Rosette

Old Jupiter Animations

I wanted to put up two animations, but blogger will not let me at this time. This animation was taken about 5 years ago. Over 5 hours worth of images combined into one animation. If I remember correclty I took still frames one after another with my ST-2000XM and 10" LX200 at f/20 for 3 minutes, then waited two more minutes before shooting another 3 minutes worth. So, each individual video frame is a separation of 5 minutes for a total duration of over 5 hours. It was tedious work, but very rewarding. Things start getting fuzzy toward the end as I was trying to go as long as I could while starting to shoot through a tree. My old house used to have a huge tree in the backyard that took up the sky from the zenith to the western horizon. We built our new house in a new subdivision with young trees, so I won't have that problem again anytime soon.

Horsehead & Flame Nebulae

This image was shot the night of December 5th. I was able to capture 3 hours and 20 min of hydrogen alpha data before clouds rolled in. As always, more data is desired. This is my first long exposure image with my new mount, my newly acquired Losmandy G-11. Image was taken through a Takahashi sky 90 with focal reducer, with an SBIG ST-2000 XMI, with CFW8, and astrodon 6nm Ha filter, guided with remote guide head. Sub exposures were 10 minutes in duration for a total exposure of 3 hours and 20 minutes. Images registered and stacked in CCDSoft and further processed in Photoshop.

Holmes Update

Here is my latest attempt at comet Holmes. It was taken the night of November 24th. My first holmes picture was taken throught my 10" LX200 at f/10 with my Canon Digital Rebel XTi. This picture was taken through my Takahashi Sky 90 at f/4.5 and my SBIG ST-2000. Just to give you an idea of how much this thin has grown since it shot out it's expanding cloud of dust, the original image was taken at a focal length of 2500mm and this image was taken at 405mm. Pretty impressive!

Comet Holmes 10/28/07

This photo is a stack of multiple 30 second frames taken with a Canon Digital Rebel XTi and Meade 10" Lx200 GPS at F/10. Stacked with Registax, very minimal processing in Photoshop. When I adjusted the saturation to bring out more color it made it all look fake so I left it alone. I would love to image this thing again because it keeps growing in size, all I need is some clear skies for a change.

M45, Pleiades

This is my humble attempt at the Pleiades. Taking the images is easy but processing this one is tough. I had some mild reflections from the bright stars. The hardest thing on this one is finding the "true" color balance. I had several different versions and just picked the one that was the most visually pleasing to myself. It is a LRGB combination of 2 hours luminance 1x1 and 1.5 hours each RGB 1x1. Taken with Takahashi Sky 90 piggyback on 10" Lx200 GPS with SBIG ST-2000 XMI with remote guide head and color filter wheel with SBIG LRGB filters.

M33, The Pinwheel

Takahashi Sky 90 piggyback on 10" LX200 GPS with SBIG ST-2000 XMI and remote guide head. Total luminance is 3 hours and 15 minutes 1x1, 1 hour and 30 minutes each RGB each 1x1. Stacked in CCDSoft and processed in Photoshop.

M31 The Andromeda Galaxy

First successful LRGB. I'm Hooked! Luminance 2 hours 45 min, 1 hour 30 min each RGB. Tak Sky 90 and ST-2000.

Cosmic Bubble

6 Hours so far...

Works In Progress

Both could use a lot more light. First we have the veil nebula, followed by the butterfly nebula.

M33, 1 hour 45 min

This is 1 hour and 45 minutes of M33 taken with the Sky 90 at f/4.5 with an st-2000 and SBIG clear filter. Flat and dark reduced and stacked in CCDSoft, further processing in Photoshop. Subframes were 5 minutes each.


Is this gradient (lower left to upper right) typical for light pollution in a widefield image shot in moderate light pollution, or is there something else at work here??? Frames are flat and dark subtracted.

Deer Lick/Quintet and more, 3 hours

This is 3 hours of The Deer Lick Group, Stephen's Quintet, and other misc friends. Could have gone a little longer but was getting the itch to catch some light on M33, see above. Same setup and processing as usual, shot through SBIG clear filter. 5 min subs.

Cocoon

Another Hydrogen alpha image. Probably would have been better if I just shot throught the clear filer, but the moon was only a couple days past full. Oh well, maybe next time.

Double Cluster

Had an eventful night imaging tonight. As was suggested by some peers, I tried to do longer exposures to make my images smoother and hopefully get better results. It seemed that I was getting some field rotation in the longer exposures, so I spent some time drift aligning the scope. I think I got it a little better, but not quite perfect yet. After that I tried to do some more imaging but intermittent clouds were rolling in. I waited a while and was able to sneak a couple of hours of imaging in before dawn. I knew I wouldn't get any great results on anything faint in such a short time so I shot the famous double cluster. I'm pleased with the results, but I can see that processing stars is a lot different than processing nebulae. Looks like I need to get out Ron's book again.

IC 5070

This is 5.5 hours of Ha data shot the evening of 7/21/07. Still shooting throught the Sky 90. I love this little scope. I'm hooked on wide field imaging. I don't see myself shooting through the 10" Lx200 anytime in the near future unless it is for planetary. I guess you could day I have APO fever. What a beautiful night. Seeing was average but skies were clear as can be. Saw several bright meteors while sitting outside for a short period.

IC1318

This is 4.5 hours worth of data of IC 1318, aka the Butterfly Nebula. Same setup as with the swan nebual from below. Only difference is that in this session I used 2 minute subexposures.

Swan 8 Hours

Shot this image 7/1/07 and 7/8.07. Skies were clear, but seeing and transparency were not so good. Just had to get out and image with my new setup. I'm using a Takahashi Sky 90 with reducer, SBIG ST-2000XMI with remote guide head, Astrodon Ha 6nm filter, piggybacked on 10" LX 200 GPS for tracking. I've imaged through the 10" in the past, but was itching to do some wide field stuff. Here are my first light images. This exposure is a total of 8 hours with 10 min subexposures through the Ha filter. Images dark subtracted, aligned and stacked in CCDSoft, processed in Photoshop. Click image for full size version.

Moon July 1st

This is my moon shot from the early hours of July 1st. I always like to end a deep sky photo session with an easier target. Taken with the Tak Sky 90 and reducer, SBIG St-2000 and Astrodon 6nm Ha filter, 20 sub exposures x .05 sec, 1x1, stacked with registax, processed with photoshop.