Venus 4th March 2009.

Dashed out in between the rain to catch this.
The seeing wasn't up to much and Venus is getting really low in the sky now (so there's lots of rubbish to see through). I thought I'd play around with the DMK camera Gamma settings to see if I could bring out a bit more of the crescent.

Saturn 1st March 2009.

Another night of poor seeing, was clear though ;-)

The Moon 28th Feb 2009

Taken with Canon Powershot Afocal using a 32mm lens and f/6.3 FR.

Venus 28th Feb.

C9.25, 2.5 x TV Powermate, homemade IR filter & blue filter for the luminance channel.

RegiStax 5 is released (beta)

There's a new version of RegiStax 5 out. It's looking good.



Some quick tests:-

Venus 21st Feb 2009.

Another from the other day taken with my 4 x Imagemate.

Comet Lulin.

Here's one frame, 30 seconds at 1600 ISO. That's all I managed before the clouds rolled in. Hardly Astronomy Picture of the Day material ;-(
I went out later as well, but I couldn't find it then! although it wasn't very clear, very misty. Not conducive for comet hunting.

Venus 21st Feb L-RGB.

L-RGB from this afternoon. The L (luminance channel) is actually my usual Celestron Wratten #25 Red filter.
This image was taken with a 3 x TV Barlow.
I don't know what causes that halo around the edge, it was on all the images. Although the seeing was a bit bouncy.

Hoping to image comet Lulin tonight, although the clouds may beat me, we'll see.

Venus 15th Feb 2009.

Good seeing again tonight. I managed to dash and capture a few images of Venus in between the clouds. One using my 2.5 x Televue Powermate and the other at prime focus on the C9.25. I used a Celestron Blue filter.
Venus is really big in the EP, looks gorgeous!

Saturn Moon Rhea transit.

I've used an enhanced green filtered image as a luminance channel to bring out the Moon Rhea transit.

Saturn 14th Feb 2009 re-processed.

Thought I'd have another go at re-processing this one already.
I used the (crtl-cursor keys) in CS4 to get a better colour channel alignment. And kept the colour tweaking to a minimum to give it a more natural look and feel.

Saturn with 2.5 x TV Powermate.

Image printed in Sky at Night Magazine.

I have one of my images from a few months back printed in the March issue of Sky at Night Magazine.
Copernicus.

Saturn 14th Feb 2009 CalSky image

That's no storm! it's the shadow of the moon Rhea, I knew that ;-) just testing.
Thanks Torsten from CN
CalSky.

Saturn 14th Feb 2009.

You can see that the storm had moved from my previous blog entry image that was taken using the red filter and the one below taken later with the green.
It's smudged out in the LRGB.

Storm on Saturn 14th Feb 2009.

Good seeing tonight... at last, and I think I've picked up a storm in one of the belts.
Colour to follow in the morning.

Couple of interesting articles.

Both articles are from the Palomar Skies blog and are about the 200 inch telescope.

May 7, 1949 issue of Collier's. First light report.

&
Amica magazine article PDF

Saturn 11th Feb 2009

Still waiting for that good seeing night... but in the meantime.

Saturn from a couple of years ago...

Re-processed in Photoshop.

OT: More snow

We had some more snow yesterday.
Haven't seen as much snow since 1963!! yes I am that old.
I was going to the Astrofest today with my mate Ray, but I chickened out.

Below my BMW, I took off the same amount of snow the day before!

Venus 7th Feb 2009

Fairly good seeing early afternoon, although it did get worse when I started to do LRGB.

Below RGB.

Below LRGB


I also got up at 2:00 am this morning to image Saturn, but I didn't get anything because the seeing was that bad, apart from a broken nights sleep :-(

Snow, snow, snow, snow...snow.

Had 4 inches of snow today. First time it's snowed properly here for years.

M31 from 2008

Since the weather is rubbish at present, it's time to re-process my M31 again!
I think I've cracked it, this is my best process to date.

Warning largish files.
Below is a version using Photoshop CS4 Distort & Lens Correction as a pseudo field flattener.

Crescent Moon - 31st Jan 2009

29 image mosaic, prime focus, C9.25, red filter, bad seeing.

Venus.

Getting more crescent shape.

The Moon & Venus - 30th Jan 2009

The Moon & Venus.

OT: Funny picture.

Venus 24th Jan using L-RGB filters.

OT:Frosty car

Bit cold the other morning.

Orion Nebula

C9.25, f6.5 FR, Canon 400D EOS, 45 x 30sec, darks, flats, bias.

Venus RGB 18th Jan 2009

Venus in RGB, very poor seeing.
2x barlow lens screwed onto the end of the DMK, so it's about 1.5x mag.

... and with a green filter and 3x barlow.

Venus 17th Jan 2009

A quick Venus from early this evening.
There's gonna be a storm tonight, so I've battened down the hatches on the observatory, i.e. screwed the roof down ;-)

Venus.

Good seeing tonight; C9.25, 3 x TV barlow, DMK21AF04AS, red & blue filter.

Aristarchus crater.