A Year of Imaging

[Knight of Clear Skies]

Firstly, a big thank you to the SGL members. Your advice, encouragement and inspiration have been a great help. In a year I've gone from taking images like this:

...to this...

(Apologies if you've seen some of these images before, there are some I haven't posted previously at the end.)

The first snap is one of my early attempts at capturing the Milky Way from a fixed tripod. It's a bit of a noisy mess as I hadn't found the aperture control on my camera at that point, but I was chuffed to find I'd accidently picked up Andromeda. The second shot is a 20 minute stack from a couple weeks ago, with a modded camera but using the same kit lens at 18mm.

September 2013 - A more successful Milky Way taken while in holiday in Menorca, by resting the camera on the patio and giving it 30 seconds with the lens wide open.

December 2013... Down in Cornwall for Christmas but not much luck with the weather, so only managed a few quick shots.

Another fixed tripod shot.

A 20 second Orion framed to show the club as well as the body, although I always see Orion as an archer.

March 2014...

Flight BA8727 to the Moon. Taken with my 250mm zoom lens.

One of my first experiments with stacking. A stack of 70 three-point-two second exposures taken with a 50mm lens at f2.5, cropped down to hide the coma. Was very encouraged to pick up a touch of the Flame Nebula, especially as Orion wasn't well placed at the time - I was looking over a town.

April 2014...

A stack of about 70 exposures taken with an old 450mm M42 lens.

My first widefield from a tracking mount, showing the Beehive Cluster and M67 on the left. About 5 minutes of data, 50mm lens at f2.8, cropped.

Bought my own tracking mount off AtroBuySell in June, an EQ3-2 with RA motor. Here's a couple early efforts with a 50mm lens, taken before I fitted a polar scope to my mount. I found I could consistently get 2 minute subs at 50mm without one.

Around Cepheus, about 40 minutes at f4 I think.

Andromeda (crop). ~1 hour at f3.5.

Also snapped some Noctilucent Clouds while I was out imaging one night (50mm lens, 10 seconds). At 50 miles altitude and just above the horizon they must have been somewhere off the west coast of Norway.

Picked up a 45 year old 135mm Super-Takumar f3.5 M42 lens off eBay for £18.40 + postage at the beginning of August.

Comet Jacques and the Double Cluster.

Pacman Nebula. Had to magic select the nebulosity and boost its saturation separately from the starfield to get some colour out of it.

Took a trip down to Cornwall a couple weeks ago and was very lucky with the weather, had three decent imaging nights. Used the modded Canon 100D at Caradon Observatory on my mount with a variety of lenses. Didn't manage any long imaging runs due to light cloud, dew and inconsistent tracking from my mount forcing me to discard plenty of subs, but I've very happy with what I did get.

12 minute Cygnus at 50mm, f3.5.

12 Minute North America and Pelican Nebulae at 135mm/f3.5.

12 minute Veil Nebula, 135mm/f3.5, cropped a bit.

22 minute Triangulum, 135mm/f3.5, cropped.

Comet Jacques passing the Garnet Star and entering (or leaving?) IC1396. Can just make out the Elephant Trunk. 135mm/f4.5?, 30 minutes.

Heart and Soul Nebulae and the Double Cluster. ~30 minutes at 135mm/f3.5. Bit yellow at the lower middle as some stray light was getting in the eyepiece.

10 minutes at 135mm, f4.5 or f5.6. Taken at about 2:00 in the morning. Bit of a gradient as it was quite low down.

A 1 minute test shot of Andromeda with my 250mm zoom lens at f5.6. Bit of coma but I can always crop a little, good to see this lens is perfectly useable on my mount. The extra reach brings more targets into range.

Hopefully this thread shows what can be achieved with modest equipment and a bit of enthusiasm. My camera equipment also gets heavily used for daylight photography.

Imaging has been interesting in other ways, it's encouraged me to larn my skies better and think more about what I'm seeing. For example, in the shot of Veil Nebula I can see glowing hydrogen and oxygen, but is most of the materiel from the supernova itself or pre-existing molecular clouds being compressed by the shockwave? I'm guessing the latter but it's quite hard to find solid information online.

I'm very happy with what I've achieved so far but there is plenty of scope for improvement in my images. At the moment I'm finding good backgrounds harder than imaging the DSOs themselves. The above images look pretty good at the size I've posted them, but I'd like to get tighter, better star shapes and colours and knock out more of the noise. I may need to stop down a bit more and aim for more data.

Next steps:

- Get my mount tracking to its full potential. Might need to adjust the balance more finely or I may need to strip it down and give it some attention, I notice there are a couple EQ3 guides on the forum here. If that doesn't work I'll need to reduce my sub times a bit, have been mostly shooting for 2 minutes at 135mm.

- Sort out a modded camera and LP filter for imaging up here in Hertfordshire.

- Think about what software I need. Have had some success with the Star Tools demo so that could be an option.

- Work on my processing skills. There are lots of tutorials out there if I can find the right ones.

- Try some longer imaging runs.

- Find a Bahtinov mask that fits my lenses, or make one.

Here's to the next year of imaging, may the weather be kind to us.

[toxic]

you have had a good year congrats

[bish]

Nice images. Your noctilucent clouds pic is superb.

[oldpink]

7 months into my first year
your doing a lot better than me

[KyleStoke]

Nice collection

[Pete Presland]

thank you for sharing your journey. well for done for the improvments you have made, it shows you can capture DSO's with just a DSLR, motorised mount and some skill! love the widefield views of some classic deep sky objects.

[Gonzo]

moooaaar

[davefrance]

That's a great 12 months work, thank you for sharing, and thank you for your support on my posts. 

[robbie c]

You got some very nice images there doing a great job well done and keep them coming I'm looking forward to seeing some more   

[hobsey]

Love seeing your widefield stuff with the vintage lens but that stacked image of the moon is amazing.

[laser_jock99]

Nice set of your progress so far.

[Sandancer10]

Well done and very good progress in a year. 

[simmo39]

V nice.

[Knight of Clear Skies]

Thanks for the comments everyone.

Love seeing your widefield stuff with the vintage lens but that stacked image of the moon is amazing.

It's a testament to the power of Registax wavelets - the source images weren't very sharp.

7 months into my first year
your doing a lot better than me

As you can see above, I've made most of my progress in the last couple months. It helps that I'm concentrating on short focal length imaging, that makes everything easier.

[hobsey]

It's a testament to the power of Registax wavelets - the source images weren't very sharp.

Shhh, you're suppose to keep that bit quiet.

Was this with a number of exposures or in video mode?

[Alien 13]

Great set of images, it does show what can be done on a budget with the added bonus that most of the kit can be used in the daytime I am very impressed.

Alan

[Knight of Clear Skies]

Was this with a number of exposures or in video mode?

It was a number of single frames as I'd have lost a lot of resolution if I'd used the video mode (don't think the 1100D has a crop video mode). From memory, I may have taken 100 odd and stacked the best 70.

It could use a little attention, the sharpening has left a ring around the limb. I think the right way to fix this is to make a separate image in Registax, sharpen less and blend the edges into the original image. It's also gone a touch green at the top for some reason. Still pleased with how it came out though.

[Psychobilly]

Really enjoyed reading the post and looking at the images showing your journey - I basically doubled the time spent on each target every year that I was actively imaging until I wasn't happy to have less than 8hrs of subs for any target...

I'm a lapsed astrophotographer who now spends all day out and about Instead of all night in the obs...

Peter...



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[ollypenrice]

A splendid post. I love the aircraft and the comet by 1396. I missed that trick, rather foolishly!

Olly

[happy-kat]

Great thread, informative and shows what can be done from a more accessible start and is encouraging.

Must finish making my barn door base...

[rolpol]

Very enjoyable post, hearty congratulations on what you have achieved so far and I look forward to seeing more!

[stepping beyond]

KoCS, you've had one heck of a ride for the past year. My avatar is my 1st lunar iimage taken from 2min. video processed through reg6 and imaged w/ z10 and Orion starshoot ll , I've got a lifetime of learning to do and I live my life through the eyepiece.

[Knight of Clear Skies]

Thanks once again.

I'm a lapsed astrophotographer who now spends all day out and about Instead of all night in the obs...

A shame, but the skies will still be there if you ever decide to go back to it.

I love the aircraft and the comet by 1396. I missed that trick, rather foolishly!

I imaged Jacques with the Double Cluster when another forum member tipped me off, but catching it by the Garnet Star was a lucky accident - I hadn't checked it's position. It then took me a couple more days to realise Jacques must be passing down the Milky Way, which must be quite rare for a comet.

[BenDavis]

Great thread, what an enjoyable journey to see.