During the last week of July 2026, good weather was expected for almost the entire week.
For the first time, I worked with both telescopes on two mounts in parallel – or rather, let them work in parallel.
The Crescent Nebula had been chosen as Object of the Month for July at my club, the Astronomische Vereinigung Vulkaneifel, and as a Caldwell object it was still missing from my catalog.
I exposed for three nights, but then discarded the data from the first night. I had noticed a visible misalignment (collimation error) and corrected it before the second night.
High resolution on Astrobin:
The annotated image:
Session details
| Telescope | Vixen VC200L |
|---|---|
| Corrector | intern |
| Effective focal length | 1800 mm |
| Camera | SkyEye24AC |
| Mount | Skywatcher HEQ5 Pro Hypertuned |
| Guiding equipment | APM 240mm |
| Guiding camera | QHY 5-III-462C |
| Date of capture | 2026-07-28 2026-09-29 |
| Nights | 2 |
| Exposure (lights) | 80 × 300 s |
| Total integration | 6 h 40 min |
| Calibration frames | FLATS, DARKS |
| Sensitivity | GAIN 100, Offset 125 |
| Capture setup | StellaVita |
| Processing date | 2026-08-01 |
| Software stack | PixInsight, Affinity |
| Location | Koblenz |
| Focal ratio | f/9,0 |
| Image scale | 0,68 ″/px |
| Field of view | 68,7 × 45,8 ′ |
