michael.h.f.wilkinson

Sunny again in southern France, so more solar data grabbed. WL: Ca-K, grey scale: Ca-K, pseudo-colour: Ca-K, part inverted: Ca-K, part inverted + pseudo-colour: Some big proms visible, with what looks like a detached prom at the 9 o'clock position. H-alpha data to follow

Absolutely lovely

Shot a longer SER file in H-alpha (4000 frames rather than 1000) to see how much detail I could extract from one of the more active areas. Grey scale: Pseudo-colour: Part inverted: Part inverted + pseudo-colour:

After the usual Wl and Ca-K disks, I grabbed a series of 1000-frame SER files for a 15-pane, full disk H-alpha mosaic. Seeing was a bit up and down, which meant I re-shot a few before I was content. I stacked 25% of each in AS!3, sharpened in ImPPG, and stitched in MS-ICE. Final postprocessing in GIMP. Grey scale: Pseudo-colour: Part inverted: Part inverted + pseudo-colour:

Got the rig out in the sun again, and landed a decent set of WL and Ca-K disks. Seeing wasn't too bad, once the thin cloud that plagued me earlier in the day had dissipated White light: Ca-K, grey scale: Ca-K, pseudo-colour: Ca-K, part inverted: Ca-K, part inverted + pseudo-colour: Will post H-alpha results shortly

Given all the ARs on the southern hemisphere, I decided to take a 4000-frame shot of that area. Grey scale: Pseudo-colour: I then gave two of the proms a similar process, but rendered them as part inverted for more detail: Grey scale: Pseudo-colour: Grey scale: Pseudo-colour: Hadn't spotted the big proms on the southern hemisphere so didn't get a similar SER file for those.

After grabbing Wl and Ca-K, I got some H-alpha data for a mosaic. I made 13 SER files of 1000 frames each, stacked 25% of the best frames with AS!3, sharpened in ImPPG, stitched in MS-ICE, and postprocessing in GIMP. Grey scale: Pseudo-colour: Part inverted: Part inverted + pseudo-colour: Clicking for full-size images highly recommended. I got a few more longer SER files to bring out more detail in the proms and the most active areas on the southern hemisphere. Will post these later

Had another bash at solar imaging with the usual rig. Seeing was fairly good, so quite some detail captured. WL: Ca-K: grey scale: Ca-K, pseudo-colour: Ca-K, part inverted: Ca-K, part inverted + pseudo-colour: Some prom activity coming through in Ca-K. H-alpha to follow shortly

Got the C8 out yesterday, and despite rather jittery seeing grabbed 8 1000-frame SER files with the ASI183MC. Stacked 25% in AS!3, stitched the panels in MS-ICE, then sharpened the result in ImPPG (which turns the result into 16-bit grey scale). I loaded the original colour mosaic and the ImPPG result in GIMP, blurred the colour version with a Gaussian, decomposed it into L, A, and B channels, recomposed the result with the sharpened grey scale as L channel, and the A and B channels of the blurred colour version (blurring the colour version reduces noise when increasing saturation). I am quite pleased with the result, given the seeing. Result after slight contrast stretch: Increasing saturation slightly yields this Clicking for full resolution highly recommended

Made a 14-pane mosaic using the APM 80 mm F/6 with Baader TZ-4 tele-centric lanes, Beloptik Tri-Band ERF, Solar Spectrum 0.3 Å, and ASI174MM camera. Grey scale: Pseudo-colour: Part inverted: Part inverted + pseudo-colour:

Got the APM 80 mm F/6 out with Beloptik Tri-Band ERF for some solar fun First WL with the Lunt Herschel wedge and Solar Continuum filter Then Ca=K with the Lunt B1800s Ca-K module Grey scale: Pseudo-colour: Part inverted: Part inverted + pseudo-colour: H-alpha mosaic to follow

I like to have the two screens available, and didn't want to have two instances of APT squabbling with each other

I only used H-alpha as lum because the stars in the RGB data were lousy in the corners (will add a couple of spacers). I am still working on my own star exterminator code. I will add more RGB data with L filter, and more H-alpha and O-III, and see where this gets me.

I only have rotation as degree of freedom, it seems to be enough

Yes, I have the F/2 version (als O-III and S-II)

Set up the dual Samyang 135 F/2 rig yesterday. Managed to get 70 minutes of H-alpha with the ASI183MM-Pro and 60 minutes with the colour camera using an L-Enhance filter. The H-alpha data came out relly nicely. Astro Pixel Processor created this version: Which is perhaps a little harshly stretched. I tried a subtler stretch to arrive at this: Adding colour husing H-a as luminance and the RGB as RGB, I got this: Not perfect, as the RGB camera still needs a few spacers to get the sensor distance right, and the alignment of the two cameras in terms of rotation was off, but I am happy with this first result

Got my dual Samyang 135 F/2 rig gathering data on the North America Nebula Two laptops attached, one for each camera. Apart from the images being in opposite orientation, the fields of view seem to overlap nicely.

Shot a full disk mosaic (17-pane) with the APM 80 mm triplet, ASI174MM, Beloptik Tri-Band ERF, Baader TZ-4 4x tele-centric lens, and Solar Spectrum 0.3 Å H-alpha filter. I first got one set of 1000-frame SER files, and took some longer ones of the huge arcing prominence. The seeing turned better during the imaging session, so I shot a second batch of 1000-frame SER files which turned out much sharper than the first batch. This mosaic is the result of the second batch. Grey scale: Pseudo-colour: Part inverted: Part inverted + pseudo-colour: The huge prom on the left is stunning, but there is a little bright patch on the righthand limb which was showing a lot of activity. I shot it repeatedly and I think there are some post-surge loops developing there in this lat shot. I will try to process the other shots later, and create a little sequence.

Got the solar imaging rig out in the sun in southern France, seeing was a bit up and down, but the detail captured was still pretty good. WL, grey scale: WL, pseudo-colour: Ca-K, grey scale: Ca-K, pseudo-colour: Ca-K, part inverted: Ca-K: part inverted + pseudo-colour: Some prom activity visible in Ca-K. All images taken with my APM 80 mm F/6 triplet, with ASI174MM camera and Beloptik Tri-Band ERF. WL with Lunt Herschel wedge and Solar Continuum filter. Ca-K with Lunt Ca-K B1800s module I also imaged in H-alpha. Will post those images shortly.

Very nice image. I might well want to have a go at that myself in my upcoming trip to southern France

That was my thought, although the ASI183MC-Pro doesn't make use of the full FOV of the lens

Me too. I have an option to replace the front rings with guide-scope rings, for adjustment. I also intend to add a focus fine-tuning system. As I mainly plan to do larger mosaics with this rig, exact alignment might not be that critical. Focus will be.

Just got a second Samyang lens in, and constructed a new dual imaging set-up, featuring two Samyang 135mm F/2 lenses, an ASI183MM-Pro with EFW2 filter wheel for monochrome luminance and narrow-band imaging, and an ASI183MC-Pro, for one-shot colour imaging. Hope to test this on a trip to France soon.

Mine has arrived as documented elsewhere. Really looking forward to some serious observing and imaging with it

Managed to take the brand-new AM5 out for a quick spin yesterday, and am very impressed so far. The build quality is excellent, stability great. I set up the Meade SN6 6" F/5 Schmidt-Newton, first with the Nagler 31T5, later with the equally hefty ES 12 mm 92° eyepiece. The mount skewed rapidly and tracked effortlessly, vibration damping easily on a par with the venerable Vixen GP-DX. Had some nice views of the Ring Nebula with the 12mm EP in particular. I still need to sort out polar alignment and go-to functions better (will probably use the ASIAIR-Plus for that), but I am very pleased so far. With the power supply I was using, I did get an occasional message of low voltage in the AM5 app, but only when slewing rapidly. The LiFePO4 battery I just got had no such problems, so I need to use a more powerful 12 V power supply when using mains voltage. What I like is that you can also just slew around with the joystick, ignoring all advanced go-to stuff, although the controls do take some getting used to.