Space Cowboy

1 hour ago, Kon said:

I should give that a try for the colour as I usually boost the saturation and it can look a bit artificial in the end.

Yep, I should have added I also use colour noise reduction after increasing vibrance.

Looking good!

Nice detail on those!

3 hours ago, Kon said:

Very nice capture and you have clearly caught the south polar cap clouds as well. I like the colour balance as well.

Thanks Kon! It was nice just to see some detail on screen after my previous couple of outings staring at mush.  

I do like to use colour vibrance in image analyser rather than saturation to keep the colour looking natural.

9 hours ago, neil phillips said:

Quite clean though Stuart. Will need better seeing to get more detail. Welcome to the UK sabotage skies Mars club. Love the colour. 

Thanks Neil. I thought my stock eyepiece holder was doing the sabotaging when I was getting a wonky reading from the laser collimator at the start of the night. Still got doubts about how well collimated this scope is. Good seeing would probably clear any paranoia! 

Tremendous detail in those!

Personally I wouldn't sharpen that much because of the limb artifact issue but you could use selective sharpening in image analyser to avoid the artifact popping out. I find the rind tends to flatten the image so you lose the globe effect.

Finally got some Mars data last night but only at 40 degrees as cloud and rain were forecast after 10pm. First outing with my new OLED laptop which made the seeing look better than it was on screen.

6 min SER @465fps producing 137000 frames. Quality controlled in PIPP selecting best 10000 frames then 80% stacked in AS!3.

Pretty ordinary image after all that!

250 flextube dob+ 3x tv & ext with asi 224mc producing f18 :

21.51ut

Another creditable image Kon.👍

I've not seen a earth based animation of Jupiter like that before. Its space probe quality! Mesmerizing!

As a farmer I can verify that is a very fine Sow's ear 😉

Nothing poor about those images Neil. Remarkable detail considering! The 10" newt certainly resolves more of the polar cap.

Looks like another good training session before we have Caribbean seeing at opposition 😉 Conditions were quite poor at my end as the rain beating against my bedroom window was keeping me awake 😜

Nice detail despite the conditions Neil. It's frustrating when the weather turns like this when Mars is nearing opposition. I remember the same thing happening 2 years ago.

As Craig says a 3x Barlow would be better, then you can go beyond f15 with an extension tube which is what my setup is for my f5 Dob and 224mc cam. At f10 you are only in the foothills of Everest but over f15 you're reaching the summit and in very good weather you can go for glory at f20.

Welcome to mainstream planetary imaging 🙂 You can use an extension tube to give more fl the body of another Barlow works well or simply pull the cam nose further out from your Barlow or a combination of both.

The cap is something else! As Kon said it's so 3D. I've never seen Mars look like this before.

They look a damn sight better than the ball of mush I got last week lol 

That's pretty decent considering its f21 😎

Well done Vani, Geof, Kon & Neil! Tremendous collection of images. Remarkable what Kon is producing with a manual Dob! 

Super captures! Wall to wall rain here. Maybe if I got a manual Dob I'd have more luck with the weather 😉

Certainly better than what I got the other night 🙂

13 hours ago, geoflewis said:

Thanks Stuart, that's very kind of you; now that I've picked myself off the floor....!!

I guess it was that polished DP look that I was after, but I couldn't convince myself about it, they just seemed too smooth, so maybe something between is what I should try for. I asked Richard McKim, BAA Mars Section Director which he prefered and he said that he thought the sharper version had more merit from a scientific content standpoint, so I've gone with that. I will keep experimenting. Cheers.

Scientists certainly wouldn't be interested in what I produced over the weekend as conditions have been dire here. You're producing some great detail under the circumstances Geof. Ideally we'd all want to produce sharp smooth shots but UK seeing doesn't always allow it so we have to compromise one for the other at times. 

Super images Geof! Must confess i prefer the smoother version which gives it an almost dare I say it Damian Peach feel 🙂

32" monitors are not very forgiving when it comes to noise 🙂

Lots of detail on that one for sure!

Nice level of detail Lee.