My little window...

[Sivakis]

nice image. did you tried camera lens?

Thanks kimo and Airconvent

Yeah, I've been doing camera lens imaging all along, that last was the first on a scope.

There's definitely an obvious difference between imaging with a 55-250 Canon EF-S lens and the AT66ED refractor.

55-250 @ 250mm (or 400mm on a 1.6x crop - Canon 1000D)
ISO 1600
1.6sec x 87 frames


AT66ED @ 400mm (or 640mm on a 1.6x crop - Canon 1000D)
ISO800
1sec x 50 frames


The refractor is definitely dimmer simply because of the longer FL, coupled with my deliberate lowering of ISO to 800 to lessen the noise.

I also seem to find it harder to achieve focusing on the refractor compared to using just the camera lens. Not sure why this is so though.

Either way, my RA motor is arriving later this month so that should expand my exposure considerably. I'll definitely re-visit Omega Centauri again once that's here.

[kimo]

Thanks for sample. recently bought 80-200mm F/4.5 lens. I realised that its too slow to imaging. as I set at 80mm it should be F/4.5 right but the result didn't looks f/4.4 or near. now I purchased Prime lens 135mm with F/2.8 (on the way). lets see if it is good enough.

[orly_andico]

Most lenses need some stopping down for good results.

My 70-200/2.8 has curvature and coma off axis. Will try it stopped down to f/3.2 next time..

[Gary]

Nice job Sivakis! Prefer the brighter shot. Keep shooting!

[Sivakis]

Finally took delivery of my CG4 motor and gotten it pretty much polar aligned at home! Phew, talk about hard work.....

Messed around for a few nights until I get a semi-decent series of shots!

Astrotech AT66ED
Canon 1000D filter removed
50 x 25sec
ISO 1600

NGC 6231 (Northern Jewel Box)

[Sivakis]

Another take on the Northern Jewel Box, portrait orientation:

[DarthCryder]

nice C76!

[Sivakis]

Thanks Darth!

Didn't really like that previous one... think I overdid it (think?? Haha, I know I did....) with the magenta and reds....

Another try at the post-processing stage...

[Sivakis]

Trying to process 6231 taken from across different nights.

Can anyone help with why I'm getting this line across the image in DSS? The individual frames are clean by themselves but this error comes up after stacking....

[PETER LOO]

Very nicce Prawn Nebula (IC 4628) Sivakis, esp the 2nd last pics, it looks very much alive ..