Bodes Galaxy & Others.

[brenski]

a month or so ago, I got hold of a Move Shoot Move star tracker. It's the size of an external 3½" HDD and the initial setup is: lock the laser pointer on Polaris, turn on the tracker and then point your camera at your target. anyhow, first time out, the laser died, but the nice people at MSM dispatched a replacement out to me, and tonight I gave it its maiden voyage.

Equipment:
MSM tracker, tripod, Canon 200d, Samyang 135mm F/2 lens., ISO800, 12x30s stacked

The target is Cigar, Bodes and Garland galaxies. (Garland is so tiny it's hard to spot). let me know if you can spot the Garland Galaxy.
the tracking is still a little "off" stars are not completely rounded. There's also another Galaxy (NGC2976) out on the periphery.
(The uncropped image contained another four galaxies (all fainter still)).



Bodes cigar garland cropped.jpg

[brenski]

I've tried three different stacking apps: Affinity, Sequator and Deep Sky Stacker. Sequator left the whole thing blown out and almost impossible to process (my own fault as the cr2 data was a bit cr*p). Top Post was stacked using Affinity. These two new images are the results of the Deep Sky Stacker app. I think there was a little more data available to process?

Partial Crop:

Bodes cigar garland ngc2976 DSS crop.jpg



Full Crop:

Bodes cigar garland ngc2976 DSS full crop.jpg

[Lavenderhill]

It sounds a complicated process but worth it when you see the images you have produced.
I've never seen the garland galaxy -- is it shown in the bottom right of the uncrossed image?
Rose.

[brenski]

It sounds a complicated process but worth it when you see the images you have produced.
I've never seen the garland galaxy -- is it shown in the bottom right of the uncrossed image?
Rose.

It'll get easier to get the hang of. Polar Alignment is everything. Going to have to use a 200mm (or longer) lens next time - 135mm is not great for smaller targets like Bodes.

As for Garland - it's barely visible - at 5'O'clock from Bodes. Just next to the really bright star.

Talking of barely visible: NGC2976 another galaxy is in the top right of the uncropped image.