Astrophotography

[Obsolesce]

Mars
Christmas night, 2022-12-25.
Alt: 71°

A better image capture of Mars than last time. It was higher up in the sky, so a little less atmospheric disturbance. I also tried some processing to bring out any detail.
Mars was 56,563,608 miles from Earth when I took the photo. That's about 5 minutes for light to travel from Mars to my camera.

Setup:
5" SCT + 2x Barlow, ASI224MC @ ~2500mm f/20
iOptron mount, tracking: mount-only
FireCapture, shutter 5ms / gain 183 / histogram ~37% (I have more to captures from that night to process that may be better than this, I'm still experimenting)
20% best of 10k light frames
AS!3 + RegiStax6

[scottalanmiller]

Wow, those turned out amazing.

[IRJ]

@Obsolesce said in Astrophotography:

Happy holidays all!

Jupiter Christmas night, 2022-12-25.
Less than ideal seeing conditions and lots of light pollution, but was still able to bring out some detail!
Jupiter was 456,134,146 miles from earth when I took the photo. It took almost 41 minutes for light to travel from Jupiter to my camera. Jupiter is the fifth planet from the Sun, has 80 moons, and is large enough to fit about 1,300 Earths inside.

Can you explain your setup a bit?

[Obsolesce]

@IRJ said in Astrophotography:

Can you explain your setup a bit?

Updated posts with additional info.

[pmoncho]

@Obsolesce
I stole the Jupiter pic from you. So darn cool.

[JaredBusch]

@Obsolesce Some nice shots. Scratches my photography itch again, as well as my love of space.. Must resist..

[Obsolesce]

@JaredBusch said in Astrophotography:

@Obsolesce Some nice shots. Scratches my photography itch again, as well as my love of space.. Must resist..

Thanks! It's a horribly deep rabbit hole, and I'm only scratching the surface. Be warned!

It's amazing to see that stuff with your own eyes. It's a totally different feeling than just seeing someone else's pictures. You're actually seeing it in real time, it's actually there... whether it's a planet, galaxy, nebula, Moon, etc. You can actually see the Orion nebula with the naked eye, which is awesome, even better with long exposures!

Going out, looking, taking the pictures, all that's involved in that, processing the photos and videos. It's so fun and goes so deep, enough to be an interesting lifelong hobby. I wish I had taken the step a long time ago.

[Obsolesce]

I want to do more planetary and DSO astrophotography (there's some good ones to capture right now) , but it looks like I won't get a chance for a while...

[Obsolesce]

Moon
2022-01-10

Well, because I won't have any clear nights for awhile and therefore cannot go out and see the stars, I thought I'd go back and see if I have any old Moon photos.

I found one from soon after I first got my telescope, learning how to use it. It will be nice to compare to the next time I capture the Moon in 2023 now that I've had some practice.

Setup:
I didn't get some of the image capture details, but this is what have:
5" SCT, Focal reducer/corrector, Fujifilm X-T4 @ ~787mm f/6.3 (I think, will update later)
PIPP + AS!3 + Lightroom

[Obsolesce]

Updated with links to the final images on AstroBin.

[Obsolesce]

Full Moon
2023.01.06 @ 21:32
Alt: 55°

First night out in a few cloudy/rainy weeks, next week or two the same
I did a little bit of everything of what I could. Dew point reached, everything got wet that wasn't in a heated dew shield, which thankfully the telescope was.

Setup:
5" SCT + Fujifilm X-T4 @ ~1250mm f/10 - 3840x2160
iOptron mount, tracking: mount-only
Fujifilm Camera Remote
FPS: 29.97 / Shutter 1/250 (4ms) / ISO 320 / Histogram 50-75%
Dynamic Range: 200%
70% / 450 light frames
PIPP + AS!3 + RegiStax6 + Lightroom

Same shot, different processing:

[Obsolesce]

I finally had a clear night since getting my new camera. Although I wasn't prepared for the surprise clear night, I still got out for a few minutes to get a decent shot of M 42 (Orion Nebula) before my portable power unit died.

I'm excited to report that with only less than 20 minutes of data via EAA live stacking, I was able this get this awesome shot in my insanely light polluted area thanks to the L-Pro filter.

This gives me a lot of hope that once I am able to get out there and get a couple hours of data, I'll be able to get something awesome.

Below, M 42, an ad-hoc 18 minutes of data with a blown out core and a satellite streaking across (thanks Elon).

Hoping for some more clear skies in the near future and a trip to some darker skies!

[DustinB3403]

@Obsolesce All amazing pictures!

[RojoLoco]

@pmoncho said in Astrophotography:

@Obsolesce
I stole the Jupiter pic from you. So darn cool.

Yup, I'll be using these for desktop backgrounds. Awesome pics @Obsolesce!

[Obsolesce]

@Obsolesce said in Astrophotography:

I finally had a clear night since getting my new camera. Although I wasn't prepared for the surprise clear night, I still got out for a few minutes to get a decent shot of M 42 (Orion Nebula) before my portable power unit died.

I'm excited to report that with only less than 20 minutes of data via EAA live stacking, I was able this get this awesome shot in my insanely light polluted area thanks to the L-Pro filter.

This gives me a lot of hope that once I am able to get out there and get a couple hours of data, I'll be able to get something awesome.

Below, M 42, an ad-hoc 18 minutes of data with a blown out core and a satellite streaking across (thanks Elon).

Hoping for some more clear skies in the near future and a trip to some darker skies!

Updating with an auto-stacked photo ~58 minutes of data, and some minor post-processing. I want to stack properly, get some more data, add in some calibration frames. Going to add in here to track progress and compare.

[Obsolesce]

Some quick fun with Jupiter during the daytime evening before the clouds rolled in, again.

Trying to get back into some planetary work. I have to relearn it, it's been a long long time.

I don't think this one turned out so well, but I think if I redo it later and spend some more time processing and learning, I can get it better. A night-time image would help too.

I think my old one was much better. I spent more time on it and used a tutorial.

Another:

Another:

[DustinB3403]

@Obsolesce Is Jupiter always at a 85% angle?

Thats crazy, I would love to be able to see that myself but lord knows I wouldn't have the patience to source a telescope/camera and to figure out where another planet is...

Good job man!

[Obsolesce]

@DustinB3403

Thanks! There's a learning curve for sure, but it isn't bad. Well worth it if it's your thing.

The angle of the image is determined by my camera's rotation. I have mine attached at about a 0 degrees. So when the telescope is in it's zero-position, my camera has no rotation angle (or close). I don't care about the rotation when doing planetary. With DSOs such as nebulae and galaxies, I generally do care about camera rotation for framing purposes.

The part that takes the most time is the processing of the images. It's a whole different world of understanding and practice.

[DustinB3403]

@Obsolesce so yes, Jupiter is at a 85% angle all of the time... right?

[Obsolesce]

@DustinB3403 No, it depends on where Jupiter is in the sky, where Earth and Jupiter are in their orbits relative to each other, Earth's rotation/angle, my camera's rotation, and my telescope's positioning.