Posts Made By: Greg Bradley

Very striking. Great shot Jimmy.

Greg.

That's a really nice widefield Jeff. I think you bought a winner there.

Greg.

With most modded cameras there is a filter you can buy that corrects for the mod for daylight shots.

Let's see from memory its a X-nite CC1 filter. Comes in different sizes to screw on the front of the camera lens.

A modded 20Da with one of these filters may be the ultimate modded DSLR. I would go for the anti-reflection coated clear optical flat glass in front of the sensor. That's what I put on my Nikon D70 and the autofocus still works.

Best,

Greg.

Great shot Jimmyboy. Its quite 3D, the stars in the left side really stream out and give a sense of distance.

Greg.

Magic widefield beauty.

Greg.

Very nice.

Greg.

I have tried on a Nikon D70.

Firstly it was a 1.25 inch filter so there was some vignetting.

Secondly it makes the view very dim so focus is slow. You have to take a shot and view the focus and adjust and keep taking shots until it is sharp. Much like an Sbig camera except the exposures probably need to be longer.

I haven't really pursued it as I have an Sbig camera with the Halpa on the filter wheel but if I did I would probably take shots of a minimum of 5 minutes autoguided at a guess, perhaps much longer.

Greg.

Small magellanic cloud has 47 tucannae globular cluster right next to it. This is the 2nd largest glob in the sky and if the best you have seen is M13 then you are in for a treat.

LMC has lots of small nebulas in it. The main feature is the Tarantula nebula. Chris Venter recently took a stunning shot of it. It really is a nice nebula and not many examples of it being imaged.

Both make great widefield shots for images. Your 80mm with a TV focal reducer would probably get most of the LMC.

Both are visible at a dark sky site as 2 patches of cloudlike haze. Quite noticeable at a dark site but missing in light polluted areas.

They don't have sprial arms, bars and are more an irregular shaped cloud of stars. There is a lot of nebula in the LMC. I have read in one of my books from memory there are 22 objects of interest in the SMC. With an 80mm you should be able to see the brighter ones at a dark site. Photo attached of the LMC with a William Optics 80/480 fluorite triplet and a TV .8X reducer/flattener, Nikon D70 (modified).

Eta Carina is now rising earlier and by midnight you will get a good look at that. It is the next best nebula after M42. Also don't miss Omega Centauri which is perhaps the most breathtaking of all. The 10 million star glob, largest in the Milky Way. Gobsmacking.

NGC 253 the Sculptor Galaxy is also visible in an 80mm as is Centauris A NGC 5128.

Greg.

Amazing detail Tom.

Greg.

Great shot Jose. Excellent FWHM value too.

Greg.