Swansea Astronomical Society Blog

Testing AstroDMx Capture for Windows using a Canon 4000D DSLR and a Skywatcher Explorer 130 PDS 130mm, f/5 Newtonian.

The Skywatcher Explorer 130 PDS 130mm, f/5 Newtonian was mounted on a Celestron AVX mount and the Canon 4000D DSLR was attached via a 2” adapter.

40 x 40s exposures of The Andromeda galaxy were captured at ISO 6400 with matching dark frames using AstroDMx Capture for Windows, which treats the DSLR like any other Astronomy camera, with the camera controls under the control of the software. The Canon 4000D camera has a 14 bit ADC and the captured images were saved as both 16 bit TIFFs and also Camera RAW, which were stored in a folder of their own.

The images were stacked in Deep Sky Stacker and post-processed in the Gimp 2.10, Affinity Photo, Fitswork and FastStone Image viewer.

Click on an image to get a closer view

Final image of M31, the Andromeda galaxy

70 x 30s exposures of M71, the Angelfish globular cluster, with matching dark frames were captured at ISO 6400 using AstroDMx Capture for Windows.

The best 90 % of the images were stacked in Deep Sky Stacker and post-processed in the Gimp 2.10 and Affinity Photo.

The Angelfish cluster, M71

Steve Wainwright and Nicola Mackin

posted by astroimager  # 9:57 PM 0 Comments

 A Celestron 8" SCT was used with an SV305 camera at the Cassegrain focus. SE files of Jupiter and Saturn were captured using AstroDMx Capture for Windows. Stacking was done in Autostakkert!, wavelet processing was done in Registax 5.1 and post processing with the Gimp 2.10 and Affinity Photo.

Jupiter

Saturn

A 6.3 focal reducer was fitted to the visual back of the SCT and 16 bit Tiff images were captured of M71, the Angelfish cluster, with matching dark frames.

The images were dark-frame corrected and stacked in Deep Sky Stacker and post processed in the Gimp 2.10.

Screenshot of AstroDMx Capture for Windows capturing data on M71

M71 the Angelfish Cluster; a globular cluster in Sagitta

Steve Wainwright and Nicola Mackin

posted by astroimager  # 5:45 PM 0 Comments

 Good conditions again last night - enjoyed views of Jupiter, Saturn and Mars and did some imaging of Saturn and Jupiter with the QHY5 and the ETX125.

After midnight conditions improved a fair bit before the clouds rolled in, allowing a 2 times Barlow to be used with the QHY on Mars. I was able to get a fairly decent image from the 7,050 frames. 

Pprocessed images done in Registax, Astrocrop and Photoshop including the mono and false coloured images of Mars with and without the Barlow.

The earlier capture without the Barlow comprised some 4,785 frames.

posted by astroimager  # 2:55 PM 0 Comments

We are settling into our online format now and tonight was our second Society lecture held on Zoom. Swansea is currently on lockdown and UWTSD where we usually meet is teaching many classes online, so it is great to be able to get together online. Chris Bowden is doing a fantastic job of organising the talks and introducing the speakers - thank you so much Chris. 

Here we all are!

posted by Gaynor Thomas  # 9:03 PM 1 Comments

A Celestron 8" SCT was fitted with an f/6.3 focal reducer/field flattener and mounted on a Celestron AVX mount. A ZWO ASI178MC camera was placed at the Cassegrain focus and 1500 frame SER files were captured with AstroDMx Capture for Windows of 6 overlapping panes of the 91.4% waning Moon.

Click on an image to get a closer view

AstroDMx Capture for Windows capturing data on one of the panes.

The best 70% of frames in each SER file i.e. 1050 frames in each SER file, were stacked in Autostakkert! The resulting image for each pane was wavelet processed in Registax 6, and all of the 6 pane images were stitched into a mosaic in Microsoft Image Composite Editor. The final image was post processed in the Gimp 2.10 and Affinity Photo. Enhanced saturation was used to reveal differences in the mineralogy of the lunar surface.

An animation of unsaturated vs saturation enhanced images was made in Animation shop.

Steve Wainwright and Nicola Mackin

posted by astroimager  # 9:41 PM 0 Comments

Celestron 9.25 SCT AVX, 2xTelevue Barlow, ZWO ASI120MC-S camera, 19879 images captured in Firecapture 2.5x64, 750 stacked and aligned in AutoStakkert!3, wavelets in Registax 6, then edited in Adobe Elements 11

Colin Miles

posted by astroimager  # 8:08 PM 0 Comments

Had a superb night here last night looking at the planet Mars at its closest approach -  amazing to have had clear skies, practically no wind and temperatures in double figures!

I used all of my eyepieces and was even able to use my 6mm lens with the 2 times Barlow lens as conditions were so good  - that gave a staggering 633 times magnification through the ETX125!

I spent a considerable time just looking - it was amazing -  just like looking at Earth from space and picking out continents - it was that good.

I am pleased with my portable set up now which I’ve been refining for some time. The telescope can be quickly mounted on the three studs in the lawn for accurate alignment and connections quickly made to my laptop in the control room.

I use a bucket to coil the umbilical in after viewing and it works a treat - especially if there is dew on the grass.

The last shot I took with the camera before I turned in was just a handheld one of a point of light some 34,000,000 miles away - The closest Mars will be to us for 15 years. A most memorable night!

Click on an image to get a closer view

posted by astroimager  # 1:39 PM 0 Comments

A while ago I picked up one of those Ukrainian devices called "AutoFi" to control the scope with my iPad using Sky Safari and I managed to get the ETX125 working with it just fine last night, so not only can I now control the targets using my iPad remotely, but I can focus the camera too using the IR repeater arrangement.

Following the test I had a look at Mars and did a few captures using the QHY5 and did a quick process in Registax and Astrocrop of the 1335 frames captured. Conditions improved into the early hours of this morning and it was good to see Mars through the scope looking so grand just a day or so from closest approach

Chris Bowden

posted by astroimager  # 5:48 PM 0 Comments