Uranus and northern polar hood (31/08/24)

[Kon]

An early start with Uranus as we are still far from opposition. The norther polar hood and the 5 main moons are nicely resolved. The moons are from left to right: Oberon, Miranda, Umbriel, Titania and Ariel at the bottom. False coloured from an OSC capture. Skywatcher 300P Flextube Goto, asi462mm, IR pass 742 filter, zwo ADC and 2.5x TV powermate. 10 min capture.

A crop before any colour addition

 

Edited September 1 by Kon

[Space Cowboy]

The big gun is starting to bear fruit!

[Kon]

13 minutes ago, Space Cowboy said:

The big gun is starting to bear fruit!

Thanks. Absolutely. It took me 30min of capture with my 8" to get it last year. I am after its rings this season 🤪.

Have you had your operation yet? It will be great to have you back imaging.

[Mr Spock]

Very nicely done. A very difficult target!

[Kon]

1 hour ago, Mr Spock said:

Very nicely done. A very difficult target!

Thanks. Very pleased with the result.

[Space Cowboy]

3 hours ago, Kon said:

Thanks. Absolutely. It took me 30min of capture with my 8" to get it last year. I am after its rings this season 🤪.

Have you had your operation yet? It will be great to have you back imaging.

That would be something 😉

Had my left eye done just over a week ago. Hopefully will have the other done within 6 weeks. For now I'm reading and typing with one eye closed. 😝

[Kon]

16 minutes ago, Space Cowboy said:

For now I'm reading and typing with one eye closed

Arrrrr.... ☠️🦜... sorry I had to. Very good to hear that it all went well. It sounds you might be good to go for planetary opposition.

[CraigT82]

Very nice capture, excellent work! Last time I tried Uranus was about 3 or 4 years ago I think with the 8.75” Fullerscope… didn’t get Miranda (at mag 16.1 I think it was) with it as just a bit too faint so glad to see the 300mm aperture can get it nicely. 

[Kon]

8 minutes ago, CraigT82 said:

Very nice capture, excellent work! Last time I tried Uranus was about 3 or 4 years ago I think with the 8.75” Fullerscope… didn’t get Miranda (at mag 16.1 I think it was) with it as just a bit too faint so glad to see the 300mm aperture can get it nicely. 

Thanks Craig. Actually, if you do a long capture with an IR pass filter you should be able to get Miranda with your setup; you will need to stretch the image a fair bit to see it. I managed it with my 8" manual Dob last year:

https://stargazerslounge.com/topic/416370-uranus-with-5-main-moons-251123/#comment-4435478

 

The 12" just needed a shorter capture to see it. I am optimising things to try for the rings this year.

[CraigT82]

13 minutes ago, Kon said:

Thanks Craig. Actually, if you do a long capture with an IR pass filter you should be able to get Miranda with your setup; you will need to stretch the image a fair bit to see it. I managed it with my 8" manual Dob last year:

https://stargazerslounge.com/topic/416370-uranus-with-5-main-moons-251123/#comment-4435478

 

The 12" just needed a shorter capture to see it. I am optimising things to try for the rings this year.

Ahh that’s awesome I hadn't seen that post… must have been the sky conditions then that prevented me getting it with the Fullerscope, or maybe just not long enough exposure. IIRC I used 60x 1sec exposures with a L filter for the moons. Will have to try again with the 300p and see what’s what.  Never thought of going for the rings before, didn’t think it was possible tbh but I see there is a few images on Astrobin showing them 👍🏼

[JeremyS]

That is impressive @Kon 👍🏻👍🏻👍🏻

[Kon]

42 minutes ago, CraigT82 said:

Ahh that’s awesome I hadn't seen that post… must have been the sky conditions then that prevented me getting it with the Fullerscope, or maybe just not long enough exposure. IIRC I used 60x 1sec exposures with a L filter for the moons. Will have to try again with the 300p and see what’s what.  Never thought of going for the rings before, didn’t think it was possible tbh but I see there is a few images on Astrobin showing them 👍🏼

Have a look at this post from @geoflewis Geoff who seems to have got them last year:

https://stargazerslounge.com/topic/416671-uranus-rings-1-dec-2023-maybe/#comment-4438101

Your 300P will be excellent to try.

 

 

[Kon]

37 minutes ago, JeremyS said:

That is impressive @Kon 👍🏻👍🏻👍🏻

Thanks Jeremy. It's nice when things work out.

[bosun21]

Very nice Kostas. I have yet to have a serious effort on Uranus. I was out a few days ago and captured Saturn, Jupiter and Mars. Unfortunately the seeing was poor with a bit of interference from the Jetstream also. I had some nice detail on Mars coming through. I am hoping for a clear Jetstream free night this coming week to coincide with the opposition of Saturn. Fingers crossed 🤞.

[geoflewis]

1 hour ago, Kon said:

Have a look at this post from @geoflewis Geoff who seems to have got them last year:

https://stargazerslounge.com/topic/416671-uranus-rings-1-dec-2023-maybe/#comment-4438101

Your 300P will be excellent to try.

 

 

Thanks Kostas,

However, I think the jury is out on whether I actually got the rings. I submitted my images to Mike Foulkes at the BAA and he in turn shared them with Martin Lewis. I had a few email exchanges with them both and whilst they thought mine was a good effort, neither of them were convinced that I got it, so I'll probably try again this year, if not overwhelmed with imaging Jupiter, Saturn and Mars.

Edited September 1 by geoflewis

[Kon]

36 minutes ago, bosun21 said:

Very nice Kostas. I have yet to have a serious effort on Uranus. I was out a few days ago and captured Saturn, Jupiter and Mars. Unfortunately the seeing was poor with a bit of interference from the Jetstream also. I had some nice detail on Mars coming through. I am hoping for a clear Jetstream free night this coming week to coincide with the opposition of Saturn. Fingers crossed 🤞.

Thanks Ian. Frustrating, especially when you stay up or get up early to do some imaging. It seems the best seeing was Friday morning but I was coming back from holidays and missed it. 

[Kon]

30 minutes ago, geoflewis said:

Thanks Kostas,

However, I think the jury is out on whether I actually got the rings. I submitted my images to Mike Foulkes at the BAA and he in turn shared them with Martin Lewis. I had a few email exchanges with them both and whilst they thought mine was a good effort, neither of them were confinced that I got it, so I'll probably try again this year, if not overwhelmed with imaging Jupiter, Saturn and Mars.

I am thinking of trying Tom's combo of filters although Martin is keeping it simple.

It sounds like that you might be imaging soon? 🥳 

(I will message you later in the week)

[geoflewis]

Just now, Kon said:

It sounds like that you might be imaging soon?

Hi Kostas,

Probably not particularly soon. We had friends from America here from 22 Aug, then spent a few days at our daughter's in Hampshire, getting back home this evening. I have a follow up review with the orthopaedic consultant on Tuesday, hopefully to discharge me after my replacement hip surgery back in February. On Wednesday we head back to our holiday home in North Norfolk, where there are a bunch of maintenance jobs to be done, before I have eye surgery on 9 September. With everything that's happened this year I've really lost my astro mojo, but hope to get back in the saddle sometime sooner or later....🤷‍♂️

[bosun21]

29 minutes ago, geoflewis said:

Hi Kostas,

Probably not particularly soon. We had friends from America here from 22 Aug, then spent a few days at our daughter's in Hampshire, getting back home this evening. I have a follow up review with the orthopaedic consultant on Tuesday, hopefully to discharge me after my replacement hip surgery back in February. On Wednesday we head back to our holiday home in North Norfolk, where there are a bunch of maintenance jobs to be done, before I have eye surgery on 9 September. With everything that's happened this year I've really lost my astro mojo, but hope to get back in the saddle sometime sooner or later....🤷‍♂️

Good luck with your upcoming op Geoff.

[orion25]

Awesome image, Kostas. Great to see you out there again!

Reggie

[Kon]

6 hours ago, orion25 said:

Awesome image, Kostas. Great to see you out there again!

Reggie

Thanks Reggie. Back from summer holidays and I am glad I did as the rest of the week is looking awful with clouds and rain ☁️🌧️

[Space Cowboy]

15 hours ago, Kon said:

Arrrrr.... ☠️🦜... sorry I had to. Very good to hear that it all went well. It sounds you might be good to go for planetary opposition.

Funnily enough I have an eye patch coming today... unfortunately the parrot was out of stock. 😉

[Planetary Observer]

Cracking image 😎

[neil phillips]

Great work Kostas 

[morimarty]

Excellent work Kostas. What a brilliant project you are doing.