Hi folks!
For several personal matters (mainly, lack of time and eagerness, and lots of work), I abandoned planetary imagery in 2011 when I did my first capture of Jupiter. Now I am returning to it little by little. I am testing right now several things, like processing options and I am fighting with hardware and so forth (almost everything sorted out, but still fighting). So, I open this post to show MARS processed images.
Software used:
Capture: Genika 32bits
Processing video: Autostakkert 2.6.8
Processing pictures: Pixinsight (exclusively).
Details:
Scope: Meade 10" ACF
Camera: ASI174MM
Filters: Baader IR685 (L) + Astronomik ir cut (RGB)
Capture time was around 22:00 UTC time 5th oct.
Image resized 150%
Mars very low...
Scope thermally not balanced.
Fair collimation (I could not do "good" collimation yet due to lack of good seeing).
Seeing: very bad to bad.
Image shows artifacts due to mars "issues" and conditions. Weird diffraction rings around planet were showing off and this was a first experience for me... latter I found out others experience the same issues with Mars, so it was not "my" issue, but general issue.
I recently adquired a Pixinsight license and it is a bit of a learning curve to use it for planetary processing. However, this program is very well built and robust (for those of you that have a certain age and experience that it is really very similar approach to oldie french "IRIS"... it is like "IRIS on steroids") and I am happy to use it over other free options (for instance, I tried Registax, and bugs didn't not allow me to do use it and it hanged here and there). Once you get to Pixinsight, you don't want to get back to anything else. As for Genika capture, I liked firecapture layout over Genika layout, but I found issues... it just didn't get along well with USB3.0 camera and USB2.0 devices (focuser, filterwheel, scope mount). Genika worked like a champ and it feels also as "robust" as Pixinsight.
At first my processing of this mars image was AWFUL, but once you get used to Pixinsight and touch the proper "strings" (you learn what to do and what not to do), results are very satisfactory. This is my first RGB processed image. Remember seeing was VERY BAD.
Enjoy!
