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We are installed in Kurrajong for the long weekend, just outside the worst of Sydney's light pollution, which means I get to open my birthday present a little early.

I plonked the little astromech on the balcony table, spent literally a couple of minutes setting it up,, and told it to start imaging the Southern Pinwheel Galaxy. For now I've just left all the settings in their default fully automatic modes and it was even easier than I expected to get it working.

I'll let it run for a bit, and then start tinkering.

#Astrophotography #SeestarS30Pro #Seestar #Astronomy #Astrodon

Photo of a cardboard box on a table
Photo of a Seestar S30 Pro "smart telescope" on a table
Screenshot of the Seestar app showing an imaging session on M83 in progress.
Screenshot of the Seestar app showing an imaging session of M83 in progress, zoomed in on the galaxy
#astronomy #astrophotography #Astrodon #seestars30pro #seestar
in reply to Anthony Horton

Anthony Horton
mastodon - Link to source
Anthony Horton
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The Moon is now up so I got out my tripod & wedge, switched to equatorial mode, and picked an emission nebula as my next target so I could use the internal light pollution filter. I think I'll leave this running for a couple of hours and see what I get.

#SeestarS30Pro #Seestar #Astrophotography #Astronomy

Photo of a Seestar smart telescope on a tripod, lit by moonlight
Screenshot from the Seestar app showing an imaging session in progress on the Prawn Nebula
#astronomy #astrophotography #seestars30pro #seestar
in reply to Anthony Horton

Anthony Horton
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Anthony Horton
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OK, there we go, the result of pointing the little robotic telescope at the Prawn Nebula for four hours.

It's kept all the data so I can try reprocessing this in Siril, but the automatic image processing has done a decent job.

#SeestarS30Pro #Seestar #Astrophotography #Astronomy

Image of the Prawn Nebula, emission nebula in a dense star field, taken with a Seestar S30 Pro smart telescope.
#astronomy #astrophotography #seestars30pro #seestar
in reply to Anthony Horton

Anthony Horton
mastodon - Link to source
Anthony Horton
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And now I've tried solar observing mode with the included solar filter. The tiny scope isn't the ideal instrument for this kind of thing, but it does OK. Sunspots are clearly visible, and you can distinguish the umbra and penumbra of the larger ones.

#SeestarS30Pro #Seestar #Astrophotography #Astronomy

Photo of a Seestar S30 Pro smart telescope on a tripod, during the day.
Image of the Sun from a Seestar S30 Pro smart telescope. Some sunspots are visible.
#astronomy #astrophotography #seestars30pro #seestar
in reply to Anthony Horton

Anthony Horton
mastodon - Link to source
Anthony Horton
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I've been using the Seestar app's planning feature to set up some imaging sessions for tonight. I'm thinking Sharpless 1 to begin with, taking advantage of the dark skies before moonrise to try to pick up the reflection nebulosity, then once the Moon is up go for emission nebulosity with the light pollution filter again, this time the Lagoon Nebula.
Screenshot from the Seestar app, showing a visualisation of an imaging plane including SH2-1 and M8.
in reply to Anthony Horton

Anthony Horton
mastodon - Link to source
Anthony Horton
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The robotic telescope's output from night two: the Lagoon & Triffid nebulae, the Swan & Eagle nebulae, and the Moon.

I did get an image of Sharpless 1 as well, but it's clear that would need a lot more time than the couple of hours I gave it to get a good image.

#Seestar #SeestarS30Pro #Astronomy #Astrophotography

Image of a large emission nebula (Lagoon Nebula) with a smaller one below it (Triffid Nebula).
Image featuring two emission nebulae, ones at the top (Swan Nebula) and one at the bottom (Eagle Nebula).
Image of the Moon, in waning gibbous phase.
#astronomy #astrophotography #seestars30pro #seestar
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