Some photos

Xelasnave.1947 said:
Much the same, most the processing is to wipe out background gradient, and most of all noise so you are trying to bring out the actual image and separate it from artificial stuff like noise and haze...
Alex
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Is it basically black and white?
When you look the the telescope?
I’ve never actually looked through one (aside from toy-type ones).
 
Jan Ardena said:
Is it basically black and white?
When you look the the telescope?
I’ve never actually looked through one (aside from toy-type ones).
Click to expand...
Through a scope it appears black and white to me but for you there may be a hint of colour but you would see much less because that last image was a couple of hours exposure.
Alex
 
Here is another reprocessed. I like this one very red. This is the Cats Paw Nebula Google that for a run down on its details.
Jan this object you really can't see well or at all using an eye piece rather than a camera. The camera goes to a lap top and I can display a reasonable image to look at,which can be a long of exposure at high gain which shows everything pretty well..but you reduce the gain and exposure for each photo ( individual sub frames (individual photos we call "subs")) for better data....as I have said earlier you combine and using software to reveal what the camera sees..the more exposure of course the more detail...but for "subs" you go for lower gain and shorter exposures to improve the quality over visual ..that image you can look at to adjust framing ...IMG_20200306_145731.jpg
Alex
 
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I have not been imaging since the bush fires started...so it was great to get out and make mistakes and sort gear and at least take a simple photo.
My main gear is missing stuff that I left in the city however I did this using an old mount and a Nikon d5500 3200 iso fl not sure but around 100 ...150 light frames at 25 second exposure and beause going so high with I S O I figured there would be lots of noise (and I was right) so I added 60 dark frames. Processed using..Stacking Deep Sky Stacker, Star Tools, Photo Shop and Gimp.
Its not flash but it was not visable the night before as it was behind trees..Eta Carina region and surrounding Milky Way.not sharp which was due to moisture in the air...
alexetaps.jpg
 
slight improvement another region Nikon D5500, fl 55mm, 150 light frames at 30 seconds and 800 iso 50 dark frames.
not flash but getting stuff sorted mainly and just doing some widefields whilst out there adjusting things.
hopefully in the next couple of nights will get both rigs working as I think I can work around the problems created from leaving important gear in the city ( a trip to Bunnings my see the main rig sorted I certainly hope so)
The colour is odd but I was happier with the detail than the earlier one.
I guess I could fix it but its not worth the effort on this one.
800ps.jpg Software...Deep Sky Stacker, Star Tools, Photoshop and Gimp.

alex
 
Saw this and thought of you. No idea if this is of interest but the price is right.... $50.00 ?.....:biggrin:

22. Starscope Monoculars - Better Than Any $3000 Telescope

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starscope_jpg_600x500.jpg


10X MAGNIFICATION

[url]https://www.starscopemonocular.com/en/index.html?Affid=2411&s1=cf&s2=%3As%3A&s3=&s4=412&s5=2b96e9392bbf4aa5a19804b9b80b9845&domain1=www.flrtni.com&network_id=69&conversion_id=%3A%3A%3Agr%3AXdVN9NCZEU6tErbnGkhNewAAAAY%3Apl%3AW-lvAKL9hUAAAH3vyzkAAAAD%3Asl%3AXk4dd6VLxecsU3arLsXLpgAAAAo%3Aps%3A2[/URL]
 
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Write4U said:
Saw this and thought of you. No idea if this is of interest but the price is right.... $50.00 ?.....:biggrin:

22. Starscope Monoculars - Better Than Any $3000 Telescope

img-3.png

starscope_jpg_600x500.jpg


10X MAGNIFICATION

https://www.starscopemonocular.com/en/index.html?Affid=2411&s1=cf&s2=:s:&s3=&s4=412&s5=2b96e9392bbf4aa5a19804b9b80b9845&domain1=www.flrtni.com&network_id=69&conversion_id=:::gr:XdVN9NCZEU6tErbnGkhNewAAAAY:pl:W-lvAKL9hUAAAH3vyzkAAAAD:sl:Xk4dd6VLxecsU3arLsXLpgAAAAo:ps:2
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Thank you for thinking of me and taking your time to show me that interesting little unit.
It may be ok but the reality most folk miss when going telephoto is you really need the set up tripod mounted. My phone will go up to 50 + mag reasonably well but you need a tripod to do even reasonable work.
The other thing is I have a number of guide scopes , spotting scopes etc all small that I could use...
However one more toy..why not..we shall see.
Thanks again.
Alex
 
IMG20200423095300_resize_40.jpg IMG20200423095351_resize_55.jpg IMG20200423095238_resize_56.jpg IMG20200423095300_resize_40.jpg For those members who may be interested I update my progress with the little observatory.
Notwithstanding careful measurements and "dry run" set ups I found both mounts in my little observatory suffer from the same problem. I have Polemaster which is a camera and software to determine the Celestial South Pole (CSP). The CSP is the point which all the sky rotates around and interestingly the angle between CSP and the Horizon is your latitude.


That's right determining your latitude at night is very simple as basically all you need is two pieces of wood hinged together to get your angle and a protractor...forget trying to learn how to use a sextant.

The Polemaster camera is fitted on the mount and needs to point at the general area containing the CSP..the problem was when fitted to either mount the camera could not "see" over the observatory wall.

In the case of one mount I had it on a pier fashioned from plywood layered up with fibre glass...I would have liked metal but I don't have a welder these days etc etc..anyways ply is good although unconventional and has a lower thermal equilibrium than metal so should be better actually.

So I added another section that gave that mount sufficient clearance.

The addition to that moumt needs to be layered up and you can still see the layers making up the ply in the photo herewith.

I add black tiling grout to the resin for colour, maybe strength?, and to spin out the resin...you can make it less viscos which is very handy..even like putty to fill holes.

The second mount is on a steel pier and by elongating the holes I was able to get it to rotate to where it needs to be ...almost...Have yet to make it perfect but it is sufficient to take wide fields with the DSLR (Nikon d5500) like the one above...I have taken more since that one but because there was moisture in the air they are not acceptable...to me.

The mount on the ply pier found perfect polar alignment after taking a fair amount of time such that I could run my 80mm triplet unguided for five minutes with acceptable star shapes ( if you have tracking problems the stars go oval) however to ensure sharp images I decided to limit exposures to one minute.
I took about 30 minutes for each filter.

So with the setting up adjusemts etc I didn't really start taking serious photos until a little before midnight and continued thru until after 3am.

I took some dark frames and tried to take some flats but could not get the flats perfect so I am now stacking just light and dark frames...I used only five filters Red, Blue,Green, Hydrogen Alpha and Luminance. I ran the camera cooler at minus fifteen degrees centigrade.

stacking each group of lights and darks will take approx two hours each, then each of the five will be individually processed which can be an hour or more each (particularly as I am drizzling the stack and each stacked photo will be over a gigabyte) ..very iffy before I get them reduced in size and a crash even on the last stack means I have to start individual processing all over IMG20200423095351_resize_55.jpg for all...anyways the five processed images are taken to Photoshop given their colour and merged into one image that can be processed downsized and posted.

Hopefully all the work I have done shows a reasonable result..but if it does I am not that worried as I have solved many problems and the observatory is pretty well complete save tidying, additional fibre glass, an additional floor, exterior paint, a second coat of interior paint, laying out electrical cables, and a wifi for one set up, a path and a nice flower bed around to help minimise heat build up.

Hope you enjoy getting an insite into astrophotography.

Alex
 
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In the third photo you can see the small polemaster camera (black) at the left of the mount.

Just checked the stacking and it is going to take two and a half hours each stack X five. ...

I have decided to build another observatory using the logs from the felled trees ...I hope to get a 16 inch astrograph and appropriate mount and camera but still can't find a review on the scope..should be a good one but it's always good to hear about "issues"... It will need a replacement temperature controlled focuser which his half the price of the scope...ouch...however I would like a rig to do faint small fallacies.
Alec
 
First stack just came thru, at a distance it looked excellent but a blow up reveals slightly oval stars...I don't know why as my pre checks showed perfect stars..maybe a cable snagged a little...that is the only thing I can think could have done it..oh well I will still process them all and see if I can process the problem away.
Alex
 
well processing went faster than expected and I rushed it because the stars were not too good but I managed to round them up a fair bit. Gear 80 mm Espirit triplet refractor, HEQ 5 Equatorial Mount, ZWO Mono 1600 cooled camera, five channels..Luminance, Red,Blue,Green Hydrogen Alpha About four hours 30 second subs, 30 dark frames, Stacked in Deep Sky Stacker, processed in Star Tools, PhotoShop and Gimp.

This is the Eta Carina Nebula.

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paddoboy said:
Nice spot Alex, Any Platypus around there?
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No but I think there are some at the other place, I thought I saw one , something caused a splash and disappeared but not confirmed as we say.
The neighbour says he has seen them in his section of that same creek.
Alex
 
Alex, I'm impressed by the results of your hobby in astronomy. I recall, in my youth, paging through the 1966 (I think that was the edition) World Book Encyclopedia. It featured the best astronomical photos available, which were from the 200 inch Mt. Palomar California telescope, taken by professional astronomers. Your images of m31 (Andromeda Galaxy) are better than from that best telescope of that time. I retained a strong interest in m31 through my younger life, intent upon locating it in the SW Ohio 40°N latitude sky and seeing it with the naked eye, since that World Book left an enduring impression on me how it was the farthest thing observable by means of unaided vision, "by the naked eye," as it described it. Having succeeded at that was something memorable.

Nice how you've observed it from so far south and so close to the horizon there, looking through much more atmosphere. I couldn't see it by looking straight at it but only slightly over on the periphery of my retina, from the only place I could find that was kind of local but without too much obscuring light pollution.
 
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