Saturn March 4th 2008

[Brinders]

Hello all,

Here's my second attempt to image Saturn last night. 693 frames out of 1007 stacked in Registax and processed in Photoshop Elements2.

CCD security cam with 1/3" Sony CCD chip using an Atik IR blocking filter and x2 times TAL barlow attached to a Celestron C9.25 on an EQ6 Pro mount.

Brinders

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[viperwhite33]

hi there. nice image. ive done a couple last night. how do u put them on the computer. as im new on here any help would be appreciated.

[dweller25]

Hello Brinders,

Great shot, the seeing was very poor that night.

Have you tried playing with the wavelet settings in Registax to bring out some more detail ?? I used the Dyadec wavelet scheme and found the second slider bar was the best.

D25.

[beamish]

That's an xlnt capture Brinders. Well done.

Karlo

[Becky]

That is an awesome shot. Well done. I saw Saturn through my little refractor on that same night, it was a lot smaller but had quite an impact.

Saturn is awesome!

:saturn:

Peace and Clear Skies.

Becky.

[Brinders]

Hi Dave,

Yes, I did manipulate it in Registax before completing the processing in PS Elements. I moved Wavelet channel 6 up a notch. Moving the other 5 channels sharpened up the detail but gave a very artificial look that didn't look at all natural. This image was the most satisfactory I could obtain (i.e. pleasing to me). Better seeing and greater magnification may give a more impressive result. I'll try your method though first.

I'm thinking of obtaining the 3x TAL Barlow. I have two TAL 2x Barlows at the moment, but stacking them gives a very poor image. I'm thinking 3X might be the right compromise for the security cam and scope combination and give a larger image.

I was rather more pleased with the results of this last session than the first. My first lot of images of Saturn taken a couple of weeks ago had a definite green cast I couldn't remove. When I looked at the RGB element I realised no red channel had been recorded and I still don't know why. This time, as you might appreciate, I was able to record all 3 RGB channels. Just some sort of glitch in either the software or hardware I guess.

Still can't get a good image of Mars though and now it's getting so small that I don't think I'll bother. Time to do more lunar imaging and have a crack at some deep sky with my DSLR I think.

Viperwhite 33,

If you use a small CCD security cam as I do, it will have a BNC connection. You then need a lead with a BNC female connection at one end and an RCA at the other. To convert from analogue to digital a video grabber is required which will have an RCA female plug for video (and two others for sound which you don't use). You connect the BNC end of the lead to the cam and the RCA plug into the video grabber. The video grabber has a standard USB plug at the other end. You plug this into a USB socket on your computer. You also require some video capture software that will capture video in AVI format. The free K3CCD tools are used by many but it won't work with my set up - you need the full version if using analogue to digital. Otherwise 3rd party commercial video capture/editing software that will capture and write AVIs (I use Videowave because I have a copy and know the software).

The final piece of equipment you will need is 1.25" C thread telescope nose adapter (see E-bay) to replace the camera lens. You then attach the camera to the scope either at prime focus (i.e. pointing into the star diagonal) or via a Barlow as I did here. Then you point your scope with an eyepiece in place align your target and once in view swap it for the cam with the capture software and hardware setup and running. Hopefully you will see the image of your target on screen and away you go! With a guided scope it is easy to keep it there. With an unguided scope let the image drift across the frame. What you are capturing is video of the target through your scope. Capture for about 500 to 1000 fames. You can then use the free software Registax (Google for a link) to align the captured frames and do some post processing. Similar principle with a Web Cam as Dweller 25 uses, but you don't need any additional leads - just plug the web cam straight into the USB port of the computer. You'll still need the video capture software though and an adapter for the web cam (you won't be using the web cams lens).

That's it in a large nutshell.

Thank-you all for the positive comments.

Brinders.