M47 open star cluster in Puppis

 

Date: 4/13/2007

Location: Tierra Del Sol, California SDAA Club site

Conditions: 0% moon, seeing 6/10, transparency 7/10, temperature 59 F

Telescope: Televue 85mm refractor, 600mm focal length, F7, prime focus, no diagonal.

Mount: Losmandy G11, Gemini goto, polar scope used to align, rough drift alignment

Guiding: C8 Celestron 8" scope, TouCam Pro web cam, PHD software

Camera: Canon Rebel 300d

Focusing: Manual used Imaged Plus software focus option with Canon Rebel.

Exposures: (8) 3 min raw 800 ISO, (6) bias, (6) darks

Processing: IP 2.75 - converted raw to FITS, align-rotate, combine median, digital development with sharpening, converted to jpg, Photoshop CS; levels, color balance, cropped, unsharp mask, reduced size for web.

Comments: This is my first attempt at guiding through the C8. It never lost the guide star but it seemed to be making large corrections. I was using a magnitude 6.5 star in the cluster. I think my focus is off. I used IP 2.75 focus routine, but was not sure what values to use the luminance or one of the color channels?