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spaceman_spiff

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Everything posted by spaceman_spiff

  1. Thanks for the replies, I do have a spare vixen dovetail and I can run a screw through one of the holes but the spacing is different on the lens foot so I can only get one screw in. I may have to drill a new hole through the dovetail bar to get this to work...
  2. Hi there everyone, I was recently loaned a long telephoto lens (Canon EF 500mm F4), it's a fantastic lens and I really want to do some AP with it but I am not sure what's the best way to mount it. I have a AZ EQ6 mount with an ADM Side-by-side bar which accepts both Vixen and Losmandy dovetails. Does anyone know of a solution. Here's a couple of photos: The mounting bar currently attached to the lens foot is too wide for a Vixen attachment bar and too narrow for a Losmandy. Thanks everyone 😀 Dan
  3. Really nice sequence! Well done.
  4. From the album: Planetary work

    A two image sequence of Venus taken on 16/04/2020 and 24/04/2020. I plan on adding more images to capture the changing crescent. Telescope: SW Skymax 150 with a TelVue 2x Barlow lens. Camera: Canon 550D with a Baader Fringe Killer filter. Images taken on 640x480 movie crop mode at 60fps. ISO 200 exposure 1/100. Processing: Movies were centred and quality filtered using Pipp and then stacked with Registax. The Giff image was created using GIMP.

    © D Elijah

  5. Thanks so much, very kind of you to say :). I actually dialled back the sharpening on it because it just didn't look right. I started observing the planets way before the imaging and it is so easy to get carried away with the processing to drag out every bit of detail forgetting that you are losing that 'clean' look you get with visual observing (I am definitely guilty of it!). I wish Mars was in a better position but it does get better later this year.
  6. Nice result! I got a similar view with my Skymax 150. I want to go out again soon and capture the crescent thinning! Dan
  7. Really good timelapse, nicely done. Interesting when the street light turns off you see the sky glow and then the flood light turns on next door; sort of a rock and a hard place. Even so, your sky looks great overhead.
  8. From the album: Planetary work

    This is a re-processed set of 159 images taken from a few years ago. Each image was generated from a 3 minute video. It shows Europa passing across the face of Jupiter casting it's shadow across the northern hemisphere. Telescope: Skymax 150 Maksutov with a TeleVue 2x Barlow lens and a Baader fringe killer filter. Camera: Canon 550D in 640x480 crop mode. ISO Auto at 1/60s exposure. Processing: Quality filtering and centring done using Pipp, stacking and wavelets processing done using Registax 6.

    © D Elijah

  9. From the album: Planetary work

    This is a re-processed image from some videos I recorded on a trip to Somerset in 2018 during the Mars Opposition. Unfortunately, I lost the exact day of the recording. Telescope: Skymax 150 Maksutov with a TeleVue 2x Barlow. Focal length was approximately 3600mm. Camera: Canon 550D unmodified at ISO 200 with 1/60 exposure. Video was recorded in 640x480 crop mode at 60fps. Processing: Video formatting, quality control and centralising done using Pipp, stacking and tweaking done using Registax.

    © D Elijah

  10. spaceman_spiff

    Venus

    From the album: Planetary work

    Stacked image of Venus taken on 16/04/2020. Image generated from 2000 640x480 frames taken at 60fps. Telescope: Skymax 150 Maksutov Telescope with a TeleView 2x barlow giving a focal length of about 3600mm Camera: Canon 550D in 640x480 center crop mode. ISO 800 and 1/800s exposure. Video converted and processed using Pipp and then Registax.

    © D Elijah

  11. Imaging tonight - All aligned, focused and framed, i'm on M51 atm.  :)

  12. The light hitting my camera was almost half a billion years old! Quite unbelievable really...
  13. There is a very faint elliptical galaxy just below and to the right of the star I labelled...it could be that.
  14. Interesting...Thanks for the reply Waddensky. 6.3% of NGC objects are single stars or not locatable! That's a lot!
  15. I almost forgot I had this one. Its a copy of the 'New Popular Star Atlas' from 1974.
  16. A silly topic, but it has been bugging me for a few days... I was looking at all the named objects in the area around M13 and I noticed NGC 6199 shown as a Dark Nebula. On Google, it is shown as a single star...I don't see how these objects made it into the NGC (I assume there must be other objects like it in the NGC). Was it compiled more like a historical list before people really knew what the objects were?
  17. @Rocket Stars Thanks for the kind comments! I think good flats make a big difference. My image is suffering because there is a street light making the right side of the image slightly brighter. @BrendanC When I used a short interval (1-5 second) I found that there was residual charge left in the pixels from the previous exposure which causes weird effects in the next image. 15 seconds allows any charge to dissipate before the next image is taken. I use the interval for my Darks, Flats and Bias frames as well. I wrote a post about the issue a while back.
  18. From the album: Photos from Bury

    Date taken: 21 and 23 March 2020. Camera: Astro-Modified Canon 600D. Telescope: SW Esprit 100 with Field Flattener and Baader U-HCS filter. Mount: AZ-AQ6 mount Image: 60 light subs (3 minute with 15 sec interval) with master dark, Flat and bias each made from 80 subs. Comments: The Pinwheel Galaxy is a favourite goto object for me. There is good detail here but not quite beating my image obtained in Salisbury a few years ago. There is no substitute for a dark sky. The larger FoV of the Esprit 100 does capture the smaller galaxies in the background well though. I may try to add more subs to this one.

    © D Elijah

  19. From the album: Photos from Bury

    Date taken: 21 and 23 March 2020. Camera: Astro-Modified Canon 600D. Telescope: SW Esprit 100 with Field Flattener and Baader U-HCS filter. Mount: AZ-AQ6 mount Image: 65 light subs (3 minutes each with 15 sec interval) with master dark, Flat and bias each made from 80 subs. Comments: My latest attempt at this target with my new Esprit 100. The increase in contrast and detail is very pleasing.

    © D Elijah

  20. From the album: Photos from Bury

    Date taken: 22-23 March 2020. Camera: Astro-Modified Canon 600D. Telescope: SW Esprit 100 with Field Flattener and Baader U-HCS filter. Mount: AZ-AQ6 mount Image: 41 light subs (3 minutes each with 15 sec interval) with master dark, Flat and bias each made from 80 subs. Comments: My second attempt at the Iris, a target that I have always found difficult. I can now start to see some of the detail that others show so well in their images. I am very pleased with it!

    © D Elijah

  21. Finally got my Esprit 100 in the post! If it's clear, i'll set up a star test to see how it performs.

  22. Mine is almost here! I've set aside a special spot for it in the spare room...
  23. I ordered one in mid June, I keep having to remind myself it's coming!
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