Sunday 24 April 2016.

Captured a few photons of the Centaurus A galaxy.

Took almost 60 light frames and only kept 33 for stacking in DSS.
Dark, flat and bias frames were also added into the mix.
33 X 30 second exposures at ISO 800.

Centaurus A(NGC 5128) lies approximately 10-16 million light years distant.
It also has a super massive black hole at it's center.

The stacked image was processed in Star tools.

On Friday 15th April I managed to capture new data on the Tarantula Nebula.

I also used Dark frames, Flat and Bias frames with this session.
The results speak for themselves.

The details are the same as earlier except for additional light subs along with the flat and bias frames.

And so here it is.

I also did a reprocess on the Sombrero galaxy.
I re-stacked the light frames and also added flats, bias into the mix.
The star colours are far better and seem more vibrant.

Here is the result.

15th April 2016.

Imaging the Sombrero Galaxy.

This was a "accidental" capture.
It was not my intended target for the night but due to a comedy of errors it ended up as part of the captures from last night.

These are 28X30 second light frames
10 X 30 second dark frames.
ISO 800
Many light frames were discarded when going through the light frames.
Better to be honest with yourself and discard any image that might taint the final product.

Considering the now three quarter moon and some serious LP here I think I have done reasonably well with this one.

The Sombrero Galaxy is a unbarred spiral galaxy in the Virgo constellation and is some 28 million light years away.
It is viewed as side on.

I think some more light frames on this one would be a nice project for another night!
I am thrilled that this is my very first galaxy image.

Scope used was the Skywatcher 102 on a ALT/AZ goto mount.
No filters etc. were used.
All images stacked in DSS and post processed in Star Tools.

Two images here, the wide field and a crop of the galaxy itself.

An Eency Weency Spider...

April 11 2016.

Took some trial run subs on the Tarantula Nebula.
This is located in the Large Magellanic cloud and is some 160, 000 light years away.

These are 40X30 second light frames and 10X30 second dark frames.
This was also my first use of dark frames in my AP endeavours.

The result here is very encouraging and I hope to find more time over the coming weekend to gather more data.
There are two images here, one is the complete wide field as captured through the scope and the second is a cropped version.

The subs were stacked in DSS and the post processing was done using Star tools.
I left the colour as it came from the camera and did not adjust it in star tools at all.
I preferred the look direct from the camera to what Star tools was doing with the colours.

I also attempted to use my DIY Bahtinov mask for the first time.
This was a learning curve and I was second guessing myself and the spikes did not look "right" and I instead tried using the FHWM function in APT.
That was another steep learning curve and as a result the focus is a little off in the image!

So here are the products of my labours, enjoy!

 Thanks for reading and looking, comments good or bad welcome.

30th March 2016.

I went out with the intention of capturing a open cluster.
I tried working on the jewel box and was not getting satisfactory results. At this point I remembered that a friend and fellow forum member(AF.net) Paul aka PCH suggested I try shoot a cluster.

So slew the scope to Omega Centaurus and take a test shot.
I was amazed at the result.
Went into APT and got the focus as good as I have ever done since starting AP.
With such fine stars in the cluster a sharp focus was called for.

Took 30 X 30 second exposures.
Some were ruined by the tracking movement of the ALT/AZ and were discarded.
A total of 22 light frames went into DSS for stacking.
Again no filters or flat frames were used.

The result is very pleasing and is very promising.
I need to capture even more frames to get slightly more from the core of this image.

All in all I am very pleased at the outcome.
The CA is still evident but does not detract from the overall image, well in my opinion anyway.