5 skies

I did get noticeably better signal than that in B3 but maybe it's down to the brightness of boogeyman vs that

[tranquil mountain]

I reckon though it’ll be nice after a few more nights of imaging

[subtle sorrel]

100%

at least you can image that stuff

ill have to put 40+ hours into something like that from my skies

[inland matrix]

Guys. I won't join you :(

[tranquil mountain]

Also for some reason this data doesn’t have anymore crop artifacts

[subtle sorrel]

to get a very mediocre image

[inland matrix]

Getting the zwo asi183mc pro

Smaller pixels

[subtle sorrel]

i found that happens after a while, once youve imaged enough

[subtle sorrel]

[inland matrix]

Eh

[tranquil mountain]

Kinda cool ngl they were a pain to deal with

[subtle sorrel]

welp guess we gotta kick you out

jk

[subtle sorrel]

of course

[subtle sorrel]

I think the cat pairs better with smaller pixels anyway

[inland matrix]

:(

[subtle sorrel]

Thomas' RedCat was really impresive with the smaller pixels of the ASI294MM

[tranquil mountain]

The lum data is always pretty clean but the rgb has weird gradients

[subtle sorrel]

interesting

[inland matrix]

Yeah. Ik

[subtle sorrel]

i mean, my RGB is pretty trash from my home

[tranquil mountain]

Mainly red and green ones

[inland matrix]

That's why I'm going for the 183

[tranquil mountain]

They are often in similar spots

[inland matrix]

Only camera with tiny pixels that is color

[subtle sorrel]

the background has red and green patches that look pretty nasty and are pretty hard to handle

[subtle sorrel]

interesting...

[tranquil mountain]

Lum data though has a easy gradient to fix

[subtle sorrel]

I found light pollution causes that

[tranquil mountain]

Sometimes it doesn’t have any gradient

[subtle sorrel]

i had none of that in my B3 data

but first thing I shoot when I get back home, i get a really nasty background

[tranquil mountain]

In my tarantula data the lum looked like it was shot in b1

[subtle sorrel]

[tranquil mountain]

Not 1 gradient and good snr

[inland matrix]

It does when you have guiding...

[subtle sorrel]

uh oh

[inland matrix]

[subtle sorrel]

i think with an older camera like the 183 you will want to get guiding asap anyway

longer subs will be better for the lower QE of the camera

[inland matrix]

qe is not even that bad

Mono has 84 peak

Imx533 peak of 91

[inland matrix]

Color around 75

It's ok

[subtle sorrel]

[inland matrix]

Everything s better than my unmodified canon 6D

[subtle sorrel]

yeah that's very true

[subtle sorrel]

oh my

the FWHM of my redcat and my OSC camera was like 6" on average

that's really really really bad

Wes' Redcat + 571 FWHM was more like 4.6"

[lapis smelt]

good lord bro

i get 2 FWHM

[subtle sorrel]

[lapis smelt]

crossno

[faint plover]

Okk thx

[faint plover]

Yes

Gen 1.5 afaik

It’s fricking shit

Need a EAF on it soon prolly

Gemini

[subtle sorrel]

Getting a mounting mechanism is a pain

[faint plover]

Yea…

[tranquil mountain]

[subtle sorrel]

William Optics is looking through my subs now.

I just hope there's enough evidence of a problem to not dismiss the issue.

Id think if QQQ can see the issue at a glance, the manufacturer could tell as well.

[tranquil mountain]

RGB FWHM: 1.34 LUM FWHM: 1.45

for my Bernes 142 Data

[subtle sorrel]

yikes

mine is nowhere near that

my best data is nowhere near that*

[faint plover]

Wtf

How the heck

[prime matrix]

this is 3hrs on IC-444 Jelly fish neb with my new UV/IR cut filter and I'm super happy with how its coming along i need a ton more data and need to spend a bit more time & effort in my editing process but for a quick edit i have no major complaints

[rare copper]

How would a small pixel size be like with the Rc51 combo and 585

[subtle sorrel]

out of focus star test on the inside of focus

you can see how that center dot is biased toward the right

that means there's a flaw, optically

outside of focus is much worse

the brightness diff is coma

you can see coma on the star in the middle too

center inside, brightness diff and middle biased towards right, coma.

WO requested some more test images so I used my artificial star to provide them

im kind of irritated with how well this "star" works because it's so jerry rigged

[tranquil mountain]

again, 11hs

Idk, kinda looks the same tbh

[rare copper]

mainly seeing a noise difference in the dust

[tranquil mountain]

yeah im seeing it a lil too

[subtle sorrel]

Very first night I had the RedCat 51, something looks off

I couldn't tell then but my eyes can see it now...

Top left looks a little smashed in

The inner concentric circles are blurred and not very well defined either.

So something probably knocked it out during shipping.

[subtle sorrel]

Still waiting on a 'final' verdict on this situation

[tranquil mountain]

I am indecisive

[subtle sorrel]

I feel like it could use some more brightness

like the reflection nebula should pop more imo

[tranquil mountain]

Maybe

[tranquil mountain]

here

[rare copper]

Do you guys know anyone who uses a 585 with the rc51 in the server?

[lapis smelt]

What do you wanna know about it?

I had it before

[rare copper]

Just wanna know how it was and if it had any issues

And was the smaller pixel size worth it or not

[lapis smelt]

Its not pixel size that you completely benefit from. Its pixel scale

[subtle sorrel]

WO hard screwed me guys

idk what to do

All of THIS tells me there's a problem 1000000%

How do you look at these and say there's no problem?

[subtle sorrel]

@faint plover this was their response

[inland matrix]

Bruh

there is obviously an issue here. The same as mine

With full frame I have rain drops in my corners

Make an image with a bigger sensor

[faint plover]

Bruhhh

[subtle sorrel]

Well that's makes sense for a large sensor

However

Do you have raindrops in the center of the field?

[inland matrix]

....no...

But almost

I have to crop it down to the size of 1 inch sensor

To get an acceptable amount of distortion

[subtle sorrel]

Oh because I do have clear coma across the entire field

And I have a small sensor

[inland matrix]

[subtle sorrel]

If that's not an optics problem, I don't know what is.

[prime matrix]

[subtle sorrel]

Is there something funky with your stars?

Looks like they all have fringing.

[prime matrix]

Yeah, I think there’s a little something wrong . I didn’t really try that hard though because I want to get BlurX done.

[prime matrix]

I think my color calibration is just a bit inconsistent

As far as my stars go

The colors weren’t coming out as good as they could have

This is the first night. I think the stars are a bit better than this.

But I overall like the date more in the new one

[subtle sorrel]

Are they oblong?

Or misshapen?

[prime matrix]

Slightly yeah

It’s three minutes subs un guided

[subtle sorrel]

What mount do you have?

[subtle sorrel]

Ah nvm then

[prime matrix]

Typo

[subtle sorrel]

Some were probably slightly trailed and some were not if I had to guess

[prime matrix]

CEM 25P

[subtle sorrel]

[prime matrix]

Not really

Fairly consistent

[subtle sorrel]

It kind of looked like the issue I have with my redcat but I can't make a definitive call if there's tracking error.

[prime matrix]

Are you guiding?

[subtle sorrel]

Yes

And perfect guiding if I might add.

[prime matrix]

Can’t you look at your graph?

[subtle sorrel]

Yeah it's basically flat lol

[prime matrix]

Oh okay good

[subtle sorrel]

And not because it's not making corrections, it's making corrections constantly.

Have to guide with the AM5N

This was a stationary test with an artificial star, intentionally out of focus.

[prime matrix]

What do you mean artificial star?

[subtle sorrel]

Made a point source of light and set it far enough away from my scope to reach focus on it.

Which with the cat isn't very hard

In practice those are identical to real stars.

Which makes it even worse.

[prime matrix]

Hhmm yeah I’m not too sure

To be honest, I probably have it bad as MF but I’m not checking😂

[subtle sorrel]

Those airy disks aren't supposed to be asymmetrical and oblong. Lol.

[subtle sorrel]

If you can't tell there's something wrong with the optics I wouldn't worry about it

My scope has a collimation issue, always has, and i could always tell something was wrong

And WO doesn't want to take responsibility for fixing it, under warranty.

[prime matrix]

Aahh OK that makes more sense

[prime matrix]

We’ve had pretty good customer support from them before

But to be fair, haven’t done anything recently

[subtle sorrel]

Yeah I'm not seeing that at all rn

And lots of folks in Lukamatico's discord are sharing similar sentiment as mine.

Things aren't looking good at WO atm.

[prime matrix]

Damn well that’s good to know I guess😂

[subtle sorrel]

Yup

They're beating around the bush with me and are being horribly reluctant to make the right moves.

So take this as a warning that WO is not good with service and make sure word spreads lol.

[faint plover]

How much data?

[prime matrix]

that one is 3hr the other one is 5hrs

[prime matrix]

[subtle sorrel]

yeah buyer beware, WO doesnt want to stand behind their products anymore, and they sure as hell wont be there for you when you have an issue

[tranquil mountain]

is this 25h an improvement from above?

[subtle sorrel]

yes

noticeably

[tranquil mountain]

What’s improved

[subtle sorrel]

there's a noticeable amount more dust in the background and the reflection nebulae look more lively

[tranquil mountain]

25h vs 21h

[subtle sorrel]

yeah i can see more dust in the 25

easily

[tranquil mountain]

I think the reflection looks sharper

Ill try and get to 30hs tonight

Pure lum imaging tonight

I wanna get to a point where the lum looks almost noiseless

[subtle sorrel]

do it

[tranquil mountain]

How much more till it reaches that you think?

[subtle sorrel]

Probably way too much to be worth the effort but I think 30 hours will be solid.

[tranquil mountain]

Ill hope for that

[faint plover]

From b9 like always?

[rare copper]

The dust and the color look much nicer

[prime matrix]

Nah b4

[faint plover]

Oh mb

Nice

[subtle sorrel]

WO never responded last night

if i dont get a response by tonight im going to talk to HPS again to see what i can do

[faint plover]

Bruh

They ignoring u I think

Yea I’m confident

[subtle sorrel]

Trust me I know and they are so far

[faint plover]

Well uh, fk them.

I probably would never get a wo product again and wasn’t planning too.

[subtle sorrel]

[hoary quail]

damn sry to hear that, hope they respond

[subtle sorrel]

Oh they finally did

I've requested for them to send a shipping label for me to do an RMA, just waiting on confirmation on that.

Pretty sure it's illegal for them to do an RMA without paying for the shipping to and from the factory themselves.

They were trying to make me pay shipping.

[faint plover]

Bro

Wtf

[subtle sorrel]

yup

[inland matrix]

uff

@subtle sorrel

How do I make an artificial star

I tried it yesterday but apparently Im too stupid

I just made a white dot on black background on my tablet, placed it a few meters away from my redcat that I could reach focus and then unfocused

[subtle sorrel]

you can cover the end of a flashlight with something, paper, aluminum foil, tape, then poke a tiny hole in it

use a sewing needle or a toothpick or anything with a very very small and sharp point

[inland matrix]

okay

In which distant to your scope?

[subtle sorrel]

normally i put it about 15 or so feet away from the scope

[inland matrix]

okay

[faint plover]

Hugh

Huh

What would u use an artificial star for

[subtle sorrel]

Star testing the scope

I made one mainly to help with collimating my various reflectors

It just so happened to come in handy with this situation I'm in

[faint plover]

But it was for a redcat

[subtle sorrel]

Mhm

You can test for collimation issues for a refractor all the same

[faint plover]

Fredolinos redcat is out of focus?

[faint plover]

Oh

[subtle sorrel]

Also, people use artificial stars with the redcat to tune out sensor tilt and get the sensor on axis with the cat's optics

Very handy if you don't have the patience to slowly iterate over months of adjustments.

[faint plover]

Ah

Thx

[inland matrix]

it is

Have raindrops in my corners

With an imx183

[subtle sorrel]

So your back spacing is wrong.

[inland matrix]

Come on

Its a petzval

[subtle sorrel]

doesnt matter

somebody earlier said the same thing but at least acknowledged that it matters to an extent

the absolute worst you can ignore the backspacing requirement is probably about +/- 5 mm from 55 mm

and with the 183, you have all of the right spacers included, just use them so you can stop being worried about it

[inland matrix]

I donttt

It doesnt fit

[subtle sorrel]

what doesnt fit?

[inland matrix]

Sorry

Cant write

No matter how I want to attach it it doesnt fit

[subtle sorrel]

what doesnt fit?

that still doesnt help

[inland matrix]

These things

Adapters

21mm + 11mm M42-M48 or something

Anyways

When I used my cat with my dslr a few months ago without spacing I had no problem

At full frame…

So I assume my scope is out of colimation

[subtle sorrel]

that's because with a T-ring adapter, the DSLR is at a perfect 55 mm of back focus

that right there tells me your back spacing is the problem

[subtle sorrel]

there should be a 3rd adapter

a 17mm which is just an M42 extension tube

the 21 mm must be out at the front since that one is the M42 to M48 adapter

[subtle sorrel]

it's a 16.5 mm M48 adapter

your order should be 11 mm first, 21 mm 2nd, and 16.5 mm 3rd.

that's different from my 533 MC Pro but that will give you 55mm of back focus

[faint plover]

I meant to say is it out of collimation but seems my mistake was correct

[inland matrix]

Yeah but suddenly with a dslr and with, as you say 55mm backspacing I had coma in my corners

For 6 weeks now

[inland matrix]

It wasnt correct

[inland matrix]

WITH the dslr

…

[tranquil mountain]

not bad

[faint plover]

Omg

Pls spare me

[subtle sorrel]

Sooooooo this statement is incorrect?

[subtle sorrel]

Looks better than mine, signal wise.

[subtle sorrel]

Coma in the corners, especially when it's radiating out from the center of the image, isn't indicative of collimation btw.

[tranquil mountain]

Signal wise?

[subtle sorrel]

Yeah

I think yours could use some more saturation

[tranquil mountain]

Needs more data for that to be done without it looking slightly cooked

I’m confused though, signal wise its the same data?

[inland matrix]

Then explain why I had no coma a few months ago at full frame, without 55m of backspacing and some weeks ago I had coma even with an imx183

[subtle sorrel]

You're either misunderstanding or ignoring what I said.

The DSLR IS at 55 mm of back spacing.

You can't get around that.

The T-ring adapter you use to attach it to the cat adds the remaining amount of spacing to round it off at a perfect 55 mm.

You have issues in your corners because you're only using 2 of the 3 spacers included with the 183.

You aren't close enough to 55 mm with the 183.

[tranquil mountain]

Shoot some ha data for the boogie man nebula, dont need dark skies for that, should help the ha pop out more without me needing to ramp up heaps of saturation.

[subtle sorrel]

wait it just dawned on me

is that my data?

[tranquil mountain]

?

Yea

[subtle sorrel]

im a moron

sorry i just woke up

[tranquil mountain]

I was replying to the message where you sent the google drive link

[subtle sorrel]

wow i didnt even see that

btw did you try any gradient removal?

[tranquil mountain]

I used a Msgr dataset

[subtle sorrel]

interesting

i was thinking you somehow got the exact same framing on it that I did and made your own image

that's why i was confused

[tranquil mountain]

Direct comparison

[inland matrix]

Apparently you do as well. I also had coma with the dslr

At first I had none. Then I had

With 55m backspacing

[subtle sorrel]

no, you did not mention that directly earlier

that is the issue

[subtle sorrel]

I did a second one earlier this month

your's wins tbh

you have a better gradient removal

and the details in barnard's loop are better preserved

[tranquil mountain]

You should really try and get some ha though

[subtle sorrel]

you know what, I thought you were trying to say 55 mm with the astro cam, i didnt read that correctly either

[tranquil mountain]

It would really help for barnard and the ha glow around the boogie man

[subtle sorrel]

clearly i have some sleep deprivation or something

[subtle sorrel]

I would if my weather wasnt miserable and if i wasnt about to ship off my redcat

oh and the position of Orion is getting worse night by night, it's getting obscured by the tree in my backyard very early on in the night

[subtle sorrel]

what generation of the redcat do you have?

[inland matrix]

idk

2 i think

[subtle sorrel]

does it have a helical focuser?

if it's a gen 2 or 3 it has a tilt adapter on the back, and if you messed with that or it came loose, it could be causing your issue as well.

[inland matrix]

yes

and has a tilt adapter

Since I first thought that I had tilt I tried to fix the tilt. When Astap said I had none I still had coma

And now the tilt adapter is screwed tight to the scope without any gap between and I still have coma (With a new camera)

[subtle sorrel]

Well a few things changed between the DSLR and the new camera, you reduced the distance of the sensor to the last element of the telescope.

It's going to be hard to accept, but most RedCat 51's can't support a full frame camera.

Despite what WO claims.

The concensus out in the wild is that they're not full frame capable telescopes.

I suggest you try 55 mm of back space with the 183 because even if at worst, your DSLR has only 60 - 70% of a usable frame, it will cover the 183.

I'm not going to continue to take you at your word without pictures to back up your claims, this simply isn't getting anywhere.

Collimation definitely doesn't appear to be the problem just off of what I've read because collimation affects the entire frame of all cameras regardless of tilt. If you can reach fine focus anywhere on any sensor regardless of the size, it's not collimation, it's back spacing or tilt (probably not tilt.)

As somebody who owns 2 very different reflector telescope designs, I've seen plenty of scenarios where collimation presents, and what's very common is if collimation is very near to perfect, I can get close to sharp focus but the stars will have weird flaring in one direction and the field isn't flat whatsoever. A tiny adjustment can normally allow my camera to reach sharp focus somewhere on the sensor. More improvements will get the overall field flatness to improve further.

I'm going to leave it at that. I'm not convinced that you had no coma and now you do with the DSLR, it's one or the other, and considering it's a sudden change to the story without a photo for evidence, I'm not willing to make a final judgement on that particular case.

[inland matrix]

Okay

Thank you for your help tho

[inland matrix]

I'll just say what had happened. I have a tilter on my redcat that I didn't touch for the first weeks/months when I bought my redcat (It was screwed tight). With my dslr I almost hadnt any coma in the edges. All stars were sharp. Then suddenly, a few weeks/month I had very bad coma. All over the image. The middle was more or less sharp. As I thought I might have tilt I pointed my telescope with the dslr at a artificial star field on my laptop and adjusted the tilt adapter that I had negligible tilt (according to Astap and Siril) but I still had coma. One week ago I bought the zwo asi183mc pro and surprise surprise... I still have coma in my corners. Naturally it is not as bad as with my fullframe but... When you said you'd have collimation issues with your Redcat and your stars looked very similar to mine I just thought that I maybe have the same problem

Problem is that I recently emptied my storage because and therefore deleted a lot of old astro images with my dslr where I hadn't any issues. I'll search post an image with and without issue.

[inland matrix]

Why would I lie?

[subtle sorrel]

Thats what I'm trying to figure out.

Without a full explanation and actual images to back up your extraordinary claims, it's hard for me to buy what you're claiming by word of mouth alone.

It's one of those things where I'd have to see it to believe it.

It feels like to me you suddenly found yourself dissatisfied with the scope and now you're trying to find justification to sell it or replace it. And since I've barely seen any images you've taken with it, I just can't buy that you're being 100% authentic.

Lots of people are liers and lie about things that are absurd and I've seen and heard of folks trying to fabricate reasons to get rid of something without any concrete evidence to back up those reasons, so their foundation ultimately crumbles when you call it out.

[inland matrix]

That's actually a good argument

And I really really like the scope. I shouldnt complain where I got the scope for only 675€ (including the blackcat)

I assume it got hit in car when I took it to my cousins place

(At full frame)

Slightly cropped when I hadnt ant issues

Crop into the down left corner

There is no coma at all

[inland matrix]

(A M81/M82 test to determin tilt)

Is that enough evidence?

[subtle sorrel]

Holy fuq finally

[subtle sorrel]

Thats certainly concerning when you put it up against the other 2 yes.

I would definitely say that something slipped.

Again, that's a drastic change and one that is big enough for me to reserve some doubts about the whole thing.

Thats why you need evidence lmao.

Thats actually really bad and yours was handling full frame better than I expected.

That coma deal or whatever is actually even worse than the tests done by our favorite youtubers who put these scopes through their paces.

That actually makes me wonder if that "hit" you said it may have taken actually caused some of the optical elements' spacing to get screwed up internally.

The RedCat's focusing mechanism has all of the optical elements riding together, all of them move instead of the camera which we know.

2 of the elements are either glued or fastened in place somehow and are not adjustable while the objective cell is adjustable.

If it took a hard enough hit, even in a case, it could feasibly cause that to happen.

Thanks for sharing some pictures finally, that helps way more than simply making statements.

[inland matrix]

Thank you

[subtle sorrel]

It looks like it was actually performing excellently.

[inland matrix]

Yap

[subtle sorrel]

Id say gather a lot more pictures, and take a bunch of test photos, with a before and after especially with the DSLR.

And then bring it to WO IF it's still in warranty

[inland matrix]

It is not

[subtle sorrel]

Otherwise, getting that fixed may not be worth the cost.

O fuq

You might be screwed.

[inland matrix]

Yup

I'll buy blurX lol

[subtle sorrel]

BlurX won't fix that. Trust me

Can't fix my issue, and yours is arguably worse.

[inland matrix]

It worked quite well on my Orion picture with the 183

[subtle sorrel]

You may have tilt, like trying to tune it out with the tilt adapter actually made it way worse (ive done this)

The right side of the M81 image is way worse than the left for instance.

Also i found that having the tilt adapter too far out will cause problems of its own.

At least you can try to tune the tilt out as much as possible by using an artificial star and placing it in the worse corner, then make adjustments until it gets better.

[inland matrix]

I'll try this weekend

Thanks

[subtle sorrel]

Also, I'm just spitballing here and I may be very wrong, but say it is an element that got knocked out of alignment and your tilt adapter is flush even, tightened all the way down with all of the pull screws... if you attempt to make any sort of tilt adjustment and there is no marked improvement, or maybe there is but you find the tilt changed at some point in the night, it's possible that whatever element may have made its way loose shifted ever so slightly...

I'm thinking if an element came loose, it could have either shifted and then become locked down or jammed again, or it's still loose enough to leave traces in your images throughout the night.

[inland matrix]

True

[subtle sorrel]

You'll have to see if that turns out to be true.

[inland matrix]

I'll just slam it against the wall hoping the element gets back to the right spot

[subtle sorrel]

Can't believe I didn't think to try that.

Maybe it would fix mine

[inland matrix]

Try it and tell me if it worked

... before I try

[inland matrix]

I want these emojis

[subtle sorrel]

Monster

[inland matrix]

Or maybe Im just gonna watch some random youtube video on how to colimate a refractor

[subtle sorrel]

One guy made a good video about it, still not as in depth as I was hoping for but it made me confident enough to do it if WO rug pulled me

BTW can I share your images with the nerds to see if they can brainstorm other causes?

Also I suspect collimation could be out a on top of a spacing issue, just after thinking about it some more.

[inland matrix]

surely

any help is welcome

[inland matrix]

could you send the link?

[subtle sorrel]

https://youtu.be/XhKudn4RjLk?si=K2zFvD7ohEmUCYB9

I say don't try it until you've done enough troubleshooting to eliminate tilt entirely.

I might be wrong here, but I do believe the RedCat 51 has collimating screws, push and pull, in the objective and not just screws to hold the objective in place.

He mentions that some scopes have what appear to be push/pull screws but aren't.

[subtle sorrel]

Ok I shared the Andromeda and M81 pics in our own nerd channel, just waiting for input.

Concensus so far is it's obviously really bad. Considering it's even worse than I thought.

The full M81 pic may help too @inland matrix

[subtle sorrel]

Somebody said that if it's collimation, you're screwed because that's WAYYYYY out.

Somebody else says REALLY bad tilt.

[subtle sorrel]

Caused by a shift in the optics

So what I said as well.

😭

You didn't. Drop it... did you?

[subtle sorrel]

I think i need to get Affinity Photo and process it in there too.

Thats how my best images came to being

Pixinsight alone isn't good enough for the most part

[inland matrix]

[inland matrix]

Not that I know of

[inland matrix]

I think Im screwed

[subtle sorrel]

That was the consensus with the nerds

[inland matrix]

Bruh

Full M82

[inland matrix]

It's out of focus too lol

When I had it basically fixed

(Same result in Astap btw)

Crop

[inland matrix]

Wait. For full frame this looks a little too small. I probably croped it to avoid the worst stars

[subtle sorrel]

yeah

[subtle sorrel]

yeah it's not looking promising

[inland matrix]

https://tenor.com/view/whhyyyy-vanish-vanish-emoji-emoji-vanish-whhhyyyy-gif-10057259719602444514

[subtle sorrel]

just about everyone mentioned that it looks like it was dropped

idk if that is salvageable at all

[inland matrix]

:|

[inland matrix]

Jay

That was a mood booster

[sturdy ravine]

@inland matrix do you have an image of the scope?

[rare copper]

what tripod is that?

[inland matrix]

Tripod of my reflector

Bresser pollux 150/1400

[rare copper]

I’ve been wanting a beefier tripod for my gti but most of them are hella pricey

[subtle sorrel]

i finally mustered up the will to stack the remainder of my Cali nebula daytar from the beginning of the year taken with my DSLR on my Cat

the stars are filled with artifacts and color fringing

[subtle sorrel]

I mean, that's not what I was hoping for either.

it's just not a good outlook for the scope.

The problem with collimating refractors, imo, is that it would be hard to narrow down what lens element or elements are out of alignment.

[inland matrix]

Yap

[inland matrix]

💀

Stars in the corner with imx183

[inland matrix]

@subtle sorrel

I dont get how to do a synthetic star

[subtle sorrel]

https://youtu.be/PoFLtjIAcVI

can be literally any kind of flashlight

[inland matrix]

tanks

[inland matrix]

Huh

Wtf

At mine it's always just a white blob with a slightly brighter outline

[subtle sorrel]

how close is it to the objective and how high is your gain or exposure?

[inland matrix]

Gain is 111. Exposure around 0.005s

And the lightsource is about 5 meters away

Far enough that I can reach focus

[subtle sorrel]

id still drop the gain a lot

[inland matrix]

Ok

[faint plover]

@subtle sorrel A lil test, drizzle 1X and BlurX

Pretty happy with this, will try drizzle 2X rn

[inland matrix]

@subtle sorrel did you get any response from WO about your colimation issue?

[subtle sorrel]

i sent my scope to them for adjustments

beyond that, no news

[inland matrix]

Id love to do that as well

[subtle sorrel]

could certainly be sharper, 2x drizzle will be best for redcat data

[subtle sorrel]

you could, youd just be paying a fortune for them to do the necessary work

[inland matrix]

for free obv.

I know someone who knows someone who could fix my scope for 150 euros...

[subtle sorrel]

that's better than nothing

if theyre reliable and could do it at a reasonable price, id take that chance

[inland matrix]

rip

[subtle sorrel]

yeah those should be focused and they dont even look close

[inland matrix]

yesss

[rare copper]

Did you guys just get unlucky or have WO become trash

[deft frost]

I've seen a bunch of people with bad redcats now, seems like WO has much worse quality control

[faint plover]

Thanks! I did drizzle 3X and had a lot of drizzle artifacts

Maybe 2X will be best

[subtle sorrel]

Seems like the gen 3 redcats don't have as good QC as the previous generations

Fred's is just borked for some reason

[subtle sorrel]

If you are getting artifacts, you may not be dithering by enough pixels...

Or not dithering often enough.

[faint plover]

Hmm

I have been getting walking noise lately and a LOT

but I always dithered this much

It’s.. weird

Anyways, here’s what I managed

Not denoised, will try a denoise prolly but it’s very understretched so not rlly needed idk

[subtle sorrel]

this grid pattern is coming from the bayer matrix not being overcome through dithering too

[subtle sorrel]

that could come from using the wrong gain in bias frames to calibrate a set of flats of a different gain

i doubt that's what is going on but that can serve as a heads up anyway

[inland matrix]

I still dont now whether I should pay the money. But in this state its just trash. Id even exchance it for a 71F….temporarily at least

[subtle sorrel]

I would just because of what you said

[inland matrix]

But I dont have the money

[subtle sorrel]

if you dont, and you dont take the chance to fix it, it's just going to sit unused

[subtle sorrel]

save up

[inland matrix]

There is no point in saving up when there is no money input

[subtle sorrel]

[inland matrix]

funnily even when Id spent the money to fix it, it still would have been cheaper then most redcats that are sold online

[faint plover]

Oh yes

I am using old biases!! In which I used a different gain

[subtle sorrel]

well that would probably be why lol

[faint plover]

Ohh omg Tysm

Life saver

I’ll retake biases tommorow

[subtle sorrel]

[faint plover]

[subtle sorrel]

[faint plover]

Oh wait a second

U were replying to me having walking noise

Ohh

I’m pretty sure it used to work tho @subtle sorrel Same biases

That’s weird

[subtle sorrel]

different gain will still cause that

[faint plover]

Ik but

I’m pretty sure I used those same biases before

With same gain

Like same gain in my newer data

Anyways, Tysm. I’ll give it a try

I hope it works cuz because of this I haven’t been imaging for so long

And it has just been stressing me out tbh

[subtle sorrel]

well if the flats are new and the bias frames are old, it could happen all the same too i think

[faint plover]

I see.

Thanks dude!!!!!

[faint plover]

@subtle sorrel new biases, walking noise still same.

i fcking hate this

im just focusing on the walking noise, the dust spot thing was so weird cuz i ddint get much in subs

ill deep clean everything its just the damn walking noise

ok, looking at my sensor now, i see a ton of small dust

its not getting out

wtf

[urban ridge]

Flats work fine on my roki but I've never been able to get them to work on redcat

[faint plover]

This is without flats

I’m worried about the walking noise here

[inland matrix]

weird

Get yourself a sensor cleaner kit

[inland matrix]

Are you making biases or darkflats?

If you are stacking in Siril try the preprocessing script. I had the problem that all my images I stacked myself were trash because of overcorrection and/or weird correction of bias frames. The script works fine although its just the same as I did manually

[faint plover]

I’m using DSS

Bad option ik

I’ll try siril rn thanks for the idea

[subtle sorrel]

that's walking noise without any calibration frames?

[subtle sorrel]

DSS is terrible yeah

[faint plover]

With biases

[faint plover]

I never had issues with it but maybe?

[subtle sorrel]

I get walking noise with that all the time

[faint plover]

Oh what

With DSS?

[subtle sorrel]

I always had issues

[faint plover]

U got walking noise with DSS but not siril?

Or pix

[subtle sorrel]

Yeah

[faint plover]

oh

[subtle sorrel]

same there too

[faint plover]

How extreme was it? As much as mine?

[faint plover]

I see

[subtle sorrel]

chances are there's actually a problem with the way you acquired your data and that stacking in Siril wont do anything but it's worth a shot

are you absolutely certain that when Nina issued a dither command, it actually dithered?

[faint plover]

Yh

[subtle sorrel]

and didnt just sit still?

[faint plover]

I’m decently confident yes

Not very sure tho

I mean

It happened to me on another night too

It’s not the only night

Like the night before this

[subtle sorrel]

it was always lesser in siril but still not preferable

[subtle sorrel]

did you try no calibration frames?

if the walking noise still presents without calibration frames, than the issue is stemming from the acquisition process

[faint plover]

No biases?

[subtle sorrel]

yes

[faint plover]

I see

No I think I didn’t try

[subtle sorrel]

if the issue doesnt present without calibration frames, it is your bias frames introducing it somehow (doesnt appear to be likely anymore)

if the issue does present without calibration frames, the issue was your data acquisition

[faint plover]

Hmm

[subtle sorrel]

whether you didnt dither often enough, by enough pixels, or dither at all to begin with is up for you to troubleshoot

[faint plover]

Wait but u said doesn’t present for both scenarios

Is that true?

Oh never mind

My bad

[subtle sorrel]

it will present in both scenarios assuming the acquisition process is to blame

[faint plover]

Okay

Well thanks

I’ll let you know

👍🏻

[subtle sorrel]

[faint plover]

no biases still there

is there a way to check logs for past data captures?

[subtle sorrel]

i believe so but idk where they are stored

[faint plover]

i know where they are

gimme a sec

found it but hard to read lmao

gotta search for a while i think

stacked in siril without callibration

still there

it was my imaging after all.

hmm

very very weird.

[subtle sorrel]

@faint plover we might be bortle 9 buddies lol

Here i was thinking i was bortle 7 or better

[subtle sorrel]

Bortle 8 at worst I think

Went up to here after an hour and a half

[inland matrix]

What's this?

[faint plover]

No way

[faint plover]

Sqm meter

It’s checking the sky quality

[inland matrix]

ahh. right

[faint plover]

Ye

[faint plover]

Nope

SQM <18 is b8-9

Ur sqm seems fairly similar to mine, according to Lp map ofc

[subtle sorrel]

@tranquil mountain it looks like WO actually fixed my RedCat and didn't put up a fight once I stuck it to them.

Seems like it will be making its way back across the pond to me today.

[faint plover]

Let’s goooo

🔥 🔥 🔥 🔥

[inland matrix]

:D

I want that too

[subtle sorrel]

they'll nickle and dime you for it unfortunately

[inland matrix]

Yap

[inland matrix]

Currently someone is selling his Redcat for 650€. 15% off for those who are in the local astronomy group 🥲

[subtle sorrel]

[faint plover]

thats a decent price

got mine about 600usd

[lapis smelt]

@faint plover whats going on with your setup?

i might be able to help

i have a redcat

[faint plover]

Nothing much

Just cleaned my sensor properly finally

Just having issue with walking noise

Never got it ever

Suddenly getting it now for 2 nights

My suspect is nina isn’t actually dithering

[lapis smelt]

do you dither

oh didnt read last message

odd. do you have a guide scope?

[faint plover]

nope, no guiding yet

i guide with direct guider on nina

[lapis smelt]

hmm ok

does it not tell you when it dithers?

how oftem do you dither?

[faint plover]

It does

[faint plover]

Every 2 subs

Has always worked

As I said, the issue should be the fact that nina isn’t actually dithering

I checked the logs but found nothing rlly

[lapis smelt]

Hmm odd

[subtle sorrel]

can you define how many pixels on the imaging camera the mount needs to dither by?

using direct guide or whatever it is?

[faint plover]

I dither by 10px

[subtle sorrel]

maybe increase that to about 25 or 30 pixels

[faint plover]

I will next time for sure

I’m just so confused cuz it used to work

[subtle sorrel]

idk if i had to guess it could be periodic error throwing the camera back to the same spot after drifting enough

im throwing out a wild guess that by dithering by enough pixels, you can make that not happen until you can get guiding

[faint plover]

Darn

[subtle sorrel]

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1eTXwWPCxWRYltl19ncoUzyNg9YWHevDe/view?usp=sharing

some really strong signal NA data

this was with my redcat so yes, there are major issues with the data

https://drive.google.com/file/d/14bwEA9LZGiLWvpfnBt2NjNBFpboB24b3/view?usp=sharing

and some not very amazing M24 data because why not

[faint plover]

Lmaoooo

Realll

[rare copper]

Not sure if veloren would name his son that lol

[faint plover]

I would

[subtle sorrel]

[subtle sorrel]

So far it looks like my redcat is perfectly collimated, with not even the slightest deviation

I got it back today

[inland matrix]

I wish...

[prime matrix]

honest thoughts? Leo Triplets 1hr 40min, M-106 1hr 50min. btw first time guiding!