Swansea Astronomical Society Blog

Reprocessing of a Stack of 1 hour of 3 min exposures of the Western Veil nebula, acquired, positioned and captured by AstroDMx Capture, whilst testing advanced functionality. Using an f/5, 80mm apo refractor and an SV405CC OSC camera fitted with an L-eNhance narrowband filter.

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The Western Veil nebula

Steve Wainwright and Nicola Mackin

posted by astroimager  # 11:05 PM 0 Comments

A Panasonic Lumix DMCFZ72, 60x optical zoom bridge camera fitted with a Baader solar filter and mounted on a static tripod was used to capture 122 images of the Sun. The images were precisely cropped in Nicola Mackin's AstroCrop before stacking with Siril and post-processing in the Gimp 2.10.

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The Sun in White light

Steve Wainwright

posted by astroimager  # 6:49 PM 0 Comments

Stack of 1 hour of 3 min exposures of the Western Veil nebula, acquired, positioned and captured by AstroDMx Capture, whilst testing advanced functionality. Using an f/5, 80mm apo refractor and an SV405CC OSC camera fitted with an L-eNhance narrowband filter.

Click on an image to get a closer view

Screenshot of AstroDMx Capture capturing 3 min FITS exposures of the Western Veil nebula

The Western Veil nebula

Steve Wainwright and Nicola Mackin

posted by astroimager  # 10:44 AM 0 Comments

M45 the Pleiades and M31 the Andromeda galaxy. Settings were 15s 6400ISO and a 4000D DSLR Canon camera attached to a 102mm Startravel Skywatcher refractor telescope on a skywatcher Eq5 tracking mount.

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M45 Stack of 80 images

M31 Stack of 100 images

Chris Playle

posted by astroimager  # 4:58 PM 0 Comments

Testing an SV705C prototype uncooled camera fitted with an Optalong LeNhance narrowband filter, using an 80mm, f/5, Apochromatic refractor with no field-flattener. The camera has a Sony IMX585 sensor and displays no significant amp glow.

AstroDMx Capture was used to acquire the objects and position them, capturing 2 min FITS exposures of the Crescent nebula and the Eastern Veil nebula. Auto-guiding was with PHD2; all using an INDI server. One hour's worth of 2 minute exposures were captured of the Crescent nebula and 20 minute's worth of 2 minute exposures were captured of the Eastern Veil nebula.

Matching dark-frames were captured, but were not subsequently used. The data were registered and stacked in Siril and post processed in the Gimp 2.10 and Fitswork 4.

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Screenshot of AstroDMx Capture capturing FITS data on the Crescent nebula

posted by astroimager  # 2:22 PM 0 Comments

A Panasonic Lumix DMCFZ72, 60x optical zoom bridge camera fitted with a Baader solar filter and mounted on a static tripod was used to capture 120 images of the Sun. The images were precisely cropped in Nicola Mackin's AstroCrop before stacking with Siril and post-processing in the Gimp 2.10.

Click on the image to get a closer view

The Sun in White light

posted by astroimager  # 6:12 PM 0 Comments

M31 the Adromeda galaxy. Settings were 15s at 6400ISO and using a 4000D DSLR Canon camera and a Startravel 102mm Skywatcher refractor telescope. I was using a motor focuser and a Bahtinov mask. The telescope was mounted on a Skywatcher EQ5 tracking mount.

109 exposures were captured and 39 of them were discarded because they were spoiled by clouds. The remaining 70 images were stacked and processed.

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The Andromeda galaxy M31 plus satellite galaxies M32 and M110

Chris Playle

posted by astroimager  # 4:22 PM 0 Comments

Members enjoyed some warm summer conditions under clear skies, to enjoy some great views of Saturn, Jupiter, Neptune, M13 and M31 through the main scope and many more objects through a range of scopes that members brought along. Several members were able to take some great images of some deep sky objects with some live stacking views provided of M31 and the western and eastern Veil nebulae and several galaxies on member’s laptop and tablet screens. Highlights included bright clear views the Milky Way, Saturn close to opposition and Jupiter with its Great Red Spot centrally placed, along with one it its moons (Io) transiting the disc.

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Jupiter with Great Red Spot and two of the Galilean moons

Jupiter with Great Red Spot and moon Europa (Triplet)

An Altair 115mm Triplet refractor was used with a ZWO ASI462MC camera connected via an ADC and a 2x Barlow lens to take 143 images using AstroDMx Capture at 00:48 hrs on the morning of the 27th August. All of the frames were stacked in Autostakkert! with the resultant image wavelet processed in Registax and processed in Adobe CS2 to bring out the details of the cloud belts and the Great Red Spot along with the moon Europa.

A Meade LX200 telescope was used with a ZWO ASI462MC camera connected via an ADC to take 755 images using Astro DMx Capture at 01:18 hrs on the morning of the 27th August. Some 80% of the frames were stacked in Autostakkert! with the resultant image wavelet processed in Registax and processed in Adobe CS2 to bring out the details of the cloud belts and the Great Red Spot.

Jupiter with Great Red Spot (LX200)

Chris Bowden

posted by astroimager  # 3:25 PM 0 Comments

On the night of the 25th August I used my Altair 60EDF doublet refractor to target objects low down on the south east horizon. Due to street light glare and other lights, I used a CLS filter on my Atik 320e OSC camera in conjunction with an occulting baffle to help reduce light pollution. I was able to capture some 46 minutes of the Lagoon nebula and 34 minutes on the Helix nebula before they got too low in the sky which I used to combine with narrowband data taken earlier in the month. I also managed to take 36 minutes of M30; one of the densest clusters in the Milky Way containing a stellar swarm of “blue straggler” stars in Capricorn. The cluster is located roughly 28,000 light-years from Earth and about 93 light-years across and estimated to be 12.9 billion years old containing stars 160,000 times the mass of the sun.

The Lagoon Nebula – 1 hr 44 mins total exposure (58 mins narrowband with an Optolong L’Enhance filter, plus 46 mins RGB with a CLS filter). Both images taken with Atik 320e OSC camera using an Altair EDF60 with a 0.8 x FR driven by an iOptron CEM 26 mount, guided with PHD2 using an SvBony SV165 guide scope with a QHY5L-IIMC guide camera. Stacked in DSS and processed in Adobe CS2.

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The Lagoon nebula

Helix nebula - 1hr 54 mins total exposure (34 mins RGB with a CLS filter plus 80 mins narrowband with an Optolong L’Enhance filter ). Both images taken with an Atik 320e OSC camera using an Altair EDF60 with a 0.8 x FR driven by an iOptron CEM 26 mount, guided with PHD2 using an SvBony SV165 guide scope with a QHY5L-IIMC guide camera. Stacked in DSS and processed in Adobe CS2.

The Helix nebula

M30 - 36 mins total exposure in RGB with a CLS filter using an Atik 320e on an Altair EDF60 with a 0.8 x FR driven by an iOptron CEM 26 mount, guided with PHD2 using an SvBony SV165 guide scope with a QHY5L-IIMC guide camera. Stacked in DSS and processed in Adobe CS2.

M30

Chris Bowden

posted by astroimager  # 3:09 PM 0 Comments