Reprocessed B33

I started again from scratch and had a complete reprocess of the Horsehead nebula. Combined now will calibration frames it is certainly a good deal cleaner. Plus I believe practice makes perfect and I am getting more adept at being more subtle with the techniques of Photoshop, less each time is certainly more!. I have also discovered it is to be turned into A3 size and printed very soon, cant wait to see it.

As mentioned previously there was a bright moon not far away at the time of capture.

I am happy with the dusty stuff captured. One thing I have noticed Blogspot appears to brighten the images a fraction from my original.

B33 Dark Nebula. The Horsehead.

I have been using Maxim to calibrate the files as I was struggling with Pixinsight batch preprocessing. I am very pleased with the detail in the flame nebula.

 

2 hours worth of data here. still not happy with the gradient in the centre.

A billion Stars

Been a little busy recently, Going on holiday, Back to work, A set of nights, Sending eldest daughter to University, all plays havoc with the astronomy. I have been playing a bit with Maxim DL. I am trying to use the auto focus setup procedure and combine automation with exposure control. I still have a slight DEC drift and need to re centre the image by a few arc seconds every other exposure. So just trying to get everything sorted out. Andromeda was at a nice elevation so I thought I would have a little test.

This shot 2 Hour 13 Minute exposure in 3 & 5 minute subs. No dark frame subtraction, Flats or bias taken. Iso 1600. Canon 40D through my imaging set up. Comparing it to the others I have taken I think it is the best hands down. I would appreciate any feedback too!

My own criticism is that if I had taken a few short exposures I could tease out a little more detail in the core. Easily remedied as maxim has saved the camera rotation angel when I plate solved the image. So another visit sometime soon I hope. I might consider sending it to sky at night mag too.

M39

The last week has been a little traumatic for the whole family, Our eldest daughter has been waiting to find out if she has the grades to get into Uni. A sigh of relief as she is awarded her primary place at Anglia Ruskin. Congratulations Jasmine. The Younger two have been driving us nuts as they are desperate to go on their sunny holiday and bored of being at home from school.

The RA drive on the mount was very tight and needed a strip down and rebuild, All went well until I ran a test on the guiding. What could be the matter here. PHD would not keep the guide star for more than a few seconds. Lets not panic yet I thought so I ran 60 x 30 second test shots. A nightmare. The subject has moved over a degree across the field of view. The only thing I could think of was the polar alignment. I do my polar alignment using the Kochab clock method. Always worked well for me!! As I looked through the finder the illuminated cross moved, damn, the whole finder had been knocked at some point and almost fell out the holder. Not a great deal more I can do tonight. Next day allowed to me to strip it all down and rebuild and align the polar finder. A chimney pot half a mile up the road stayed where it should be as the pole finder was tightened into position.

A new test on Scheat in Andromeda was perfect. 2 minutes, 5 minutes, 10 minutes was no issue at all.

M39 was the target of choice nearly above my head so I ran 30 x 2 minute guided exposures at 1600 ISO. Processed in Maxim DL & Photoshop.

M15 and a new toy.

Last nights clear night saw the first test of my new Auto focus system from JMI and HiTech Astro from the very speedy and efficient Rother Valley Optics I called them Weds am and was promised a call back as they were busy completing an order. As promised they called back and was offered excellent advice saving me £70. A promise was made for delivery tomorrow. I have to admit I was holding back a laugh when he said it. Sure enough to his word it arrived the following day via courier. Set up was simple the motor just fits between the locking screw for the focusser and a hood onto the 10-1 focus knob. The control box was pre wired with a cigarette socket plug, lucky for me my now redundant dew system used the same connector and a power supply was hooked up. I downloaded the ASCOM drivers and it was recognised by the laptop instantly. I use both Imagesplus and Maxim for image acquisition and connection to the 2 programmes was simple.
ISo 800 and 1 hour of exposures has captured stars to the core. Maxim DL is now the prefferred programme for stacking. A small DDP stretch and a pretty star spike later has landed me a wonderful result.

http://www.hitecastro.co.uk/
http://www.rothervalleyoptics.co.uk/productsd.php?search=jmi&x=0&y=0

M2

M2 (NGC7089) is one of the largest globular clusters consisting of approximately 150,000 stars located within our galaxy at a distance of approximately 36,000 light years. Estimated to be 13 billion years old, almost as old as time itself. A lovely view at high power resolve the cluster into a swarm of bees. Even with my Megrez 90 I am pleased to resolve nearly all the way to what is a very dense core. Once again Iso 800 works well with the clusters and an hour of 2 minute guided exposures. A fantastic well illuminated wide field has not required a need for flats here.

Lonely among us.

Floating amongst a myriad of stars lost in time for 10 billion years,(a junior in globular standards) M71 will have spent eons watching the birth and growth of our galaxy looking down from it's vantage point outside the disk of the milky way 1200 light years away. To it's left lies the wonderfully coloured g Sagittae a red giant in it's twilight years some 640 times more luminous that our sun and 55 times more massive too.

Stacked in Maxim DL and processed in Photoshop this 1 hour exposure at Iso 800 has had no darks, flats, or Bias frames. A minimal DDP stretch. I find with globulars less is more with the processing. A pleasing result and very happy being being able to resolve stars to the core of M71