Friday 14 September 2012

First guiding attempt with PHD

Here is my first attempt at guiding with a QHY5 camera and PHD.
Taken 13 September 2012 this is a SINGLE, 20 minutes exposure of the Crescent Nebula (NGC 6888), taken with the QHY8L ccd with my William Optics Megrez 102 on a NEQ6 mount.
Perfectly round stars right into the corners. Some people have reported that they were having problems with PHD, I don't know why, it is a really simple to use program and very effective.


I have had a go at processing this image.



Sunday 19 August 2012

Sun taken Sunday 19 August 2012

Hi all. Here is my sun from today Sunday 19 Aug taken around 10am

LXD75 Goto mount

ED80 with Baader solar film filter
Modded Canon 450D
ISO 100 at 1/320 exposure



Wednesday 15 August 2012

Saturday 11 August Perseid attempt!





Well had a go at the Perseid meteor shower on Saturday night without much success. I did manage to capture a few weak ones and one photo with a meteor and the ISS passing in to Earth's shadow. I captured a better ISS passing in to the shadow again on Sunday (in a break in the clouds) but no meteors this time as it was very cloudy!


Tuesday 5 June 2012

QHY8L First Light

Here is my first attempt with my new QHY8L ccd camera. I am very impressed with this camera.
Well the moon did cause a little bit of a problem last night but I think the Baader Neodymium filter helped a lot here.
 
Right technical details
 
Focused using one of my Bahtinov masks (deh........ of course)
20x 120s Lights
10x Darks
0x Bias
0x Flats
QHY8L OSC cooled to -15C
Williams Optics Megrez 102 at f7
EQ6 Pro mount unguided
4 June 2012


It's not brilliant but the moon was interfering, it was my very first go with this camera, but still I am very pleased with the result. Longer and more exposures needed and flats would be of benefit too. Also I had to use a 2" extension tube as I couldn't reach focus with the camera straight in the focuser.

Saturday 10 March 2012

Tuesday 24 January 2012

M42 and Rosette

Both of these taken using a Baader UHC-S filter instead of th Astronomik CLS clip filter.




Wednesday 18 January 2012

M42 16 Jan 2012

Hi All, what a difference shooting in RAW and taking darks can make!



Monday 16 January 2012

M42

Sadly due to meridian flip I got this one misaligned. Taken same night as the Horsehead below, also only jpegs.

12x 3.5 mins at ISO 800


Still some nice detail there though.

Horsehead and Flame

Here is my latest attempt at these. Unfortunately my camera somehow got turned on to jpeg only mode so no raws taken and my battery failed before I could do any dark frames.

30x 3.5 mins at ISO 800