Jupiter - 19-8-12 Second Shot Almost 6 Months Later

[russellhq]

I'm quite chuffed with this, I first took a shot at Jupiter 6 months ago with my dob. I've returned to the giant gas planet, this time with the scope on an EQ5 Synscan and a 2x barlow. Quite a difference!

Jupiter from February this year:

Jupiter from tonight:

This one has more wavelets...

Any tips or comments would be more than welcome, as I'm just at the very beginning of this imaging malarky

[russellhq]

After much jiggerypokery this morning in GIMP, I think this is my best offering:

One thing that bothers me is the lack of whiteness. I've seen a lot of Jupiter pictures where there is clearly white banding. I'm guessing it's the light pollutiong from taking the image in the centre of Glasgow, I might try the Baader Neodymium Filter next time and see if that helps. Any tips on bringing out more white?

[JamesF]

How about this:

Same image, just a bit of a tweak with levels and curves.

James

[russellhq]

Hey, you found a 3rd moon in the data! I never new that was there

It still has that orange hue to it. I was search around the forum for comparisons and found the following:

http://stargazerslounge.com/topic/75680-another-first-jupiter/#entry736106

http://stargazerslounge.com/topic/137858-venus-jupiter-and-mars-24212/#entry1377365

And this one is the best I would say:

http://stargazerslou...r/#entry1156655

[JamesF]

It still is a bit orange, yes What setup are you using for imaging?

James

[russellhq]

My mount setup is a Skywatcher 150P on EQ5 with synscan, connected with EQmod to Stellarium. Then for imaging, I have a PS3 Eye Toy, and x2 TAL barlow capturing 60fps RGB32 640x480.

I used SharpCap to take a 2:30min sub, 7500 frames (output file was 9GB ) and then ran it through registax.

Registax settings:

ALIGNMENT PARAMETERS

Prefilter: Normalise

Min Dist Between: 15

Min Dist. from Edge: 20

Intensity selection

Lo: 30

Hi: 230

3x3 area

I then click "Set Alignpoints" and get 9 points. I then click align and go make a cup of tea

I then select best 50%, stack and then muck about with the wavelets

[neil phillips]

How about this:

Same image, just a bit of a tweak with levels and curves.

James

Hi i dont think its light pollution i think its somekind of white balance problem

[russellhq]

You could be onto something. I do normally keep the colour levels low; but if it's WB shouldn't I be able to GIMP it out?

[JamesF]

I think you're possibly right, Neil. That or having too much red because there's no IR filter, perhaps?

Do you have an IR filter on the camera? And does SharpCap offer you any white balance settings? I wouldn't be surprised if the default camera settings were for indoors under electric lighting.

James

[russellhq]

The camera has a slider for R, G & B. I set then to the same level. It doesn't have the typical temp. colour settings or "lighting" settings.

There is no IR filter, should I use one or is that opening up a can of worms?

I've got a Baader Neodymium Filter which does IR. I could use that?

I've done some more mucking about with registax and GIMP. Used Registax to auto balance the RGB then used GIMP to play with the levels. Quite happy with the result:

[JamesF]

That looks much better. Could be worth an experiment with the Neodymium filter to see if it makes a difference.

James

[russellhq]

Think I'll give that a go. Although might need to wait a while 'till the other half lets me out again

[JamesF]

Think I'll give that a go. Although might need to wait a while 'till the other half lets me out again

That's the one advantage of astronomy. I just wait until she's gone to bed

James

[luis]

Nice JUPO with a DOB !

[Grotemobile]

You have realy got some good detail on

the planet.Will give me something to aim

for.Very good.Well done.

Steve