Posts Made By: Alex McConahay

I've never been there, and need some advice from somebody who knows.

I will be coming as a side trip to another trip, with minimum luggage. (Just a backpack).

Can I just camp? I suppose the weather is warm enough that light summer stuff and a tube tent is enough.

Are there showers/etc.

Is food available on site (cafeteria/snack bar)?

I do not plan to get a rental car unless somebody tells me I need one. So--is there public transport to and from there to Boston? Come to think of it, is there public transport (local bus) around there.

In short, I am thinking Amtrak or Greyhound to someplace nearby, local bus to the site, and tube tent and lite sleeping bag. Am I crazy (well, yes) or do I pretty much have to get a rental car and/or motel room for the adventure?

Alex

I want to make a travel scope, and one of the design elements is a very short focal ratio (an 8" F3.8 is what I am shooting for). I plan to stick with long Plossls (40 or 32), a Tele-vue 8-24 zoom, and a barlow. All 1.25....

How much do I have to worry about Coma?

More specifically--Is there a 1.25 inch version of a coma correcting optic? They seem to be all 2 inch barrels--not in keeping with my minimalist design.

Alex

Do you want to get out of All of Astromart, or just this particular subset?

Alex

I just plugged an ST-7 into my G11 hand/control--Guider port for the first time. It appears that the electronics in the G-11 are confused. When I remove the ST-7, it all clears up.

Do I need some kind of special interface to connect the G11 with the ST-7?

Alex

At Nightfall in Borrego Springs (October 11-14), there will be a series of talks about Imaging and Amateur Astronomy.

More details are available at http://www.rivastro.org/ras_imaging_event.html

This year will feature a number of workshops, including an all-day Imaging Workshop. Jim Burnell will be there to work with you on imaging and processing techniques. He, along with Richard Berry, literally "wrote the book," The Handbook of Astronomical Image Processing, and the powerful AIP4WIN software that goes with it.

Jim will be on the imaging field at night, and will present an all-day workshop on Saturday. His sessions are hands on, with ample opportunity for questions and interaction. He will be using AIP4WIN to show how powerful image processing software can bring out the best in your astro-imaging data. However, his session will be limited in enrollment.

Other workshops of interest to amateurs are about Palomar Observatory, introductory image processing, solar viewing, the DSI Imager, and getting the most of your equipment.

Alex

Nightfall, a star party under dark skies in a luxury resort near Anza-Borrego State Park, California, will be held October 11-14. The great thing about this star party (besides the dark skies) is that it is at a hotel/rv park with restaurants, pools, air conditioning, and all that.

This year there will be a series of talks about Imaging and Amateur Astronomy.

More details are available at http://www.rivastro.org/ras_imaging_event.html

This year will feature a number of workshops, including an all-day Imaging Workshop. Jim Burnell will be there to work with you on imaging and processing techniques. He, along with Richard Berry, literally "wrote the book," The Handbook of Astronomical Image Processing, and the powerful AIP4WIN software that goes with it.

Jim will be on the imaging field at night, and will present an all-day workshop on Saturday. His sessions are hands on, with ample opportunity for questions and interaction. He will be using AIP4WIN to show how powerful image processing software can bring out the best in your astro-imaging data. However, his session will be limited in enrollment.

Other workshops of interest to amateurs are about Palomar Observatory, introductory image processing, solar viewing, the DSI Imager, and getting the most of your equipment.

Alex

Hi all,

There have been many times I have advertized something or another in the Classifieds here that somebody has responded-"-Do you have a picture of it?"

I can see their interest in some cases. But I mean don't we all pretty much know what these things look like? If I advertize a "Standard Losmandy Tripod for a G-11," should not one expect it to look pretty much like all the other standard Losmandy Tripods for G-11? Or an LX200 Classic 8 incher--DOn't they all look pretty much the same (or at least their photos do!).

I suppose I am also saying that it is hard to get a good picture of a setscrew mark, or a chip of paint off a tube, or even a clean picture (without glare) of the optics. So, how much could a picture tell somebody?

Or am I missing something?

If you have asked for a picture as a follow-up, could I ask why?

Please educate me.

Alex

I think I need to replace the autoguiding control chip in my ST-7. It is a ULN2003L .

Apparently it is discontinued. How does one buy such a thing? My local electronics warehouse does not have them.
(I've called SBIG, and am awaiting return call.....Just want to research other possiblities while waiting.

Any ideas?

Alex

Hi all,

I've been through the manual, read Wodaski's books, and googled various keywords, but cannot find an answer that satisfies.

Just what is the workflow in CCDSoft? Specifically, it seems that to get many of the operations on folders to work right, I have to isolate the files into a special folder. This means copying the files back and forth into folders.

For instance--at the camera I take a color series, and get a folder of files names Something.Luminance, Something.red, etc. To dark subtract, I have to then put the Luminance together into a folder, and subtract the appropriate darks, same for reds, etc. So they wind up in different folders, and I have to move them back together to do their aligns, and re-seperate them to do the combines, etc.

There has to be an easier way to do all of this, but I have not yet read it.

Is there a link on the web somewhere that says: This is what you do step by step from exposure to finished pre-process?

Alex

Generally speaking, for deep sky you need more aperture (even more, in the long run, than 6 inches--152mm). For Photography the 100mm is more than adequate. What kind of photography are you talking about? What kind of budget. (A quality 100mm refractor will cost 10 times or more what a 152 mm reflector could cost).

Just what kind of lount do ou intend to use for astrophotography?

Alex