Ngc7000 Starless & re-edit

 Over the last few days I have had the opportunity to use starnet++ and re process the data. More happy with the image now with a star reduction. 

Ngc 7000 Narrowband.

 The Curse of the new gear strikes again.

Yes the weather has not played ball for the last couple of weeks lending credence to the curse of the new gear for us astronomers. I am desperate and stupidly excited to create my first "Hubble Palette" style image using the Optolong Narrowband 36mm filters in the ZWO filter wheel. I did manage to get the filters installed with no issues and had to wait a week to test. All filters are parfocal and using the ZWO EAF "auto focusser" all gave pinpoints stars within 10 focus steps. Sometimes seeing can set the focus point with a difference of up to 30 steps so very happy with that. I first tested the Ha filter on NGC7000 and here is a stack of 12 x 5 minute exposures.

Hydrogen Alpha 7nm Optolong Filter. 12 x 5 minutes

I have imaged this target many times in the past and I am stunned at the quality with a 1 hour stack.

I have had to wait a while longer to image the OIII and S2 filters. 

OIII 7nm Oxygen III Optolong Filter. 18 x 10 Minutes

Sulphur 2 7nm Optolong Filter 18 x 10 Minutes

All Combined in the Hubble Palette RGB image.

New arrivals

 Arriving tomorrow from my favourite astronomical retailer Widescreen Centre https://www.widescreen-centre.co.uk/

Should be my new ZWO 7 position filter wheel, this is the new mk2 version that is slightly larger than the mark 1 and better compatibility with the newer ZWO cameras. 

 No off axis guider used on my system so I will follow the set up here to create the correct 55mm back focus,

Along side it will be the 36mm unmounted LRGB from ZWO and 6nm narrow band filter sets from Optolong. I was incredibly impressed by Optolong's L-enhance tri band & L pro filter light pollution filter. Many images of their use can be seen in the previous posts. Unmounted filters will require fitting rather than them having a screw thread. 36mm are needed for the APS-C chip on the camera to avoid the vignette.

   These filters will allow the full range of wavelengths of light through to create images that will

 The Optolong 6.5nm SHO narrowband filters set is for astrophotographers who want to obtain the maximum contrast of nebulae while cutting out background emission and suppressing star lights. This filter set includes a 7nm hydrogen-alpha filter and 6.5nm sulphur-II & oxygen-III filters.These filters cover the major emission lines of emission type nebulae. These filters are also commonly used by astrophotographers to present their photos in Hubble Pallete. I cannot wait to capture some starlight. I will wait and see what arrives tomorrow.

Update:19/8/21  Well everything has arrived and I have now inserted the filters into their new home, installed and rebalanced scope.  Just need a few clear skies. 

22/8/21 Aghhhhh was promised a clear sky last night albeit with the full moon, but alas clouded out.

23/8/21 For about an hour and a half tonight despite a near full moon I managed to find focus for each filter and they all focus within 10 clicks of each other happy with that for par focal.

I couldn't resist running a very basic stretch on this before bed now at 1.20am.

So 12 x 5 minute exposures with the Ha filter.

Images used from ZWO and Optolong websites.

The Moon

 Our nearest neighbour at 383,000 km from earth as of 23.30 ish on the 23rd August. Most will be unaware that during a lunar month the moon does not have a perfect circular orbit around the earth, and its distance to earth varies over the month by just over 50,000 km. Currently the moon is getting closer by a 1 km per second.

Just 3 Persieds.

Sitting and facing in a direction opposite to where the camera is pointing is a guarantee for me anyway for a failure to capture anything of significance especially when meteors are involved. A beautiful evening spent on the sun lounger I saw some really bright meteors  and a few really bright ones streaking through the Andromeda region and going south. The camera however  was under our pergola and left overnight to see what it could find.(covered jusy in case it rained) ISO 1600 and 20 second captures are the best my Canon can hope for without an excess of noise anyway. So here is the result a composite of 3 images with 3 faint streaks across the sky looking east.