M3

Nice work Bill! I am actually getting jealous because I don't have the kind of stuff you guys do to get that kind of quality images!

Seanie, worry not, when you join the Meath Astronomy and Soup Society, you get to borrow a DSI. Everyone in MASS uses DSI, and they get it from me :lol: :lol:
Bill

Seanie, worry not, when you join the Meath Astronomy and Soup Society, you get to borrow a DSI. Everyone in MASS uses DSI, and they get it from me :lol: :lol:
Bill

:lol: :lol: :lol:

Hi Bill - I think I discoverd the darks issue same time as you. Now its fresh darks each time. Maybe the DSI is real sensitive to temperature.

As for focus, my method is this:

Go to Jupiter, use a 1 second exposure - you'll see the moons. Focus on these - keep tweaking real slow until they are in focus. Next, drop the contrast to 1 and go to a mag 3 or dimmer star and see if all is OK.

Now you're in focus.

When you are galaxy hunting, use the goto on the scope. You may be lucky and get it first time. Check if its there by choosing something like a 2 sec exposure then crank the contrast up to two - you should something that looks bigger than a star If not, the glaxy aint there. You may now have to hunt around a bit. Of course, if your alignment is bang on, it should be dead center. I used to get black screens and wonder where the hell M101 was... Then I used the contrast trick and well hell, there it was!

Keep it up - we've a way to go to better Keith G

Cheers

Dave McD

Keep it up - we've a way to go to better Keith G

Cheers

Dave McD

He will have to slow down a hellava lot for me to catch that up :shock:
Dave L, I have a couple of M13, I will post them later, or tomorrow, I'm flagging a bit now, but yes, it was an easier one to focus on. good focus I'm getting OK on, but critical focus with this beast is a hair puller, but once mastered, I'm sure I will be wondering why I used to fuss!
Bill.