StarDuke82

I spent the better part of June not using my rig because of clouds and rain, maybe got 3 nights out of the whole month and July wasn’t much better. Luckily it’s August now and now it’s nearly August and the forecast for the next week is clear skies and it usually stays that way until October here 🤞🏻

I’ve never been much of a sleeper ever since I was a child, I would be up till 3-4 am in the morning sleep maybe 2-3 hours and be awake all day. It continues to this very day I am lucky if I get 4 hours of sleep a night. But I usually go out observing from sunset until about 11pm go inside take a nap for 2 hours then wake up again and view my early morning targets and go back inside at sunrise and take another nap for 2 or 3 hours or sometimes go straight into editing images and don’t take a nap until lunch. Sometimes when I do this I get so exhausted and have such eye strain that I can’t go out observing the following night and have to a night of rest. When I am that tired floaters and blurry vision makes it difficult if not impossible to see through a eyepiece. 

Did some more editing in LightRoom for this one 

@paulastro just my thoughts on it and a guess but I would think like everything else Celestron makes app or tech wise there would be a firmware update to either obtain a new code or transfer the old code onto a new device after the limit if there is one. 

Was out imaging Jupiter and Saturn early this morning when I noticed M31 Andromeda was pretty close to Zenith so I had to make an attempt. 
 

M31 4:42am from my Bortle 6/7 skies, 24 mm Baader Hyperion EP shot with iPhone 13 Pro shot with Astroshader app: 11 exposures, Exposure time 1 sec, Exposure gain 70, Iso 4400, White Balance 4000.  

I think the raw Astroshader images (top two) look a bit better than what I did in LightRoom but that may just be me. 

Lovely view of the ever narrowing crescent Venus early Saturday evening around 7:42 pm no filter on this early shot as can be seen from the reflecting glare from the setting sun, 9.25 Celestron Nexstar Evo, Badder Hyperion Mark IV zoom set on 8mm. 

10 hours ago, PeterStudz said:

@StarDuke82, these are great and an obvious improvement. Especially the third capture of M57. You can even see the central white dwarf which I think is visual magnitude 15.75 - a tiny camera in phone picking that out is amazing! Can I ask what Bortle level were these taken at? 

I’m at a Bortle 6-7 Zone I can just barely see Polaris and a few hundred of the brightest stars from my backyard on a typical night. 

@Richard I really just got into Astrophotography myself but most apps on Iphone do stack automatically, however the easiest way on an iPhone is to use Live Camera Mode, you can then edit the photos and go through the individual images that were stacked together to make the best image for what you’re imaging, this works in video as well and you can go through the individual frames and separate out the best and then stack those with other Apps available in the App Store, Video Stack for instance lets you take 5 second videos or frames of video no longer than 5 seconds edited together and stack them to make a single image. of course there’s apps that do this for you, the photos I took are actually not stacked but just the best images I got from several different shots I probably could have stacked them and cleaned up the images of M13 and M12 a lot better at the moment I am just happy with having images that are recognizable for what they are after trying for quite some time.

Quote

 

 @PeterStudz I here’s my latest attempts M57, M13, and M12 used Lightroom after taking the photos with Astroshader got much better results with the post processing. 

3 hours ago, Steve Ward said:

You weren't talking about photography , you were complaining about your eyesight whilst at the eyepiece.

Your best bet woud be to visit a healthcare professional regarding your eyes instead of speculating on an astronomy forum on something that would appear to be a medical issue.

The two are interrelated and a lot of new scopes are controlled via devices. Besides that I go to an Optometrist every year and other than being near sighted with an astigmatism and having 42 years on my odometer my vision is fine. As for Speculation, I don’t think it’s Speculation when I post links to research and recent articles about the subject, even Harvard changed some of their ideas on Blue light and its well known the effects of devices and LED and Fluorescent lighting causing eye strain, blurred vision, headaches and sleep deprivation supported by several studies from over the last few years from several reputable researchers. I was just trying to start a conversation about the subject. Even my more extreme claims in my opening statement haven’t been disproven because the data is contradictory, diseases like heart disease, diabetes and obesity may be more of a concern but I for one consider my vision very important and would like to know if there is a risk even if it’s just minimal.

What eyepiece are you using? I it’s like a stock eyepiece (one that came with the telescope when you bought it) depending on what type it is sometimes they can provide a good visual but be impossible to take a photo through.  If it’s not that try adjusting the distance of the camera from the eyepiece and also adjusting the exposure it looks like both of those are possibly off, though I would adjust your exposure settings first and then adjust the backfocus

18 minutes ago, Steve Ward said:

The simple answer is ... when participating in astronomical observation leave your electronic "devices" , be they laptops , tablets or the ubiquitous 'smartphone' indoors well away from the observation point , i.e. the telescope.

And try not staring at the phone all day long if you're worried about it affecting your eyes .... !

True but it’s kind of hard when you’re using a Device to control your telescope and setup, and then process images if you do photography.  I keep mine on low brightness most of the time and set all my indoor lights on timers to go red at night it’s one of the safest and least harsh colors on your eyes and preserve your night adapted eyesight if you have to go inside for anything.

1 hour ago, Tiny Clanger said:

After images are an entirely different thing, a temporary and poorly understood quirk of our colour vision, nothing at all to do with blue light or physical damage to our eyes. There seem to be differences between the sudden after image caused by a brief photo flashgun  , which is bright and the negative after image which forms from longer less bright light. No one ever sued a photographic manufacturer because a flash unit damaged their eyes, even if fools like me occasionally stood in front of a studio flash and pressed the test button without remembering to look away from the reflector. A half minute or so and our sight restores itself to normal because this isn't physical damage, but something in the neural system which, in effect, seems to stop registering the light (and colour ) being flooded with, so you see a negative after image which subtracts that shape and colour, leaving you seeing, for a few moments, the shape in the opposite colour. Do an online search, there are various possible explanations I'm aware of,  but I'm no neurologist so best someone who is does the explaining for you.

I used to include it as a fun optical illusion when teaching 8 year olds about light and how our eyes work. Draw a shape on some white paper, something simple like a square or triangle maybe 4cm or so across . Colour it in a strong darkish colour, green or red work well, blue may be less good for this trick. I used to use pieces of coloured sticky paper stuck on card. Now rest your elbows on the table, and hold your head in your hands for at least 2 minutes. You hold your head as still as possible, and stare at the shape on the paper. When the time is up, quickly look up at a plain white wall and see your shape, in the opposite colour . It works less well with a blue shape because the after image will be yellow and therefore paler and harder to see.

One cheeky little guy took this trick home, had his little brother stare at a red drawing of a ghost while listening to a spooky tale about a green ghost which haunted their house, then pointed at the wall and said , "Quick, look there it is !"

Belief doesn't come into it, and I do not have to agree, because science does not work like that. I'll leave any further explanations to someone else, I think I've done my bit.

 

 

I guess you’ve never read up on Flash Blindness it’s rare but it can happen and be caused by photography, nuclear explosions, landing lights, lasers, UV lights ect… I’m not trying to argue with you but I also know that is an actual issue, if I didn’t have concerns or have problems with my own eyesight occasionally I wouldn’t have even thought about bringing it up. 
 

I hate it when I have nights that I have to step away from my scope because I just can’t see anything because the view through my scope looks pixelated. Then there’s nights when either my pupils are so strained they constrict to where I can’t see or it’s hitting a blind spot on my retina I can’t figure out which; but if anyone else has experienced something like this I would think there’s some kind of connection and the only thing I can think of is I have LED’s everywhere and I constantly use a Device. Going on that I did some research and decided to make a post to start a discussion. I didn’t think I was going to have to give a dissertation and cite sources just a friendly discussion but you made it interesting. 

1 hour ago, Hawksmoor said:

Thanks for posting. I followed the link and read about Ann Hodges. What a sad story. Unsurprisingly there is no 'upside' to being hit by a meteorite.

Best regards from George in Lowestoft on a wet and dreary afternoon.

It is Sad and interesting she did survive, and she’s the only person according to the Smithsonian Archives to be hit by a Meteorite other people have been indirectly hit by space debris after impacts but noone has ever been directly hit by one again by scientific standards. Also contrary to online sources mostly based on old historical accounts that may have been exaggerated or misinterpreted no one has ever been killed by a meteorite in our recent history.

6 hours ago, Tomatobro said:

Did I not read somewhere that there is a town in the USA that has had two Chevys badly damaged by meteorites?

Yes that happened in Peekskill Colorado to a Chevy Malibu

3 hours ago, Tiny Clanger said:

That doesn't mention eye damage at all, but sleep patterns.

"Thanks for visiting! GoodRx is not available outside of the United States", so I can't assess that site. I wondered why, then read the wikipedia page about it, which says "GoodRx Holdings, Inc. is an American healthcare company that operates a telemedicine platform and a free-to-use website and mobile app that track prescription drug prices in the United States and provide drug coupons for discounts on medications."

I read the whole of that, it's not very long, not at all technical, and I couldn't help but note the many mistakes in grammar and punctuation. That lack of rigour is worrying, suggesting as it does a less than adequate peer review system and editorial policy for what claims to be an academic publication. I've no knowledge of that particular publisher, but am aware that there are many dubious sites feeding off  academics need to publish in order to advance their careers. The competition for positions and funding requires they show they have published work. There's even a phrase for it in common use, 'publish or perish'.

Drill down a bit further, look at the references, and they cite for eye damage research on rats, mice and goldfish. Not humans, and all in laboratory conditions on small samples of animals with extremely high intensity light.

I followed another of their references, "O'Hagan JB, Khazova M, Price LL. Low-energy light bulbs, computers, tablets and the blue light hazard." which you can read at https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/26768920/ , the abstract says

"Occasional claims that the light sources with emissions containing blue light may cause eye damage raise concerns in the media. The aim of the study was to determine if it was appropriate to issue advice on the public health concerns. A number of sources were assessed and the exposure conditions were compared with international exposure limits, and the exposure likely to be received from staring at a blue sky. None of the sources assessed approached the exposure limits, even for extended viewing times. "

I'm not getting at you, it's just that there's a lot of background research to be done before it's possible to have a reasonable level of confidence in an scientific article or journal, Unless it is one with an excellent reputation. It's important to know how the system works, approach it with suitable scientific scepticism, and spend time investigating sources, authors, commercial links etc. before you accept an article as a genuinely good source, because science departments, authors, and academics are all under the same societal pressures as everyone else, and scientists are just as human.

It does appear that the temporary effects of strong light on human circadian rhythms are generally accepted as true, with a clear causation from melatonin suppression, but that's an entirely different topic, and is not evidence of possible physical eye damage.

I don’t feel like you’re getting at me the whole reason I started this thread was to open a discussion about this topic and get varying opinions and views. Also I agree with you on some points but you have to agree that when you look at a screen for even few minutes and turn away or blink it leaves a afterimage burnt into your eyes for a brief moment. I know personally I can’t look at a phone screen, LED or or even walk outside on a beautiful sunny day and look at the blue sky with my eyes burning and seeing after images of the light source (shape of the device or light bulb) or swirling static in a blue sky. Anything that does that is damaging your eyes whether you want to believe it or not and you can easily check the light from LEDs with a Spectroscope and headlights, streetlights and most of the lights I have tested with them with my own spectrometer I use to measure the efficiency of filters I order and various other things like identifying leaks in lines but I digress, if you look them through a spectroscope a lot of peak closely to the UV spectrum and trail off into it, this particular light peaked around 436nm and probably dropped in the 250nm range in the UV spectrum and even spikes up in the red as if going into an infrared signature both of which are unfortunately missing (I need to upgrade my software on my Spectrometer)  but you can clearly see what I am talking about.  Sorry for the run on sentences When I get to writing I sometimes forget to put punctuation just keep going it’s a bad habit I need to get out of. 😂

My home state in the USA has a unique history associated with astronomy and space from the NASA and its work on the Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo programs to building components for the ISS and testing Rockets, but it has something even more unique about it that can’t be claimed by many other places in the world, in addition to this unique event there is another one that inspired our original State Tag of Stars falling from the sky in 1934 a historic meteor shower display lit up the sky that was reportedly so numerous and luminous that it was reported that onlookers could read newspapers by the glow of the light cast by trails of shooting stars, it even inspired a Jazz Song the same year by the title “Stars fell on Alabama”  if you wish to hear it.  The Meteorite that hit Anne Hodges is in the Local University History Museum and can be viewed and even touched by visitors if anyone ever finds themselves on this side of the Pond and wants to visit, the University also has a Observatory that has Public Nights where visitors can come to the observatory and look through the massive telescope. (I really wish I had it 😆) but yea here is a link to her story with a photo of where she got hit on her leg enjoy.

https://rarehistoricalphotos.com/ann-hodges-meteorite-1954/

First attempts at deep sky imaging and imaging a globular cluster set experimented with several different exposure times from .8 seconds to as long as a 3 minutes and then different ISO settings until I was generally pleased with this one it’s not great but I think it’s a good first attempt and definitely better than my first attempts at shooting nebula,( please forgive the elongation of the stars it’s 30 C at night with 80% humidity here and impossible to do anything without a fan blowing on me and it sends vibrations through my deck into my mount unfortunately) I used my Celestron 9.25” Nexstar Evolution SCT with a 2” mirror diagonal to get the views of the targets.

16 hours ago, Tiny Clanger said:

https://www.health.harvard.edu/blog/will-blue-light-from-electronic-devices-increase-my-risk-of-macular-degeneration-and-blindness-2019040816365

appears to be a credible source and a qualified author, and says

"Compared to the risk from aging, smoking, cardiovascular disease, high blood pressure, and being overweight, exposure to typical levels of blue light from consumer electronics is negligible in terms of increased risk of macular degeneration or blindness. Furthermore, the current evidence does not support the use of blue light-blocking lenses to protect the health of the retina, and advertisers have even been fined for misleading claims about these types of lenses."

 

https://www.health.harvard.edu/staying-healthy/blue-light-has-a-dark-side a later study that says from a year later counteracting some of their previous findings and showing that Blue light blocking lenses or goggles work for blocking light.  Of course just like polarized sunglasses there are fraudulent companies that make claims that their lenses block light and they don’t work because they don’t have the proper optical properties or coatings.  And though just an Article from Good Rx it’s from 2023 https://www.goodrx.com/health-topic/eye/blue-light-bad-for-your-eyes and it states the findings are still inconclusive and contradictory on blue light from devices and LED’s being harmful meaning there’s Data that shows that it does and doesn’t, considering that it emits light in the same part of the spectrum and depending on the diodes or color of light you’re viewing I suspect it does. Of course then there’s also this exert from the European Book of Research and Pharmaceutical Medicine https://www.researchgate.net/publication/364994490_Effects_Of_Blue_Light_On_Human_Body that state that it is harmful and more research needs to be done 

We have Smartphones, Laptops, LED lighting, LED Televisions our eyes are literally being bombarded with blue light constantly and most studies are showing that it is harmful to our health and our eyes. It disrupts our Sleep Patterns, it can burn our retinas if our screens are too bright, and some studies say it can even cause cataracts, eye cancer and macular degeneration. I know personally if I am on my phone all day or at my laptop and I try to use my scope I often can’t see anything through my eyepiece. Its worse if I spend a whole night observing and go out the next night without adequate sleep, on those occasions I can’t even focus on stars the night sky is a swirling mass of black static and my eyes sometimes go completely dark and I have to call it a night because well if you can’t see anything through your eyepiece then why be out. Perhaps this is a problem that only plagues me but I suspect that some others have the same issues especially with aging eyes or those that wear glasses, in any event it’s not good. Red light displays and Settings are a good solution as they are generally gentler on the eyes and don’t disturb night adapted eyes; but alot of devices simply turn the display red and do nothing for the brightness so be mindful.  There are also special blue light filter lenses for glasses that cut out the harmful glare and protect your eyes this is a fairly good alternative if you do EEA or other activities that have you at a device all for periods at time to protect your eyes. 

My Celestron Dew Heater Ring, Dew Shield, Dew Heater Controller and Baader UHC L Filter arrived as well as my Vibration Suppression Pads that came with my Scope that were backordered since March. Now if my Baader Oii and Variable Polarized Filter will arrive I will have everything I have ordered since May. 

5 hours ago, PeterStudz said:

@StarDuke82, there’s no one way or right way of doing this, especially with smartphones  where there’s a lot of new apps. Personally I find Lightroom (I’m just using the free version) useful for adjusting colours, colour balance, noise and colour noise. Snapseed is also useful but I find the interface annoying! Others might get on with it. And there are other apps that are just as good or maybe even better. 

You could also upload unite images to a PC and use your favourite apps there. Although I can’t do that as I don’t have a PC. Editing on a small smartphone screen, however good it is, makes life a little more difficult - it’s easier to spot issues on a larger screen. Although I find doing everything on the phone rewarding and I bit of a challenge. 

I’m still learning too. And it’s good to see what other people come up with. I’ve only used AstroShader twice and both times I was in a bit of a rush (against the rising sun) and just randomly played with settings. Need to give it another go when I get astro darkness back. 

Yea I noticed how difficult it was trying to adjust the exposure timer, Iso, and White Balance on my phone bout as difficult as controlling my scope through wifi with my phone, probably be much easier with a tablet or laptop doing both, incidentally I checked out the App Store for additional photo editing apps, don’t try Starry Night though it’s supposed to use AI to automatically adjust Exposure and ISO but it is mainly for city scapes and portraits not for astrophotography.

53 minutes ago, PeterStudz said:

Well done. I’ve had some success with AstroShader and you do need to practice. Some settings are definitely off, so keep trying!

However, you can get more out of your images. I hope you don’t mind but I took your M57 and spent about 5 mins editing on my iPhone using the stock camera app, WaveletCam & Lightroom. Here’s the result. 
 

Thank you, and I don’t mind it helps me see what I can do with time. See I’m still getting used to wavelet and I didn’t even think about using light room to edit (slaps self in forehead) I’m used to taking exposures in daylight these fraction of a second ones are tricky to get just right, but I am going to read up on DSO Camera Settings today I was just kinda going at it blindly after reading up on Planetary Settings for Jupiter and Saturn yesterday so I was really just playing around with it. So hopefully with a bit more knowledge and taking some more time I can do better. 

First night since the 4th that it hasn’t been raining or cloudy so early in the evening I took the opportunity to take a few quick photos of Venus for my my Venus project and do a bit of visual observation then I decided to try my hand at imaging properly for the first time since understanding how to time my exposures for astrophotography so I decided to practice for a while on M27, M57, and C22 while I waited for what I had been looking forward to for over a week to try and see and image again Saturn and Jupiter. The night held out just long enough for me to get good images of Saturn but just as Jupiter was moving above the tree line thick clouds moved in but I had stayed out all night and I was not about to give up. I decided to try and observe and shoot images between breaks in the clouds and snap a few quick photos and pack everything in for the night and hope for better results in the wee hours of the morning Wednesday. Despite the clouds rolling in got image the clouds of Jupiter having seen them for the first time just last week, I’m not sure if it’s having an 9.25” scope or just staying outside longer and letting myself get dark adapted but I am seeing more and more now than I ever did with my 6” or 8” scopes. 

Earlier in the evening while waiting for Jupiter and Saturn to rise I decided to to dive headfirst into my night of imaging by trying out some DSO’s specifically M57 the Ring Nebulae, M27 the Dumbbell Nebulae and C22 the Blue Snowball Nebulae all shot with IPhone 13 pro and Astro Shader App, they look really rough especially M27 (it was the first one I attempted) but I plan on trying again tonight weather permitting.