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Captured in Anglesey under a 98% waxing moon.

• Altair Lightwave 66ED

• Celestron AVX mount

• QHY5LII-C camera

• IR cut filter

• 2 alignment stars + 4 calibration stars + All Star Polar Align

• Focus with Bahtinov mask

• 100 lights unguided + 50 darks + 100 flats

• Calibrated, registered, stacked in Siril 0.9.9 + GIMP 2.10 final processing

Next session I will try 60s exposure (rather than 30s).

Dave

For anyone starting out, the settings in bold are the ones that matter. In this case gain=2 and offset=200 gave a decent histogram.

[QHY5LII-C]
Debayer Preview=On
Output Format=FITS files (*.fits)
Binning=1x1
Capture Area=1280x960
Colour Space=RAW16
Pan=0
Tilt=0
Force Still Mode=Off
Enable Live Broadcast=Off
USB Traffic=12
Speed=1
Offset=200
Amp Noise Reduction=On
Frame Rate Limit=Maximum
Gain=2
Exposure=30000
Timestamp Frames=Off
White Bal (B)=10
White Bal (G)=0
White Bal (R)=0
Contrast=0
Brightness=0
Gamma=1
Apply Flat=None
Subtract Dark=None
#Black Point
Display Black Point=0
#MidTone Point
Display MidTone Point=0.5
#White Point
Display White Point=1
TimeStamp=2018-08-22T22:05:09.6057114Z
SharpCapVersion=3.1.5193.0

Very nice, Dave!

I wish I could join you. The weather continues to be challenging. It's the Amazon Rain Forest.

Brian

Thanks Brian.

I really should stop trying DSOs around full moon. At least I am consistently getting the basics like polar alignment and focus consistently better with practice.

Dave

Dave,

Try Ha. The Moon doesn't seem to bother it and it digs 60-second exposures!

Brian

Thanks for the suggestion Brian.

I have ordered an H-alpha filter.

Dave