First Astrophotograph - The Moon :-

[LunarLight]

Hey guys

I saw that there was a small gap in the clouds and figured I would give this photography a go.

This is my first image so its a little out of focus which sucks and its also shot through a thin layer of cloud. Any advice on shooting or editing you guys can give would be much appreciated.

by the way how do you take close up pictures without a lens or a eyepiece in the scope? is there a specific adapter other then a T-adapter

here is a link to the full size image: http://img34.imageshack.us/img34/230/astrophotographymoona.jpg

[Lee85]

) awsome its 1 million times better then my try

[LunarLight]

hey thanks, appreciate the compliment :-)

cant wait for the sky to clear and try my hand at m31 or something though

[LunarLight]

so...does anyone have any advice on how I might improve focus or process this image? at all?

[davidscanlan]

Nice pic...quite atmospheric :-)

Well done

Dave

[Shibby]

so...does anyone have any advice on how I might improve focus or process this image? at all?

I've recently started using a Bhatinov mask and find it a very handy focusing tool. Nice image though, better than my first attempt at the moon.

[jgs001]

It's a very good attempt, the mist is clear in that, which isn't going to be helping the focus.

I hope you don't mind, I had a quick play using GIMP..

A gentle S curve to boost contrast, a quick adjust with colour balance (I've not quite got it right), and a high pass filter sharpen

Let me know if you want me to take it down.

[LunarLight]

thanks for the compliments guys

jgs001 - wow thanks alot :-) I can see the improvement that you have made! thats cool.

Is this GIMP worth getting then? a better question, I guess, is it easy to use considering I have no experience processing images at all.

you can leave it up its cool :-)

[davidscanlan]

Yeah GIMP is quite good....bit hard for me at times lol :-) but its free so why not give it a go

Just google it....becareful what links you follow though as typing GIMP into search engines can bring up some unwanted links lol :-)

Dave