Return of the Astro-Jedi

So, I have been away for almost 2 months. I was off getting married and on my honeymoon etc. A much needed break from the daily grind. Now I am moving in with my wife and long-time girlfriend into a single bedroom apartment :( Which means I won’t get as much face time with my tele anymore. But, over the span of these two months, I did get robofocus and feathertouch focuser installed on my trusty reflector. Make a huge difference in the focus. First, it’s a much shorter and more pleasant experience. And then, it’s spot on!! Just look at some data I gathered while playing around. I am using focusmax to achieve critical focus. Some images of the focuser and the motor will come soon.

This image is 12*10min light and dark images. No flats. I was playing around with robofocus and wanted to get some data to see what improvement it brings and wasn’t really trying to get really good data. But it’s obvious with some better data and calibration this image would shine. The focus is really good and very little coma. Although a coma corrector and a light pollution filter would really help. This also happened to be the march challenge for the tac-imaging mailing list.