Hello everyone, I’m sharing my first image captured from Death Valley Observatories. It was acquired using frames collected while we were still calibrating the telescope (fine focus adjustment, collimation, balancing, polar alignment, etc.), so the data is not optimal—but I’m happy with the result.

This is not a very long integration, using 3-minute sub-exposures:

5 hours L

1.5 hourS per RGB filter and 2 hours Ha.

The processing focused on bringing out the background galaxies, and I honestly can’t believe how many are visible!

EXIF:

JF-NP 12" f/4 DIY telescope
CQ350 mount
ASI2600MM
Chroma LRGB + Ha filters
Processed with PixInsight, GraXpert, and Photoshop.