It's been very cloudy for quite a while, but the past two nights have been nice and clear. I missed last night, but decided to get my act together this evening. I'm definitely in photon-deprivation mode these days, so I opened up the dome and spent several hours in there. I have been doing most of my observing for the past year or so with the wide-field scopes, but my CGE mount is still in the shop so I fired up the RCX again. I was pleasantly surprised to find that it had retained its alignment since the last time I used it, so it was just turn it on and go.
The RCX needs a lot more hand-holding when I image through it, and it is a work night, so I didn't stay out all night. My main target was M16, and here is a quick process of the first 10 subexposures. They were 300 second frames at -20C (I'm using the chiller that my wife used during her knee surgery recovery last year), and I also used the SBIG adaptive optics unit which really helps the guiding.
This is one of my favorite targets, I always love to see "The Pillars of Creation" show up on my screen when the frames download. I'm hoping for some more clear nights, if we get them I will try for additional data, including using the color and other narrowband filters.
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