Help me diagnose if I have a problem with my Quark

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Nik
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Help me diagnose if I have a problem with my Quark

Post by Nik »

I have been shooting Ha with a Quark Chromosphere for a few months now and it looks like my quark is providing good contrast and uniformity, but I can't stop noticing how all the details lack of smoothness when I zoom in.
It's almost like an irregular but low spatial frequency pattern is overlaid on the chromosphere structures
Some examples below:
Image
Image

I see images form other Quark users with similar setup/cameras and structures have a very smooth "silk-like" aspect.

Any ideas what could cause this effect?
- Camera noise? I would exclude I am using the Max at HCG and RN should be limited
- Photosphere granulation leakage ?
- Deteriorated Quark blocking filter?

My setup: Quark Chromosphere, Bresser acro 127/1200, Astronomik L3 Uv/IR cut, Apollo M-Max. Frames are flat calibrated.

Thanks


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marktownley
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Re: Help me diagnose if I have a problem with my Quark

Post by marktownley »

Are those unprocessed images?


Image
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Re: Help me diagnose if I have a problem with my Quark

Post by Nik »



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Re: Help me diagnose if I have a problem with my Quark

Post by marktownley »

Thanks!

I don't think you have a problem with that Quark at all. I think you have a very nice one. I think your image is ever so slightly in the blue side of the Ha centreline, but that is easily fixed.

The pattern you are seeing is the chromosphere overlain over the granulation of the photosphere, this is because your Quark has a wider bandpass. This isn't a bad thing and the Quark is in spec, indeed, it is a very even fov, which is rare for a Quark!

Here is my processed version of the raw data...
image.png
image.png (744.94 KiB) Viewed 1385 times


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Re: Help me diagnose if I have a problem with my Quark

Post by Nik »

Thank you, so indeed it’s a photosphere leakage. How is that not a bad thing?
How do I fix the blue shift? I have the quark set to -4 CCW as that one appeared to be the best in band position to my eyes

The quark is decently uniform but the stacks have been calibrated with flats, that’s why they are so even
Here how the flat looks like
Image

Thanks!


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Re: Help me diagnose if I have a problem with my Quark

Post by marktownley »

That's a very good flat, you do have a very good quark, not all are like this!

My advice would be to take images of same mid disk feature, no flats with a click either side of and including the current click position, and without processing look which is the darkest and most even in terms of illumination.

BTW, interesting to see the results from this setup. I have the same scope and a Quark and have been wondering what the Apollo Max would be like with it, I use an IMX174 chipped camera.

Mark


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Re: Help me diagnose if I have a problem with my Quark

Post by Nik »

Hi! here three unprocessed stacks at different tuning positions:3CCW, 4CCW and 5CCW. TIFF can be downloaded from here:https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/ ... sp=sharing

3CCW
Image

4CCW
Image

5CCW
Image


3CCW is definitely the less uniform.
5CCW appears more uniform but to my eyes maybe also a bit softer in the details compared to 4CCW


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Re: Help me diagnose if I have a problem with my Quark

Post by Dennis »

4ccw looks like the best to me. Maybe you can also try to rotate the camera relative to the Quark by 90° to see if you get even better results with the 4ccw setting.


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