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My first Jupiter for ages (my first anything for ages actually!!)

Helen

By Helen
in Imaging - Planetary

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Helen

Helen

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I was out for the first time for months on Friday. I originally had plans about getting the full gear set up and working again, but got taken in by just viewing - really enjoyed myself! Then Jupiter appeared and it seemed a shame not to try and capture it with the webcam. It was still pretty low and focussing was a nightmare. The moons seemed to be squirting around! I didn't really nail focus, but thought I needed a bit of processing practice so I've finally got around to giving it a run through Registax 4. Lots of trial and error (mostly the latter :)) and here's the image. (The monitor in the Obs here is not the best so sorry if the colour is off!)

Nexstar 8 SCT on a wedge. Toucam at f10. 530 stacked from 895 at 10fps.

Suggestions for improvements very welcome!

It was fun to imaging again though :)

Helen

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Helen

Helen

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I'm a bit confused about the RGB align in registax :) I did estimate and then moved the arrows so the values went down to zero. Is that right? or does the software align automatically and in effect I double corrected??

Thanks

Helen

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minimalist

minimalist

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Looking very nice Helen, and great job of cleaning up Peter.

As far as the alignment, yep, the values registax came up with are the corrected alignment, setting them back to zero just puts everything back the way it was originally. Once you click estimate and the numbers change, you're done. :)

Daniel

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brianb

brianb

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It might be worth RGB aligning before applying the wavelets as well.

When I was using a colour camera I found it didn't make much difference. The wavelet sharpening in Registax applies seperately to the RGB layers which can then be dragged into alignment. However RGB aligning beforehand makes it easier to judge the effect of the wavelet sliders. Even if aligning first it's worth trying again afterwards too, you sometimes find that RGB alignment shifts by a pixel or two as a result of applying wavelet sharpening (or deconvolution, or simple unsharp masking, which appear not to be options in Registax so please don't ask where to find the features!)

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red dwalf

red dwalf

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This is what I wanted to do ! Great picture Helen, I`m green with envy, I`m struggling even to focus anything with the webcam with my 6" sct, will keep trying though.

can i just ask a question ?

I see that you only used f10 focal, I thought that the more you increased the focal length with a barlow, the more detail you can pick out and therefore better picture, is this right ? or am I barking up the wrong tree.

Rob

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Helen

Helen

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Thanks for the advice guys! I feel a re-process coming on.

Rob, I was using f10 because I was just playing really. Jupiter was also really low and I'm not sure how much magnification the seeing could have taken. But as a general point, yes increase the magnification until the optimum point of detail is reached.

Helen

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brianb

brianb

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I thought that the more you increased the focal length with a barlow, the more detail you can pick out and therefore better picture, is this right ?
If you can focus the thing .... trouble is, as the focal length increases, the exposure time required gets longer so the seeing usually manages to make the individual frames blurrier, making it harder to get even a good approximation to correct focus. On Saturday night I shot Jupiter both at prime focus (f/10) and with a 2x barlow ... I thought I had the focus reasonably well nailed but there's far more detail in the prime focus images.

I certainly suggest working at f/10 until you get more practise.

It's a pity you can't get a good quality "low power" barlow ... say 1.5x ... hint to anyone looking for product ideas:cool:

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minimalist

minimalist

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Brian, I think GSO makes a 1.5 barlow in a 2" version at that, and from what I hear gso barlows are pretty decent. I use a celestron ultima, the chinese made version, and even pushed to 2.7x (it's 2x native) I get barely a 1, maybe 2 pixel shift between red an blue channels. I had compared head to head against a 2.5x powermate a couple of years ago and found it equal to the powermate in terms of contrast and resolution. It was actually better at color, the powermate had a yellowish cast I didn't like.

You can actually reduce the power of a barlow btw by using a shorter version of the barrel that attaches to the back of the lens elements. You may have to fiddle to find the right length barrel and thread. What I did to mine is the reverse. I took the lens cell and mounted it inside a different tube which is longer in the back, thus giving the extra mag.

Hope this helps, and sorry Helen for hijacking your thread.

Daniel

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brianb

brianb

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Now I've uplaoded it it looks worse than the original :)

Actually it's fine, just ab bit too bright .... pull down the gamma. It's very hard to predict what any image will look like when uploaded / on someone else's system unless you have your monitor profiled ... mine is.

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