CCD vs Film? Lots of time vs no patience? Alright, this is your place to discuss all the astrophotography what's and what's not. You can discuss about techniques, accessories, cameras, whatever....just make sure you also post some nice photos here too!
Sharing my recent trial at AP through the Balcony Window from my Astro Pier set up! With Scorpius leaving my balcony view soon, the milky way will soon follow. Soon 2-3 months of target-less views.
Messier 7 (NGC 6475) or known also as Ptolemy Cluster, is easily detectable with the naked eye, close to the "stinger" of Scorpius. Didn't get too many subs in on Thursday night though, with clouded haze sneaking in around 11pm+. But pretty pleased with what was achieved though with the milky way as the backdrop....hope you all like it!
- 12x60s subs WO Mgrz88FD+Starshoot SSDSI II/Autoguided/Nubulosity2 capture/Maxim DL5 process/PS CS3 post
Last edited by timatworksg on Sun Jun 26, 2011 11:10 am, edited 1 time in total.
My wife never complained about how much time, effort & money I spent on my Astronomy hobby!................suddenly I met her!!!
Howdy Bro! How are you? Thanks but wish they were real diamonds...lol!
@Chris
Hi Chris! Your a sight for sore eyes...HAHA! Been wondering where you've been!
Target-Less.....the balcony window height limits me to image till midnight at most nowadays...lol! Already done the Triffid & Lagoon. Tried a Cat's Paw but needed longer exposures. However it created lots of noise from the SSDSI II's CCD. Darks didn't help much either. Been toying around with the idea of making a cooler box for the SSDSI II cooled with a Peltier. Just to reduce the noise artifacts that the CCD creates. It's not a high end cam anyways and even at 5min subs...a fair bit of noise crops up, which is removable by darks. But longer and darks themselves are noisy even stacked! Hence the possible experiment of a cooling box. Also will probably get a new CCD soon.
As for the artifacts....it seems to be an inherent problem with Orion. Everywhere I checked, even the Yahoo groups...and there are issues with this. I still get artifacts but limited to 2-3 subs at least.
Suggestions I could give are, try plugging the cams USB direct to the Laptop. The Cam takes up the most power from the USB compared to anything else plugged in! If your using a USB Hub,...get a powered one!
Basically, from the feedback gathered, it's more a signal issue. Just gotta live with it as long as those dashes/artifacts are limited to a few subs...they can be thrown out! If too many..then it's a serious CCD issue!
Also read that there was a batch some time back where the polarity of the peltier was reversed!!! So the casing never got warm!...lol! The casing should get warm as the peltier hot side is running through a plate which is screwed to the casing as a heat sink!
The SSDSI II which I have now is a mere 3V peltier. Don't want to do any serious mods....but thinking of a cooling chamber around it. Worth a try a I guess...since I do wish to upgrade...lol!
Hey! We MUST catch up! Will visit one evening! Lemme know which night is good! Cheers and God Bless
Tim
My wife never complained about how much time, effort & money I spent on my Astronomy hobby!................suddenly I met her!!!
Thanks for sharing. The M7 was the first cluster I saw through my newly purchased ETX90 when I first started into astronomy. Plonked the scope on the floor of my darkened kitchen and peered up at it. It was so serene!
Brought back some memories. I tend to call this the Swastika cluster for obvious reasons! Next I moved on the M6 which looks really like a butterfly!
The Boldly Go Where No Meade Has Gone Before Captain, RSS Enterprise NCC1701R United Federation of the Planets
Glad it brought back memories "Her Kommandant!"...lol!
Never noticed the "Swastika" till you mentioned it...and it is a beautiful cluster to admire through any scope! It's a rare few with nicely spaced stars, clear with a shape that is serene...I agree.
My wife never complained about how much time, effort & money I spent on my Astronomy hobby!................suddenly I met her!!!
timatworksg wrote:
@Chris
Hi Chris! Your a sight for sore eyes...HAHA! Been wondering where you've been!
Hey! We MUST catch up! Will visit one evening! Lemme know which night is good! Cheers and God Bless
Tim
Hi Tim,
Yeah, I have not been doing much imaging - what with the terribly cloudy skies we have been getting. Anyway to keep myself occupied, I got to learning about plate solving. Quite interesting topic, especially when used to match some of my old images to sky maps. Try the free Aladin sky map software.
Yes, we will catch up. Let me know what CCD camera you are getting. Maybe I will ride along too.
