Even though I enjoyed last year pursuing my Messier goal, I often felt like my observations were rushed and lacked full engagement. Finally, after weeks of rain and cloudy skies, last night marked my first EAA session of the year. My sole focus was to capture NGC 2359 (Thor's Helmet), a target I had stumbled upon in November 2023 but failed to capture successfully.

While waiting for NGC 2359 to rise, I revisited some familiar celestial objects to refresh my skills with Sharpcap, as I hadn't used it for a few months. Surprisingly, my setup went smoothly, and my polar alignment was so precise that everything I pointed to ended up at the center of the field of view.

For the capture of NGC 2359, I initially used the L-Pro filter from Optolong, despite knowing it might not be ideal. Reflecting on my previous visit to M1, I realized the L-Pro filter didn't produce the vibrant lines typically seen in this nebula. Checking my filters post, I found that the L-Extreme filter was more suitable. However, it yielded peculiar results, possibly due to my flat frames. I switched to the reliable UHC filter, which enhanced some details but not as expected. Increasing the exposure time to 30 seconds proved to be the key. I am curious about the L-Extreme's performance at 30 seconds, but that will have to wait for my next session, once the rain subsides, and I fine-tune my flat settings for that filter.

The result is a 45-minute capture of NGC 2359 at 30-second exposures with a gain of 350.

It was a great experience focusing on capturing one object and wrapping up for the night, rather than an all-night session with multiple targets. I'm thinking of making this my usual approach for EAA, along with revisiting some Messier objects to improve my photos to keep the hobby fresh and exciting.