M42 a re-process.

In an effort to better understand photoshop I have been running my M42 data from a few weeks back through the mill again.
This image is a complete re-process in photoshop only.

I am starting to get the hang of layers and layer masks etc.
Now I need to learn more about star masks and controlling the stars better. I am happy with the new result and now need to improve on it further by use of star masks.
I hear the stars can be removed from the image and put back in later when you have done stretching and processing the nebula , so I need to investigate that and give it a bash.

All the capture details for the data are further down this page in my previous "best" attempt.

So here she is...

NGC 2516

NGC 2516

On saturday evening the 8th of November 2017 I captured this open cluster.

NGC 2516 is a open cluster in the constellation Carina. It was discovered by Abbe Lacaille in 1751-52.
It is also known as the Southern Beehive or Sprinter cluster.


This was not my intended target but a "Plan B".
Plan A was to try again for NGC 104. Sadly this dufus astronomer did not check one ore two test subs properly and missed the fact that something is not aligning straight and the right half of the image is distorted, like really bad coma.

So in order to salvage something from the situation without having to resort to a break down of the equipment to check all the fittings between camera and scope I opted to image a cluster and frame it over to the left of the sensor.
Then in processing I could cut the offending bits out.

So there is something to show after all, rather than a failed night we got some lemonade out of this one!

Particulars of the photo shoot as follows:

Skywatcher 102 on a alt/az goto mount.
Canon 1200D without astro mods.
Meade Nebular filter.
ISO 3200
50 X 25 second exposures.
Dark frames.
Flat frames.
Stacked in Deep sky stacker.
Processed mostly in PS with a touch up in Star tools.

First, the sky chart courtesy of Stellerium. Then the image of NGC 2516 and lastly the annotated version, courtesy of Astrometry.net

So while the cloud gods gave me some clear sky they gave my equipment a kick before I got started, none the less, here is the lemonade!

Hope you enjoyed plan B, any comments(good or bad) are welcomed.

M42 Short exposure alt/az.

Messier 42 or NGC 1976.

This image of the Great Orion Nebula was taken on Saturday evening the 29th September 2017.

It has taken me a while to post as processing was a real pain. You can process this one so many ways that finding the right balance is tough!
I am sure I will still abuse this data for some time, hoping to squeeze out a few more drops and improve on the star quality and colours. Keeping the core tamed and getting the finer outlaying detail is a fine balancing act.
Then there is noise,light pollution and gradients to contend with.

At any rate I have settled on this image to share here with you the reader.
The details of my little photo-shoot on the night are as follows:

Skywatcher 102 F5 mounted on a alt/az goto.
Canon 1200D DSLR with no modifications.
Meade Nebular filter.
ISO 1600
60 X 30 second light frames.
60 X 30 second dark frames.
60 X light frames in AV mode.
All stacked in DeepSky Stacker and processed with both Star tools and Photoshop.

With the processing on this image I tried to use PS more extensively and get to grips with processing DSO with it.
PS and Star tools work well together and the more I learn about PS the more I like it, used in combination they will produce better images together as my skills with each improves.

For those of you not too familiar with the night skies here is a image taken from the planetarium freeware, Stellerium.
It shows where the constellation of Orion is and the red arrow points to M42 in the small green block.
For those in the Northern hemisphere you may notice that Orion appears "upside down" from your perspective. This is the way we see it in the Southern hemisphere.

And here is my rendition of this fine nebula.

Many thanks for reading and looking.

Comments or criticisms are always welcomed. And many thanks to those that have left comments in the past, always much appreciated.

Clear skies friends!

Milky way photograph.

MILKY WAY.

This image was also captured from our dark sky site.
This one was done with the camera on a static tripod pointed at almost zenith to get the image.

These a several images that have been stacked without any darks etc.

The full details are as follows:

Canon 1200D
30 second exposures.
ISO 1600
Lens EF-S 18-55mm, F3.5 set at 18mm.

The processing of this image gave me headaches. With each successive re-process I obtained a slightly improved or worse image, getting the final image was from re-process after re-process.
I think I have about a hundred discarded images from all the processing.

The image below is probably the one I have liked the most so far.
The other issue was focus.
Getting the focus right with this type of image is always difficult. On this one it's close but not perfect.

It's one of the best images of the Milky way that I have managed to date and I am hoping to have it printed and framed for my wall.

Thank you for taking the time to read my blog and take a look at the images.

TUC 47 from dark skies.

TUC 47.

I managed to spend some time away at our dark sky site last month and managed two decent(to me) images.

The first I have for show and tell is NGC 104 also known as TUC 47.
This is the second brightest globular cluster in the night skies and is a real treat to view. From the darker skies she was magnificent through the eyepiece.
At home it appears as a small tight ball of stars and under darker skies it explodes into a symphony of stars all clamouring for your attention.

The image consists of the following:

30 X 30 second exposures.
30 X dark frames.
ISO 1600
Skywatcher 102 alt/az goto scope.
Canon 1200D.
Meade nebular filter.

Processed in both Star tools and Photoshop. I am becoming a little more comfortable and confident with PS and every bit helps.
So here she is in all her majesty!

Thanks for taking a look.

Sun in white light 7 September 2017.

This is 30 jpeg images stacked in registax and captured using a Canon 1200D through a Skywatcher 102 telescope using a baader solar film.

Clear skies all!

NGC 362

On the evening of August 8 2017 I captured a few photons from NGC 362 and it's surroundings.

As it's located right on the border of the Small Magellanic cloud(SMC) I have also picked up a few nebula in the image.
These belong to the SMC. The two brighter nebula in the image are NGC 346 and NGC 371.

The Globular cluster NGC 362 is in our galaxy and the nebula are all in the SMC, bend your mind around that for a bit.

The image consists of the following:

100 X 20 second light frames.
114 X 20 second dark frames.
50 X flat frames.
ISO 1600
Canon 1200D
Skywatcher 102.

Just to remind you that this is all short exposure astrophotography on a alt/az goto mount.
This generally limits our exposures to 30 seconds or less.
We then gather as many of these exposures(light frames) as we can and then stack them later.
In this case the target is very close to the SCP(South celestial pole) and so field rotation on the alt/az mount becomes a problem so I gather fewer subs than I would have liked.
None the less the image looks OK to me.
The dark frames help with toning down the noise and the flat frames help reduce any vignetting and those pesky dust bunnies that sit on the camera's sensor.
Sounds like plenty of work but it is all good clean fun and I cannot complain, seeing a good result for your effort makes it all worthwhile for me.


So here is a screen shot from a planetarium simulation program(K-Stars) that indicates where in the sky it was when I took aim at it.

And then the image itself, NGC 362 is upper left, check out the annotated image below that for more info on the other clusters and nebula in the image.

Annotated.

Here is the brief run down on what each object in the annotation is.

NGC 362- Globular cluster.
NGC 361- Open star cluster.
NGC 299-Open  star cluster.
NGC 306-Open star cluster.
NGC 330-Open star cluster.
NGC 345-Open star cluster with associated nebula.
IC 1611-Open star cluster in Tucana.
IC 1612-Open star cluster in Tucana.
NGC 371 open star cluster with associated nebula.
NGC 395-Open star cluster in Tucana.
IC 1624-Open cluster in Tucana.
IC 411-open cluster Tucana.
IC 1655-Open cluster.

Thanks for taking a look.

clear skies!

NGC 55 and 253.

NGC 55(and a bonus NGC 253).

Here is what wikipedia has to say about NGC 55:

NGC 55 is a Magellanic type barred spiral galaxy located about 7 million light-years away in the constellation Sculptor. Along with its neighbor NGC 300, it is one of the closest galaxies to the Local Group, probably lying between the Milky Way and the Sculptor Group.


I photographed this galaxy on the night of the 23rd August 2017.
For the first time I was using a filter for my astrophotography work, a Meade series 4000 nebular-broadband.
This was graciously sent to me by a friend in Germany, many thanks JG.
The filter has helped bring out some finer detail and also reduced the purple halo's around the brighter stars. It makes a tremendous difference when processing the image.
I need to take a closer look at filters and see how they could further be used in future.

Right, let's get down to it with the details of the shoot.

Skywatcher 102 alt/az goto.
Canon 1200D(no astro mods)
Meade filter.
153 X 25 second light frames.
149 X 25second dark frames.
10 Flat frames in AV mode.
ISO 1600.
Used the camera white balance when stacking in DSS and then processed in both Star tools and Photoshop.

First, here is where she found herself in the night sky at the time of capturing the data for the image.

And here we have NGC 55.

As an added bonus I also got a half decent image of NGC 253.


Before shooting NGC 55 I did a bunch of practice exposures on NGC 253.
Later I examined the images and decided to have a go at stacking them to see if there was anything there. Turns out I managed some decent exposures.
I only took 44 exposures and discarded a few and only 32 ended up in DSS along with some darks and flats.

I was very surprised at the results despite the high noise factor due to the low number of light frames.
When you first use the Star tools colour module it selects what it believes to be the best true colour/s.
It selected the colours you see in the image and I liked it and kept it.

So without any further fuss here it is.

And the star chart for NGC 253.

Thanks for taking a look at this blog post and your comments are always welcomed.

Clear skies all!

Sun August 20 2017

SUN AUGUST 20th 2017.

With the fast approaching eclipse I decided to do some solar AP work.
Been a while since I last took images of the sun so I am happy with the results.

Sadly the eclipse will not be visible from South Africa so I will have to make do with imaging the lovely sunspot group designated AR 2671.

96 still frames.
Stacked in Registax 6.
Processed with photoshop and false colour added.

Skywatcher 102.
Canon 1200D.

And a crop of the sunspots.

TUC 47: Short exposure astrophotography.

This is my second attempt at this target for this season.

I have tried something new here. Taking a bunch of different length exposures and combining them in DSS.
It worked out surprisingly well, at least I think so.

The image is composed of the following:

90 exposures ranging in duration from 5 to 20 seconds along with 60 dark exposures.
These were then stacked in DSS and processed in Star tools.
Skywatcher 102 alt/az goto.
Canon 1200D.(no mods).
ISO 800

This is where it was in the sky at the time of shooting.

And here is TUC 47.

Thanks for reading and clear skies!

Crux wall art.

Now for something completely different...

I have been painting the outside of our house for the last week or so. We decided on a black and white theme for the house.
White walls with all the trimmings in black.
So what does this have to do with astronomy? Well the wall where I sit outside with the scope was designated for some black.
While painting I had a thought about putting up a constellation on the wall. After some discussion(read negotiation) with my wife the plan came to fruition.

So, about the wall.
This wall is usually at my back, it faces N to Nw. So I look toward the S to SE. This allows me decent views of the SCP in the south and panning across the East and a bit further North which is bogged down with the Durban light dome.
Just over zenith and I have the house roof.

In the image at upper left is the window sill, this is about  2 meters above ground level. Our home sits on a slope. From the sidewalk you actually look over the top of the house.
I come down some stairs on the right(just out of shot, you can see the shadow though) of image and down to this level where I took the image.

I have drawn in the Crux, Musca and Hadar and Rigel Kentaurus.
If you care to zoom in a little on the image you will also see my misrepresentations of NGC 4755(The Jewel Box) and IC 2602 (The Southern Pleiades).

It was fun and I if you did not know that a passionate amateur astronomer lived here  before then you do now!

Wishing you all clear skies!

NGC 6752 A GLOBULAR CLUSTER SKETCH.

21 June 2017.

NGC 6752.

NGC 6752 is a globular cluster located in the constellation Pavo. It is at an estimated distance of 13 000 light years from Earth and 17 000 light years from the galactic center.
It is listed at an apparent magnitude of 5.4 and is estimated to be 11.78 Billion years old.

Here is a Stellerium screenshot showing it's location.

I set about observing and also sketching this cluster on the evening of the 21st June 2017.
I had left the scope out for two hours for some cool down time. At about 22H00 I ventured out into the cold winter night dressed warm and armed with my sketch bag, eyepieces and enthusiasm.

Before viewing my intended target for the night I first took in some old friends to help aid in some dark adaption and get some valuable star hopping time in on the dob. Having not used her in a while the skills become rusty. 
What was also nice is that after the sketching session I was able to squeeze in NGC 6720 also known as the Ring Nebula or Messier 57.
Using both a UHC and OIII filter improved the views. I noted a small white/grey ring sitting in space. It appeared almost like a small ring of smoke blown by a smoker. It is very small and does not hold up well to magnification. This is probably due to the fact it is in a part of the sky that sits in the Durban light dome and the sky glow is severe over that way. This was my first ever view of NGC 6720 so that was a nice icing on the cake after the sketching session.

Having done a tour of the southern skies I set about locating NGC 6720. It was a reasonably easy star hop considering most of the stars in that region are not visible to the naked eye.
Once in view I spent another half an hour letting my eye adapt to the image and hopefully take in as many photons as possible. Once I was satisfied with what I was seeing and had planned the sketch out in my mind, I do this by looking for patterns in the stars in the cluster and hopefully try and replicate that on paper, I then began sketching using soft white pastel pencil on A5 black sketching paper.

The sketch took a tad more than a hour to complete.
By this time my dark adaption had grown and with averted vision I was able to see a nice soft diffuse glow emanating from the core and spreading outward. With direct vision I was able to discern a multitude of brighter stars peppering the cluster with many more dusting the spaces in between.
It really does make for a very pleasing cluster to view and sketch. I really would like to view and sketch this GC from my dark site and do a comparison of the views.
I am sure that my light pollution is hiding a great deal more of this lovely cluster. just as it does with the others.

So here are two images, the first is my set up for the night and then the sketch itself.

NGC 5189

NGC 5189

This one has a bit of a spin to it.

This object was brought to my attention by Alan(KT4HX) on AF.net(see the useful links top right).
He posts a a very popular blog there with monthly targets for you to observe, ranging from the easy to difficult.
He posted NGC 5189 in the June edition and I was keen to see if I would be able to crack this one in my light polluted urban backyard.
Usually planetary nebula like these tend to hide from me in the light pollution but I was willing to try.

I set up my dob along with the laptop outside to run Stellerium.
After a hour cool down time for the scope I got out and took in a few old friends first to get my "seeing" eye in.
Once I was comfortable and ready to do some deep sky hunting I took aim at NGC 5189.
The star hop was not too tough and within 10 minutes I was on target.

It presented itself as a small oblong smudge running north to south in my eyepiece view. Trying various filters I found the OIII filter brought out a few brighter patches in the smudge.
I was very pleased at this find and felt a sense of euphoria and elation on the find. It always feels good to do a star hop and find your target, certainly more satisfying than using the goto scope.
In a way this reignited my love affair with the dob and there are many more nights planned for her.

Feeling good I decided to have a go at a sketch of NGC 5189.
So I went in, careful to keep my observing eye shut to preserve my night vision and returned armed with my sketching bag of tricks.

And this was the result of the sketch with the view as seen through the eyepiece with the dob.

I also started playing with the idea of imaging this target. So on the next evening I had the imaging scope out I was ready to shoot.
Set up as follows:

Skywatcher 102 ALT/AZ Synscan goto .
Canon 1200D.
ISO 800.
50 X 25 second light exposures.
50 X 25 second dark exposures.
Stacked with DSS and processed in Star tools.

So this was a interesting target and I got to practice my visual, sketching and short exposure astrophotography skills.
Maybe some night I will point the Mallincam at it for good measure!

Thanks for reading and clear skies!

Comet Johnson C/2015 V2

COMET JOHNSON C/2015 V2.

This comet was also imaged on the night of 17 June 2017 along with comet 71P/Clark.
It is a hyperbolic comet discovered by Jess Johnson on the 3rd November 2015.
Here is a Stellerium screen shot showing it's location for today 20 June 2017.

When I went to process the image I had noticed something fuzzy close to the comet. This as it turns out was a wonderful surprise. I will expand more on that later.

Set up as follows:

Skywatcher 102 ALT/AZ Synscan goto.
Canon 1200D(No mods).
ISO 800.
30 X 25 second light frames.
30 X 25 second dark frames.
Stacked in DSS and processed in Star tools.

This comet is moving into better and better sky for me to observe and image and I hope to revisit this at it's best in my night skies here in the southern hemisphere.
So here is C/2015 V2 (Johnson).

Lot's off dust motes in there that necessitated a cleaning of the sensor after the shoot!

Now for the surprise.
I cropped the image and stretched it some more and to my surprise two objects showed themselves.
After running the image through astrometry.net to find out what I had, I see there are in fact three objects in the image besides the comet!

What I had also caught in the background is NGC 5566, NGC 5569 and NGC 5560.
Although NGC 5569 is barely visible in the image.So those three are a nice added bonus.
NGC 5566 is approximately 65 million light years from us!

Here is a cropped version showing the trio.

And the annotated image.

So that was the fun on my acre of Africa, clear skies friends!

Comet 71P/Clark.

COMET 71P/CLARK.

 I imaged this comet on the evening of the 17th June 2017.

Comet 71P/Clark is currently located in Scorpius.
Here is a screen shot from Stellerium showing its location today 20 June 2017.

Comet 71P/Clark was discovered by Micheal Clark at Mount John university observatory in New Zealand on the 9th June 1973 with a brightness of apparent magnitude 13.
It is a periodic comet with a orbital period of  5.5 years.

Set up was as follows.

Skywatcher 102 ALT/AZ Synscan goto.
Canon 1200D(no mods).
ISO 800
30 X 25 second exposures.
30 X 25 second darks.
Stacked with DSS and processed in Star tools.

I could not pick up this comet visually in the 8" dob and that is why I decided to have a shot at imaging it. Was very pleased to see the comet once I started processing!

And here is Comet 71P/Clark.

Milky way with a DSLR.

Had another attempt at the Milky Way with a DSLR on a static tripod.

This time I chose a wider field of view to incorporate as much of the center of the MW as possible. I was also able to fit Saturn into the image at top left of center.
I also tried a few different techniques in Star tools. So far I am pleased at the result, a bit more artistic license was used in this process.

This image was taken on the night of the 18th June 2017 at about 22H30. Sagittarius was by that time almost at zenith. This is the best time to try capture the MW from my urban backyard setting.
To close to the east and I have too much light pollution and over to my west I have trees and other problems.
The closer to zenith I get the better the image details are and there is slightly less atmosphere to contend with as well.

You need to take several test shots to determine an exposure length. Too long an exposure and you have star trails from the Earths rotation. I determined that the focal length I had set for the camera, 28.0mm, required a 15 second exposure before any star trailing became evident.
You can also use these test images to review your focus.
I was not using a laptop on this occasion and focusing was done using live view on a nice bright star.

Once I had all the prep work done it was down to business.

Canon 1200D.
18-55mm kit lens set to 28.0mm.
ISO 1600.
White balance mode set to Daylight.
AV 5.6
Taken in portrait mode.

18 Light frames at 15 seconds each.
18 Dark frames at 15 seconds each.
Stacked with deep sky stacker and processed in star tools.

Thanks for reading, comments etc. are always welcomed.
Clear skies friends!

Milky way wide field DSLR imaging.

June 7th 2017.

Milky way wide field imaging with a DSLR.

This image was taken with a near full moon. It's a spread of the center of the milky way showing NGC 6523 also known as the Lagoon Nebula(M8) along with NGC 6514 also known as the Trifid Nebula(M20) and also showing very prominently is NGC 6475(M7).
The image is 15.4 X 7.51 Degrees with a Pixel scale of 22.9 arcsec/pixel.
The center of the image is at (RA,DMS) -28⁰ 58'   14.023"

Image was taken on a static tripod and a Canon 1200D(no mods).
ISO 1600
102 X 5 second light frames.
18 X 5 second dark frames.
The lens used was a 75-300 mm set at 75mm.

I attempted to capture Saturn in the image but due to the amount of light frames it moved out of the field of view and I had to crop it from the stacked image. It was sitting on the border of the image where the frames start to overlap.

All frames stacked in DSS(deep sky stacker) and processed in Star tools and downsized for the web in photoshop.

So here it is,

 There is a rather crowded annotated image if you like.

So that was the fun from my acre of Africa. until next time friends...

Milky Way Durban 28 May 2017

MILKY WAY  Durban May 28 2017.

Took this image of the milky way from my suburban backyard on the evening of 28May 2017 at approximately 1AM.

Equipment used:

Canon 1200D(no modifications) on a static tripod.
ISO 1600.
Kit 18-55 lens set at 18mm.
F3.5
11 X 20 second exposures.
11 X 20 second dark exposures.
Stacked in DSS using the camera white balance(Daylight) and processed in Star tools.

Was a rather late and unexpected session as it cleared at almost midnight and I rushed the camera outside to take advantage of the conditions.
Due to a ongoing back injury I was unable to carry out the scopes or other kit!
So that was the fun from my urban backyard.

Short Exposure AP - NGC3372 Underberg South Africa.

May 21 2017.

Recently had a trip to a dark sky site.
Sadly it coincided with a full glaring moon! And that moon is bright up in the mountains!
So I had some serious obstacles for a DSO. I figured that since NGC 3372 is so bright it should still shine through and it did!
With a full moon I was able to see the same amount of stars that I normally would from my light polluted back yard on a clear moonless night!

To give you an idea of that moon strength I took a pic with it in among the clouds casting it's evil glare down on us!
 Almost makes the sky seem blue near it!

On the first night I had horrible clouds to contend with and a few decent sucker holes. So the binoculars had to do the tour of duty.
I also snapped what is possibly the first proof there are weather gods watching us! I took this image where the moon was behind the clouds and it looked like a eye looking through the clouds, well to my mind anyhow.
They were probably doing a check on what astro equipment I had brought along.

Here is a pic of the AP night's setup.
I came out for occasional checks as it was COLD out, it snowed on our last night there!

So here is NGC 3372.

Camera settings as follows:

Skywatcher 102 Synscan goto.
ISO 800
133 X 20 second exposures
Canon 1200D(no mods)
Stacked with DSS and processed in Star Tools 1.4

This is a process in progress, I am not very happy with the results and have re-processed this a 1000 times already.
So this image will be the one to grace this blog until I get better at the processing.

Still struggling with star colour and bloat, along with the CA that is inherent with my scope.
I have also had to crop the image a lot due to field rotation and to reduce it to a more workable size in star tools without binning.

Also managed to capture  a image of Venus at dawn, it is to the top right of the tree.

 And last but not least I had the dob out one night and dodged clouds looking at some of my favourite constellations and the treasures contained within each.
The image was taken after completing collimation and setting the scope out to cool and acclimatize.

So that was my 5 day adventure under dark skies and a full moon.
All that is missing is a image I took of the milky way early one AM when the moon had set. I copied it onto a external drive and did a clean up and saved it where I cannot find it now, so will post that when I find the file.
Thanks for reading and feel free to leave a comment.

COMET C/2015 ER61(PANSTARRS).

APRIL 16 2017.

Target was comet C/2015 ER61(Panstarrs).

Equipment used.

Skywatcher 102 alt/az goto(synscan).
Canon 1200D.
ISO 800

This was a few frames taken in the early hours of Monday morning 4AM just before dawn.
This was part of a all night session that started at 7PM and involved some video astronomy, some visual and some AP/

This is my first crack at a comet so I am pretty pleased at the result.
This is only a handful of subs so there was plenty of noise and I had to cut back the stretching so as not to further exacerbate the noise during post processing.
I was pushing the stretching to keep the little bit of the tail I managed to capture.

And here it is.

CENTAURUS A (NGC5128).

The weekend of the 21/22 April 2017.

Target: Centaurus A, NGC 5128.

Centaurus A is a galxy located in the constellation of Centaurus and discovered by astronomer James Dunlop.
It is estimated to be between 10 and 15 million light years from Earth.
It is viewed side on and is thought to be a disturbed galaxy and has a very prominent dust lane that bisects it. It is also a radio active galaxy that has been studied extensively.
It is also the only galaxy that pushes through my LP and allows me a visual peek at it on good nights.
See more here: https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=1&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0ahUKEwio1ObY9rnTAhWlJsAKHULtA6UQFggkMAA&url=https%3A%2F%2Fen.wikipedia.org%2Fwiki%2FCentaurus_A&usg=AFQjCNEXYWB56Fe-Z7i6LbXJPm4eawE9Lw&sig2=GsYWmQZ2mHt2wUfx-vlyog


Friday night 21st April and I set up my gear with the aim of getting some AP done for a change.
Things were looking good with decently clear skies and mild to cool weather.

So got set up, did an alignment and set about getting focus with a bhatinov mask.
Set APT to do a run of 300X25 second exposures.
I checked back every so often to confirm all is on track and about two hours in I check again and see APT has lost contact with the camera.
Rookie mistake number one! The camera battery was not fully charged and gave up the ghost.

So a quick check on the folder shows a total of 187 light frames captured. Not my target but enough to garner a semi decent image.
So it was almost 1AM and I decide to pack away for the night.
Rookie mistake number two, some idiot forgot the bhatinov mask on the scope and all 187 images are now ruined!

It has been a while since doing any DSO imaging and this was a major disappointment.
Not much to do but berate myself whilst packing up, some choice words were used and are not suitable for re-printing!

The good news is that Saturday night was another clear night but also fraught with pitfalls from the get go.
So once again set up and attached a fully charged camera, did the alignment and removed that darned mask this time.
Got the target well centered as field rotation will be a big issue with this target!
And we are off to the races!

Within half an hour clouds start to interrupt the session and I have to stop the sequence. Wait almost a hour to see more clear patches and resume shooting only to be thwarted by more intense cloud cover.
Grrrrrr, so wait another hour and call it quits as the dew is also starting to become an issue now.

So what do I have to show for all this?
!33 light frames in the bag, after removing all the cloud frames I have 93 that will suffice.
Well so I thought, DSS has other ideas and will only stack 39 of those!
What the...

The resulting stack was put into Star tools and somehow I made lemonade from these lemons.
There are no darks, flats or bias images with this stack, only the light frames.
And still it looks semi respectable.
The full details as follows.

Skywatcher 102 alt/az goto.
Canon 1200D.
39 X 25 second exposures.
ISO 1600.
 Processing done with Star tools and resized in PS.

And here is the image.

So some rookie mistakes were made and this shows what happens when you have too much cloud cover over the course of the summer and your AP skills get rusty.
There was some consolation and I have a image to show for my efforts.

Thanks for reading and comments and criticisms welcomed.

Solar in White light Sunday 02 April 2017.

At long last I have something to post here.

This Summer weather is nowhere near what it used to be. There seems to be more and more cloud cover in recent years.
Climate change is a harsh reality!

Right, back to Sunday's adventures.

The equipment used was a s follows:

Skywatcher 102.
Canon 1200D.
Mallincam Hyper Colour and 7 inch monitor.
DIY solar filter.with baader solar film.

I started out by doing a bit of visual only and was enjoying the nice large sunspots AR 2644 and AR 2642.
Even in white light they are very clear and large!
Then I swapped out the eyepiece for the DSLR.

Took about 60 frames at 1/800 of a second at a ISO of 100. Saved to file and then popped in the Mallincam.

Again a short learning curve to figure out the settings for solar and I had a decent image on screen.
At this point I called my wife Trish out for a look, first in the eyepiece and then back to the cam.
She enjoys the monitor views far more than having to squint through a eyepiece!

So it was a great way to laze away a Sunday afternoon. Just the way I like it!

For the life of me I could not get registax 6 to align and stack the DSLR images. I could not get to the bottom of the problem since my Registax knowledge and skills are pretty poor!
So out of desperation I popped a single image into Star tools and set about processing that.

I was very surprised at the resulting image, probably one of the best I have taken to date.
Not sure what was different, I put it down to a purely lucky shot on a good day. I have not done any solar AP in a while so was happy with the results.

At some point over the next weekend I will revisit Registax and see if I can get those frames stacked etc.

So here is the image.

 

Thanks for reading and feel free to comment etc.

Video astronomy report 17/2/2017

Another report on my foray into the world of video astronomy.
This has been a very exciting journey so far and I only wish the weather would be more co-operative.
Hopefully with autumn around the corner we will start to see better skies and I can really put this camera to the test.
I need a good all nighter to really get to grips with the camera.

On a night when I was least expecting clear skies I got some!
There was a strong wind component though, likely fallout from the cyclone not far north of here during the week.

Setting up takes somewhat longer and you need to pay plenty of attention to all the cabling!
Man that stuff becomes a spider's nest real quick if left unattended for too long!

So once the scope was set up and a two star alignment done the chief objective for tonight was to figure out more of the setting from the internal menu on the cam and see what each does or does not do.

Setup for tonight:

Skywatcher 102.
Mallincam hyper colour.
UV/IR cut filter and focal reducer.

First target for the night,

C85, IC 2391 also known as The Omicron Velorum cluster.

This was the first test subject.
I wanted to try reducing the star bloat and getting the colours right.
This proved to be easier said than done and after much fiddling I was happy with a image of a cluster in full glorious colour!

NGC 3132, C 74 also known as The Eight burst planetary.

Now this one I was not sure of, I have never seen this fellow visually so was not sure if I had it on screen or not!
At some point I will need to haul out a atlas printout and scour the field proper and try identify this object.

NGC 3532, C 91, also known as the Wishing well cluster.

This cluster is just bursting with stars and very bright one's at that!
Again some small tweaks(more like fiddling and hoping for the best) was required to again reduce the star bloat to an acceptable level.
But once that is done the image is a joy to view.


Did I mention all this is in FULL COLOUR!
Also your night vision does not need to be well dark adapted since you are viewing a monitor, so going indoors there is no need for the eye patch!

C 102, IC 2602 also known as The Southern Pleiades.

This cluster is large and has very bright stars!
More fiddling and the image was as fine as I have seen, again the colour is the deal clincher here!

NGC 3372 also known as the Eta Carina nebula.

Any of you that know me know this is my all time favourite object!
It also took me quite some time getting the settings good enough to show the large gaseous and nebula regions.
But once I found the sweet(to me) spot the view was outstanding!
Did I mention full colour?
I invited my wife Trish out for a look and she was blown away, sadly with no pun intended the wind was also blowing her away and she headed back indoors after only a minute or two.
This had a negative impact on the image as now and again the OTA would shake with a strong gust of wind leaving star trails all over the place!
Depending on the settings this can take a while to correct itself but once it does it is a magnificent object!

NGC 3201, GC

Again this needs differnt settings to bring out the best image, I struggled with keeping the background dark enough but also bringing out the cluster nicely.
Again a very pleasing image when all is said and done.
Oh and that colour thing!

41P/Tuttle-Giacobini-Kresak, comet.

Ok the mag on this according to Stellerium is 11.6.
From what I can tell the cam has no problem getting down that low.
I did a goto on a nearby galaxy(NGC 2903) to get close to this guy, I could not be sure if I could see the comet or not.
I then tried for a close by star, closer than the galaxy.
That was SAO 80809.
Still not sure if I had it in the field of view or not.
I will revisit this one for sure.


At this point the clouds had realized what I was up to and sent reinforcements real fast!
In no time at all I had too many clouds interfering with the view and the cam clearly does not like that!
From red to white screens with each passing bank of cloud.
It got to the point where I parked the scope and powered down.
Two hours later and the blanket of cloud was still stubbornly clinging to the skies, so that was that and the toys went back in the box!

Video astronomy is growing on me in a big way!
Makes viewing objects so much more fun when there is colour and both eyes are used!
It also punches through the LP here in a dramatic fashion and I can actually see the smudges that are galaxies.
I hope to pursue a few more of those once I have got the hang of this setup.

I tried to take a picture of the screen with Eta Carina on it.
Sadly my cellphone takes terrible images of the monitor, all the wrong background colours and lines all over the place that are not seen with the eye.
There are hporrible blues and purple colours in the background and yet on the monitor it is black!
Only right down at the bottom half of the picture can you see the black background.
So please forgive the quality of the image below, but it gives you some idea.
At some point I hope to get a screen grabber and try taking some decent pics to share, but based on the cost that will be a while yet!

So that was the fun had under African skies last night!
Thanks for reading and comments, hints, tips all welcomed!


Tonight is looking promising so hopefully there will be another opportunity to get some video astronomy under the belt!

Clear skies!!

Video Astronomy, Mallincam hyper colour.

It has been some time since my last post here. I had home internet problems that kept me without internet for over a month! Thanks a lot Telkom!!!
The weather has been awful this Summer. More cloud than not!
Over the December period I managed a dark sky trip and had one good night out under the canopy of the Milky Way!
That is a story for another day, today we talk about my new adventure and foray into video astronomy.




I have recently acquired a Mallincam hyper colour and am taking my first steps into video astronomy.
Although the camera is of the first generation camera's it still performs as advertised!

So, after the cloud gods relented and gave me some clear sky Saturday morning I had to do a test with the new setup.
I set the scope up indoors with it pointed out the window toward my old high school on a hill well off in the distance.
Initially I had a very fuzzy image.
I took me a while to figure out using the Focal reducers that come with the cam but once I hit the right combination I had a image that I could get into perfect focus!
Fiddling with the screen settings gave me a nice sharp clear image in full colour!

Let me quickly explain the setup.
Skywatcher 102.
Mallincam hyper colour.
The Mallincam is feeding the video to a screen that is typically used in a car for playing DVD's. A small 7" LCD display.
Power from a 12V marine deep cycle battery.

Buoyed by the indoor test success I moved the entire rig outside to do a first light with a solar test.
I got the scope set and located the sun.
I am using a home made solar filter using baader solar film.
Now I connected the MC and had a blank screen!
This had me puzzled and I sat back to read the manual and see about the settings on the MC.
I glanced at the screen and from my angle realized there is a feint image on the screen.
Adjusting the screen brightness and contrast gave me a nice clear full disk!!

The MC focuses at just about the same place as my DSLR with no further room for outwards travel.
Fortunately I was able to move the MC slightly further out of the drawtube and could then obtain perfect focus.
The two sunspots on the solar disk were small black dots!
First light on the MC achieved!!!

The cloud gods had seen all this and had already gathered the clouds and forced me to abandon the session.
At about 10PM this evening the clouds started to show signs of thinning and clearing!
So off to bed and back up at 2AM with a glorious clear sky.

Scope was setup and a two star alignment done.
The MC was inserted and powered up.
Straight away I get a image of Acrux, my second alignment star. I get the focus set and aim the scope at NGC 3372.

NGC 3372. Also known as Eta Carina.
I use the quick set up guide for the camera settings, in this case deep sky 2.
And there she is in splendid colour!!!
Way to large for my FOV but spectacular none the less.

On to the next target!
NGC 5139 Omega Centaurus.
Again a bright clear image showing a dense core with a strong yet soft glow from the center outward.
And the stars are in full colour!

This is amazing stuff!!!
I then check out a few open clusters, on some the brighter stars are suffering from CA and some bloating, this is attributed to the scope and not the cam.

Next is NGC 5128 Centaurus A.
Without a doubt you have a galaxy in your sights!
The dust lane is clearly visible and there is that brownish colour associated with this galaxy.(To my eye anyhow).

M4.
This globular clusters resolves right to the core and is very clear.
At this point I try the switches on the right side of the camera.
There is one that has OFF, 7 and 14 on it.
Right let's try the 14.
This dramatically improves the image as I suspect this is stacking 14 sec exposures?
I need to check the manual and get that figured out.

So with a better image I revisit NGC 5139.
The quality of the image is much improved and I am mesmerized!
I also try adjusting a few other items on the MC menu and try to get a feel for what is happening with each adjustment.
This is going to be the learning curve for sure!

I also briefly try Jupiter but it is way over exposed and I cannot get a decent image. Most likely the scope limits again.
So back to NGC 5139 and I enjoy that view as the sky brightens with the impending dawn.
Time to pack it in and call it a successful first deep sky light!

So in one day I manage two first lights!
One solar and then some dark sky!

I can see me delving much deeper into VA and getting the hang of the camera and it's settings.
Plenty of homework there!

Thanks for taking the time to read this report.
If any of you have any experience with this camera I would love to hear any advice hints or tips you may have!

Some images from the proceedings.
First is a image of the setup during the Solar test along with a screen shot of the solar disc.

Next up a image of the screen with NGC 5139.
This was taken using my cellphone so the quality is very poor!
The camera picks up the LCD display lines and over exposes the core of the globular cluster.
It also gives the background a blue colour as apposed to the nice black background on the screen naked eye.
So sorry for the poor quality image.

Clear skies everyone!