Hi guys
One more galaxy image captured from my backyard, this time is M 106 and it's friends, very happy with the details, not so happy with the gradients I'm getting lately on my images (circular semi arcs), this image could be strecehd a bit further but the background is a mess...I'm gessing it's because of the rampant light pollution on my already bad site...
I'm currently on the process of flocking the heck out of all my gear, tube walls, coma corrector, all adaptors, inside the filter wheel, focuser tube, back of the mirror etc etc...one particulat thing that is driving me nuts is the circular gradient I get when I mask the mirror, I had never noticed this untill now!
With the full mirror apperture (200mm f/4 newtonian) I get a pretty good and even flat but if I mask the mirror...boom! I get this circular gradient (donut shaped) smack in the middle of the image, I can see it well on my flats!
My mirror seems to have a slight turned down edge as I get way better pin point star shapes, that´s why I need a mask.
With all the flocking I've been doing I got to a point where it seems minimized (still a lot more testing to do) but to me it seems that is some kind of light interference patern, something like newton rings interference when you place two filters together with no spacers for example
I''l post a few images of my finding soon, maybe they can be of good use to anyone else with this issue!
Well, here goes my M106 image, a bit cropped from full frame, taken with my 200mm f/4 newt (stopped down to 175mm), QHY 163M camera and EQ6 mount from Bortle 7 backyard:
M 106_final version 106x60_L by Luís Campos, no Flickr