I had a terrible time getting the Telrad and guide scope lined up; I never did get the guider where it needs to be, but just decided to go ahead. Could not find the Coma Berenices stars (too dim tonight for my sky conditions and lack of patience with dark adaptation), so I used Cor Caroli instead as my starting point, and that worked fine. Once again, the PicGoto came through beautifully. I imaged up past the meridian, then did the flip and reacquired the target with no problems. I used 2 markers in Nebulosity to realign after the flip, and that seemed to work very well. Unfortunately, my guiding after the flip leaves a lot to be desired. Still, I think this is better than last year’s image.
Date: 23 Apr 2014
Subject: NGC 4725, Ring Galaxy in Coma Berenices
Scope: AT8IN + HPS Coma Corrector
Filter: None
Mount: CG-5 (Synta motors+PicGoto Simplificado)
Guiding: 9x50 Finder/Guider + DSI Ic + PHD 2.2.1 (Win7 ASCOM VMWare)
Camera: DSI IIc (no chiller T = 6-8 °C)
Acquisition: Nebulosity 3.2.1, no dither
Exposure: 19x480 s
Stacking: Neb 3, bad pixel map, bias included, normalize first, trans+rot align, 1.5 SD stack.
Processing: StarTools 1.3.5.279 Crop; Wipe:Color & Brightness 77%; Rotate 180°; Develop 87.49%; HDR
ptimize; Contrast; Color:Scientific, Sat. 250%; Sharpen; Deconvolute: 2.0 pix; Life:Moderate; Track, RNC 48.28%; Magic:Shrink 1. CS6+Astronomy Tools deep space noise reduction; less crunchy more fuzzy; increase star color; Gaussian blurred layer mask to enhance outer arms; AstroFrame.
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