TAKE YOUR FLATS!

Maximising time imaging without technical issues is most important. I have only been doing this for a year now, and when I got to the stage I wanted to computer control my rig, the question was how to do it. At first I was going to hook up a spare laptop and run NINA. Then it was getting a mini PC, running everything on that and then remote connection to that. Although I am tech savy, the more I looked at it, watched KZfaq videos, and read forums, the more I was pushed away. It seemed complex, possibly have issues and waste the limited clear sky time. I jumped ship and purchased an ASIAIR. For me it works, the plug and play with ZWO gear cuts out (most) of the headache. So for me, it was a winner.

Garbage in, BlurX + NoiseX out, I’m good 😂 Great vid as always!

Also, a guy named Murphy shows up every single time I do astrophotography. Every single time. I enjoy his company.

This was a great review of some of the most important tips to make astrophotographs better, Bray! Thanks for putting this together. It's a head-scratcher to me that folks in this hobby keep looking for shortcuts and 'Easy' buttons, e.g., not taking flats because everything is the same from session to session (which it's not, of course) or using this software instead of that just to save half an hour of processing time often with less-than-optimal results after spending all night acquiring images. It's a mystery to me. Well, as you alluded to, everyone has their own goals and priorities in this hobby. Anyway, your suggestions were terrific! Thanks again.

Finally! These 5 is the most important aspects and good to see it out there. It is hard to give these advices especially for beginners because they might feel offensive. Or even community groups would criticise you for these advices saying they are "just" beginners leave them alone. But knowing these are so important! Good video, and I hope you don't get too many negative comments for it.

I can very strongly advocate for leaving your mount set up and aligned outside with a cover on it. Slap you scope on it, connect wires and you’re shooting in 1min. It totally overcomes the issue of having to convince yourself to set up or whether it’s even worth it. I see my mount as a tool that needs to do work. If it lives a slightly shorter life outside so be it. I know I will have imaged 5x as often.

Awesome video. Thanks for making these videos. Don’t let anything discourage you. Get out there and keep making videos

Honorable mention: “dither or die”

Thanks for the sound advice. Keep up the good work!

Great video and Congrats on the 10K, Bray!!! Very awesome! 😃

Congrats on 10k, still underrated in my opinion!

Congrats on 10k! Wish I had more time to get out and image. I'm hitting a ceiling with how much integration time I can get and for that reason my images suffer. But currently working on a fix for that. Great tips all around! And yes I agree with the other commenter who said dither or die as an honorable mention haha

love your vids :) Thanks for the advise

Indeed, check the weather patterns in your location before you start (it's going to frustrate you to not be able to finish your project before the target gets too low in the sky). I have slowly built my rig (not the best by far) just to realize more and more that my location, although really good in terms of light pollution (Bortle 4 to 3 when the lights go out shortly before midnight), really sucks at the weather (north-western Slovakia). So far, I've been at least lucky to encounter almost no issues when introducing more complex hardware or software upgrades to my procedure. Well, at least now I know that the fall and winter seasons are mostly no-go for me, so I'll have to make up for it during the spring and summer (hopefully :) ).

*Mr. Crabs voice:* “Money!”

Excellent video. Thanks, Bray!

Brilliant Advice, I have Been Doing Planetary and basic Deep sky Imaging with my 130 Reflector and An alt az Mount. Guess What, It's actually a Visual Setup😄. But I have been Doing Astrophotography with the Same Scope for nearly 2 years, Haha! Thank you Bray!

Accept and embrace the troubleshooting grind :)

Great video. Much appreciated! Only one note...I just don't want to cut down my favorite palm tree!

Thank you for helping beginners 😁

Bonjour de France. Je viens de découvrir ta chaîne grâce à des articles français qui parlent de toi et de ta découverte . Je suis admirative. Félicitations à toi et continue ce que tu fais😉

i suppose patience and budgeting could also be solid advice ;)

Wise words. It's all about the data. Also, if you could contact these people who have all the top gear but don't use it fully please. There are plenty of enthusiastic amateurs on a budget out there who would really appreciate a donation of some top of the range equipment 👍😉

Agreed on almost everything, apart of few nouances regarding calibration frames. And this will be controversial, but hear me out - in my opinion they are NOT as important as sometimes portrayed. It doesn't mean you shouldn't bother to take them, it's just in most cases they won't save an image - and this has to do with what you said at the beginning - garbage in -> garbage out. No amount of even perfectly shot cal frames will let you get good dust nebulae data with 2hrs of suburban skies. I've seen many times on astrophoto groups ppl, usually beginners (but not always) shooting 100+ darks, biases, flats, flat darks etc., overestimating their importance; in most cases this is completely pointless. Difference is absolutely negligible. The most important are ofc flats, but still - they are not 'restoring' the photo, they are just better at making it look restored than any software, even APP. So yeah, you should take them, but 15 is almost always enough. Same with darks and biases, don't stress your DSLR shutter (if you're using one) with hundreds of excessive frames every session - use this time to drive to better skies instead. :D I'd say the only situation when getting more calibration frames is needed is probably when you're at phenomenal location, imaging reeeaaallyy dark objects, maybe it's hot and you're aiming for absolutely beast of a photo. To somehow back this up (it's not the best argument, ik) - during my astronomy bsc I worked in our observatory, imaging and photometry of planetoids. Never have I used more than 5 calibration frames for any image. And the data was later used for a publication in Astrophysical Journal I believe, quite serious stuff. Our camera was cooled, but only to -15 or -20 C if I remember correctly. btw. cgz on oxygen around M31, stunning photo. :)

All good points, like putting lipstick on a pig. 😂

2:00 Genuinely curious/want to understand better: what makes that image "gross"? It looks outstanding to me 😅. -- Is it just bc you shot "LRGB from a city"...or something I'm not seeing/understanding that qualifies that image as sub-par (in your opinion/by your standards)?

Don't need to wait 10 years for such 😊 just buy a great tracker, take lots of shots, make coffee and use time to stack and edit 😊 I still need the right tripod and a tracker 💪

Dang, I came for advice on astrophotography, I left with a life philosophy.

Is that a HEM in the background?

Hello Bray, Iam just curious, did you ever use c14, if yes was it great?

truth!

@Bray Falls, you say 10k subs, well, 2 months down the line I see you've got 65.8K subs, so you MUST be doing something right...

well done ! Agreed - Take Your Flats