Moon-gazing again last Sunday... playing around with a colour video camera on the 6" R-C... 17 clips each of 250 frames, stacked with AutoStakkert!2, coaxed into one mosaic using iMerge (see previous post), tarted up with Photoshop CS3.
The result is better than expected.
Feel free to click on it to see the full version, but be aware that it might take a while to load - it's about 12Mb:
If that's not enough, there's a ~40Mb .bmp version here.
We've now got all of the bits, they're fitting together nicely:
Should be finished soon.
"The moon is essentially gray, no color; looks like plaster of Paris or sort of a grayish beach sand."
James Lovell, Apollo 8, first transmission from first lunar orbit, 24 December 1968.
More of the jigsaw should follow soon.
It's hard to believe that it's been over a year since I posted anything astronomy-related.
I'm not yet ready for full nights up in the obsy, but unexpectedly I was allowed out to play during the day.
Here are a couple of sunspot pics and a stitched image from a session a couple of weeks ago. Not my best work, but it was fun trying to remember which wires connect what to what, and which software settings are best for the conditions and the data.
Active Region 2529 (17/04/2016).
DMK mono camera with 2.25x Barlow on C80ED-R, Baader Solar Film filter.
Active Region 2532 (17/04/2016).
DMK mono camera with 2.25x Barlow on C80ED-R, Baader Solar Film filter.
Sun (17/04/2016).
Six stitched images from the DMK mono camera on C80ED-R, Baader Solar Film filter.
I have a book which was a gift from Chris and the kids a few years ago, a fair while before I bought a decent telescope and started down the slippery slope of astro-kit buying.
I remember looking at the Andromeda Galaxy image on the back cover and thinking "I'll never be able to get images anywhere near as good as that":
Title: UNIVERSE
Publisher: Dorling Kindersley Publishers Ltd (6 Oct 2005)
ISBN-10: 1405310715
ISBN-13: 978-1405310710
Well...
Andromeda Galaxy (M31).
Subs: 35 light @ 300s, darks and bias frames, ISO800.
1000D on the C80ED-R refractor, guided with PHD.
I doubt that it's cover-worthy but I'm chuffed with it anyway.
Another night or two of imaging should provide enough additional data to allow me to reduce the noise and tease out more of the finer details.
Moon (13/03/2014 @ 22:00 approx). 26 panes stitched with iMerge. Each pane is ~300/~3000 stacked frames. DMK mono CCD camera on the GSRC6M.
