Uranus 30/11/2017

[Astro_king]

Hi Guys,

My first attempt at Uranus. Used 10mm eye piece projection method to capture this shot, 0.5sec sub at ISO1600.

Many lessons were learnt in the end and now looking forward to imaging again next time with better planning/foresight.

Enjoy

[Knighty2112]

Nice work. Well done!  

[Pieter]

That result is stunning! Thanks for sharing!

[nightfisher]

Have you zoomed the image, looks pretty big

[Astro_king]

55 minutes ago, nightfisher said:

Have you zoomed the image, looks pretty big

I have yes as I didn't see much loss in pixels upon cropping at first. But that was pre-processing. It was pretty decent at 10mm eyepiece projection already compared to the tiny dot when seen from the eyepiece itself.

Unfortunately, I didn't expect much from the image at 10mm as it had a haze around it so took 100+ images at 25mm instead when it just looked like a small dot still better than prime focus. This is just 1x sub post processed at 10mm. The disk became apparent during post processing. Wish I had taken a lot more subs. I intend to image uranus again at 10mm but take loads of subs to stack in registax6. I can't take a video from my 450D so this is what I am confined to.

Thanks.

[barkis]

The planet is showing a gibbous phase, but Starry Night depicts it as full phase.
The superior planets do exhibit phases, but they are rare, and the Earth Sun and outer planet geometry
has to be in place.

[Astro_king]

26 minutes ago, barkis said:

The planet is showing a gibbous phase, but Starry Night depicts it as full phase.
The superior planets do exhibit phases, but they are rare, and the Earth Sun and outer planet geometry
has to be in place.

Thanks for the info Barkis.

I was wondering the same thing. With Uranus only recently passed opposition, I had expected a normal full circle. Also, in the 10mm eye piece it didn't resolve to a complete disk but more of a slighltly oval shape very small to detect. Only when I took the image it became clear that it might be going through a phase.

 

[Moonshane]

That's very impressive. What scope were you using?

[celestron8g8]

I agree , awesome capture and color ! I also want to know what scope were you using ? I remember back when I imaged Uranus I found it only by sky maps and scanning the area cause I don't have a go to mount but I do have tracking motors on my CG-5 . Best view I had was with my Celestron 25mm Plossi .  Mine was very small but very distinct .

[Astro_king]

Thanks guys. I used a C8 to capture this.

Clear skies!

[Tim]

10 hours ago, barkis said:

The planet is showing a gibbous phase, but Starry Night depicts it as full phase.
The superior planets do exhibit phases, but they are rare, and the Earth Sun and outer planet geometry
has to be in place.

 

Probably just the SCT is a little out of collimation Ron.

[barkis]

No doubt that would distort the disc Tim.
Eyepiece projection requires exacting alignment too.
The original image wouldn't reveal the distortion, only when he blew it up
did he assume the Phase?? aspect.

[lukebl]

21 hours ago, barkis said:

The superior planets do exhibit phases, but they are rare, and the Earth Sun and outer planet geometry
has to be in place.

I think you'll find that Uranus is at such a distance that its gibbous phase, even at quadrature, is so slight as to be imperceptible, i.e. 99.9%.

Also, given that the planet's disc is tiny and virtually featureless, I often wonder if the images I see of the planet are simply out of focus blobs. Not saying that's necessarily so in this case, though.

[michael.h.f.wilkinson]

You can certainly resolve Uranus with a C8. I have managed that with my C8 and ASI224MC in the past. There was even a hint of a colour gradient matching what was seen in more detail by the guys with C14s and other big guns. I would guess collimation is somewhat off in this case. If it were seriously out of focus, I would expect a bit of a donut shape

 

[Luna-tic]

23 hours ago, Moonshane said:

That's very impressive. What scope were you using?

 

22 hours ago, Astro_king said:

Thanks guys. I used a C8 to capture this.

Clear skies!

There's hope for me yet, then.

Great first effort. I've only seen it visually so far in my Edge 8". Since you cropped the image some, were any of the Moons visible in your subs?

[barkis]

Useful info. here.

http://www.nakedeyeplanets.com/uranus-telescope.htm

[Kokatha man]

Sorry to pour cold water on your attempt A-K, but apart from the colouration (which is good) your image isn't indicative of what you could either expect nor achieve with the equipment!

I'd like to see the RAW image from your dslr & also hear what post-processing applications you applied to this image, to make a better appraisal of how it might have eventuated...

Please don't take this as a negative post, one suspicion I have is that you have arrived at an image that "might" be defocused & distorted by the seeing, leaving aside collimation etc issues; that & any post-processing applications as well, possibly...

Ourselves (my partner Pat & me) as well as numerous other planetary imagers have been successfully imaging Uranus (& Neptune also) for several years, "resolving" cloud banding & even storm features (rare for Uranus, but Neptune is quite active on the other hand) - we work closely with numerous professionals re the Ice Giants (see our website for further images) so naturally when I see images such as your own presented I not only examine them but also like to investigate their background!  

[MarsG76]

Thats massive... did you think about recording Uranus through a IR filter?.. might get some atmospheric detail.