Jupiter with an iPhone and 10" Dark Star dob

[Bruce Leeroy]

Hi people , I've been enjoying Jupiter and trying to capture it on an iPhone 4s below are my attempts using an  8x monocular  telescopic lens (the type that is attached to a phone case) then attached that to a 32mm eyepiece.

 

If you tap and hold the screen it will lock AF/AE and allow you to manually alter the exposure level and lock the focus allowing manual focus to the telescopes focuser without battling the iPhone's built in automatic focus.

Other thing that helped was a very useful find in Poundland..they have a remote selfie button for use with android or ios, basically a low cost remote shutter button.

Telescope used is a 10" Dark Star dobsonian I have no idea of it's focal length but I imagine it to be around 1200, it's terracotta red in colour if anyone knows the focal length or any details on this dob I'd appreciate the info?

(pic 1 is the 1st shot taken no GRS in view, pics 2-3-4 show a hint of the GRS).

No post processing

[Pete Presland]

Fabulous,  especially for a I phone. 

[laudropb]

Very good capture for an IP

[Bruce Leeroy]

Thanks, just finished tweaking the alignment of the monocular and iPhone lens (it was slightly off center in the pics above hence the double moons) ...hoping for a slightly better image when the weather permits, GRS is visible tonight between 8-10pm.

[Stu]

Nice one Bruce. I dabble a little in the dark art of dodgy iPhone shots too. I use a couple of apps which you may find handy.

Procam 3 I think it is now, this gives you much better control of the exposure and focus of the camera

PS Express is basically a simple processing app which allows you to adjust a which range of parameters and get the best out of your images, all just in the phone.

Do you have a bracket to attach the phone to the eyepiece? That's another thing which can help with better results.

Stu

[Bruce Leeroy]

Cheers Stu, I use a plastic cover that came with a barlow lens it fits very snugly over the 32mm eyepiece leaving a 2" length of plastic tube protruding out and this is where I insert the 8x monocular which is glued to an iPhone cover..I have a few camera apps and am currently testing them. I like the remote shutter from Poundland but the app that uses it (snap remote) has only the basic camera settings, I do have another app (VSCO) where you can adjust alot more parameters but I don't think it has a zoom setting and pinching the screen doesn't seem to bring up the zoom slider.

Thanks for the heads up and tips I'll take a look at the programs you mention.

 

Bruce

[Stu]

Not sure if you saw my efforts. They were with a 4" frac. They don't have the colour you achieved and are grainy, but the belt detail and moons are visible. The second one is the original, first one cropped and processed quite heavily.

The last one is my attempt at M42, again cropped and lightly processed

 

[Bruce Leeroy]

1 hour ago, Stu said:

Not sure if you saw my efforts. They were with a 4" frac. They don't have the colour you achieved and are grainy, but the belt detail and moons are visible. The second one is the original, first one cropped and processed quite heavily.

The last one is my attempt at M42, again cropped and lightly processed

 

 

 

Yes they inspired me to join/post today, didn't see M42 though that's my next target, the seeing for Jupiter right now is poor so no progress there atm, going to try again sometime after midnight when it's not above any close rooftops.

I recently acquired a Schmidt Bender draw scope 15-60 x 60 but haven't really tested it yet and I'm reluctant to Magyver any type of iPhone holder to it, I think it might have the edge on the dob...where did i put my sticky tape and zip ties lol, I also have a 4" frac but only 600 focal length.

How do you attach your iPhone and do you use a Barlow or eyepiece of any type?

I believe the official iPhone headphones can be used to snap the shutter if you didn't know that.

 

[Stu]

31 minutes ago, Bruce Leeroy said:

Yes they inspired me to join/post today, didn't see M42 though that's my next target, the seeing for Jupiter right now is poor so no progress there atm, going to try again sometime after midnight when it's not above any close rooftops.

I recently acquired a Schmidt Bender draw scope 15-60 x 60 but haven't really tested it yet and I'm reluctant to Magyver any type of iPhone holder to it, I think it might have the edge on the dob...where did i put my sticky tape and zip ties lol, I also have a 4" frac but only 600 focal length.

How do you attach your iPhone and do you use a Barlow or eyepiece of any type?

I believe the official iPhone headphones can be used to snap the shutter if you didn't know that.

 

Excellent, welcome aboard ??

I have an Orion Universal Steadypix mount which attaches to 1.25" eyepieces, the smaller ones with straight side anyway. It works well with an iPhone 5, but I upgraded to an iPhone 6 Plus which doesn't fit and typically the 5 stopped working almost the same day I upgraded. So, I now handhold the phone at the eyepiece,take plenty of pictures and select the best.

My frac is only 740mm focal length, but using an eyepiece which gives a decent magnification, say x150 or x180 you get a reasonable image scale.

I may try modifying the Steadypix to take the 6 Plus as that certainly helps. Thanks for the tip about the cable, didn't even think about that! ??

I would think the 10" would outperform the 60mm, far greater resolution which is what you need on planets.

[Chris]

As a phone luddite, shots like these make my mind boggle......I'd still be happy with a Nokia 3210! 

[Stu]

1 hour ago, Chris Lock said:

As a phone luddite, shots like these make my mind boggle......I'd still be happy with a Nokia 3210! 

Chris, it is quite amazing what they are capable of. I think I'm right in saying that smartphones are driving development and improvements in sensor technology which can only be a good thing. There are things my phone does that make it better than my 1000D in certain ways!

[cuivenion]

What with some smartphones being capable of long exposure now it would be interesting if a model had a removable lens, so you could use at prime focus. It could be useful for outreach as well. Excellent pics for an iPhone by the way.

[Chris]

6 hours ago, Stu said:

Chris, it is quite amazing what they are capable of. I think I'm right in saying that smartphones are driving development and improvements in sensor technology which can only be a good thing. There are things my phone does that make it better than my 1000D in certain ways!

I think you're right Stu, CMOS sensors do seem to be taking over from CCD's! I read that Sony (whose CCD chips are used for ATik camera and the rest) are going to stop production of CCD's in favour of CMOS pretty soon. Phones, tablets etc do seem to be driving CMOS technology forward at quite a rate.

I looked at this recently as I wanted to pick up an old Atik 16 CCD for a bit of DSO imaging, but after researching went for the ZWO ASI120MM with CMOS sensor as it's QE was so high at 75%, it was cheap new, and could do a bit of every type of imaging not just DSO's   

[Bruce Leeroy]

10 hours ago, Stu said:

I would think the 10" would outperform the 60mm, far greater resolution which is what you need on planets.

To be fair the 10" dob is far from optically perfect, when I first removed the primary mirror it didn't really cast a reflection of any kind and as it had a few millimeters thickness of stuff and fluff so after a blow/rinse/soak/clean/rinse it still needed more attention as the coating was oxidizing..I tried alot of things from lemon juice/white vinegar to tartare sauce to remove some of the oxidization, when the mirror is initially rinsed it looks very nice but as it dries it goes misty but where the mirror clips have been stays very reflective. The mirrors need a recoating but that will have to wait for the right timing (when the Mrs is distracted).

 

I was hoping to take a better image of Jupiter last night but something wasn't right I don't know if it was the seeing or the fact I removed the secondary mirror and moved it up the tube by about 5mm to center the mirror to the focuser, something I was wondering about is the optical path between the primary and secondary I would guess ultimately that ideally the closer together the mirrors are the wider the cone of light is that hits the secondary mirror ie more of the secondary surface is used, I wonder if that's more desirable. Either way last nights images seem to have some extra colour fringing and are not as sharp as the pics above, maybe centering the iPhone's camera iris to the light path is too much and having it slightly off gives a better light balance...just my thoughts not questions :).

11 hours ago, Chris Lock said:

As a phone luddite, shots like these make my mind boggle......I'd still be happy with a Nokia 3210!

Me to Chris, this iPhone is just for imaging .

 

8 hours ago, cuivenion said:

Excellent pics for an iPhone by the way.

Thanks cuivenon I'm enjoying finding the limits of what I can do with it!

[Bruce Leeroy]

20 hours ago, laudropb said:

Very good capture for an IP

Thanks laudrobp!

21 hours ago, bunnygod1 said:

Fabulous,  especially for a I phone.

Thanks bunny!

[Bruce Leeroy]

Double moon transit captured on iPhone.

Unprocessed

[Stu]

2 minutes ago, Bruce Leeroy said:

Double moon transit captured on iPhone.

Unprocessed

Impressive stuff! Amazing detail for single unprocessed shots

[Bruce Leeroy]

[Bruce Leeroy]

doh