Rosette Nebula
I reprocessed 20×150 sec, ISO 800, F/4 raws of the Caldwell 49 Rosette nebula using my star handling routine as a step. The camera was the Canon 1100D mod, and the mount the old EQ3. Light acquired on 2016-04-03 at Gyerőfidongó/Dângău Mare.
Veil Nebula, about 4 hours
In summer 2015 I acquiered some 4 hours of light with the then unmodified Canon 1100D and the Canon EF 200mm f2.8L II USM. I gave it another try to see how processing the old raw material turns out, deploying my star handling program. I think the result shows improvement.
The Milky Way in Chepheus and Cygnus
I imaged the Cygnus-Cepheus region of the Milky Way characterized by bright emission nebulae, countless stars and dark clouds of interstellar dust. Deneb with NGC 7000 North America and its neighbour, the Pelican, and gamma Cygni with the nebulae rules the upper right corner of the frame, while on the left the much fainter IC 1396 holds the Elephant’s Trunk. Downwards from the center the Cocoon Nebula ( IC 5146 / Caldwell 19) is also visible, amongst other fainter and less prominent deep sky objects.
This time I used the cheapest lens I have, the Canon EF 50mm f/1.8 II in manual focus mode, which is held tight and in focus by some hard wire I put on it. Although dialed to F/4, it performed pretty well, given the circumstances. In order to avoid having bad corners, I made a mosaic with big overlaps. So the HEQ5 mount held the Canon 1100D mod camera on a ball head, with the lens. 50×3 minutes, ISO 800, F/4. I also used the healing program – source code below.
NGC 7000 as I processed it on 2016-09-22
Back in December 2015 my modded camera had the first Ha-enhanced light. As I keep most raws, I dag up those in order to test whether my processing abilities have evolved. One aspect is the healing algorithm I wrote to handle the dense star fields – ie: remove all highlights and their immediate context and fill the holes from the remaining image data. Canon 1100D mod, 20×110 sec, ISO 1600, Canon 200mm f/2.8 lens dialed to f/4.5, EQ3 mount, unguided. More than fairly dark sky of a place near Dangau Mare, Cluj county, Romania. (tovább…)
F.Balázs: NGC 7000 area – There is something wrong with these colors
There was some debate about a picture published on the asztrofoto.hu website, whether the unfortunate colors are a result of processing or there is something wrong with the lens or the camera being used. The author (F.Balázs) published several similarly miscolored pictures and I thought I would investigate. The author was kind enough to publish one of his raws, which I could use to verify some theories about what could have gone wrong and where. The picture to the right is the one published on the asztrofoto.hu forum. The metadata is Author: F.Balázs; Date: 2016-08-28 00:00; Optics: Nikon 300mm f4 fix; Mount: SkyWatcher HEQ-5 Pro with Syntrek; Camera: Nikon D700 (NOT modified); Exposures: 44*300s ISO 1600; Location: Hódmezővásárhely. It is obvious that something is very off. (tovább…)
Dark Skies 2016 Astrocamp, Rotunda Pass
Amateur astronomers from Máramarossziget/Sighetu Marmației organized the Dark Skies 2016 Astronomy Camp at the Rotunda Pass. The area is one of the last remaining dark spots in the EU, so dark that the clouds appear to be dark brown/black.
The camp being meant mainly for visual observers, had no electricity, just a generator run in the evening, during the dinner to recharge the gadgets. It is the owner’s fault we had no running water at all, an issue I would have imagined for the savanna/desert in Namibia, not the Romanian countryside with a long estabilished cabin with as much water that my jacket got wet in a clear night. So much for the level of civilisation and decency. (tovább…)
M16
I imaged the Messier 16 and Messier 17 objects, the Eagle and the Swan Nebulae. My specific target was the Pillars of Creation region in the M16, a region best known due to the Hubble space telescope.
I set up my instruments – Canon 1100D mod @ 150/750 Newtonian with corrector on HEQ5, unguided – at Gyerőfidongó (Dângău Mare, CJ) on a field with decent sky. I took 30×60 sec of each object, ISO 1600 of M16 and ISO 3200 of M17.
Gamma Cygni region, 32×30 sec, ISO 3200
As a plan B, I imaged the γ Cygni region with my usual equipment, the Canon 200mm @ f/3.2 Canon 1100D mod 32×30 sec, ISO 3200, HEQ5 PRO. Plan B, because I forgot to bring the screws which set the altitude/latitude of the mount, thus effectively criplling the mount’s precision. With some non invasive, duct tape improvisation I managed to take surprisingly good 30 sec subs at 200 mm, the 150/750 newtonian being out of question. This is the result.
Calea Lactee, regiunea Antares și Marte
Ochii noștri nu prea fac față în întunericul nopții. Vedem stele, da, vedem dunga Căii Lactee, dar nu și culorile, nu și detaliile zonelor împodobite cu nori de praf și de gaz. Cu toate că acestea nu sunt deloc mici. Adică aveam nevoie de pupile mai mari (mult mai mari) dar nu și de telescop (mărire).
În primul rând se remarcă planeta Marte care aproape că distruge peisajul stelar: această expediție din 2016 a fost nefavorabilă pentru fotografierea regiunii, mai ales cu telescoape unde apăreau fel de fel de reflexii ciudate din cauza luminii relativ intense, chiar dacă Marte însuși nu apărea în câmp. În această poză Saturn apare alb, la marginea de sus a pozei, formând triunghi aproape dreptunghic cu Marte și Antares.
M16, M17
Cele două nebuloase, în engleză Eagle (M16) și Omega (sau Swan, M17) sunt ușor vizibile și din România, în constelațiile Șarpele și Săgetătorul, fiind printre țintele preferate ale amatorilor în timpul verii. Totuși, din Namibia se văd aproape de zenit, împreună cu zona centrală a Căii Lactee. Acest fapt plus cerul impecabil le fac ținte evidente pentru astrofotograful plecat în expediție.
M16, sau după roi, NGC 6611 este o zonă tânără cu un roi deschis al cărui lumină ionizează gazul relativ dens din jurul lui, regiunea HII fiind catalogată ca IC 4703. Se află la cam 7000 ani lumină și se întinde 50-70 ani lumină, ceea ce se traduce într-o pată pe cer de cam un sfert din diametrul lunii pline. Totuși, ea are doar magnitudinea șase, la limita capacității ochiului uman, și se pierde în anturajul deosebit de luminos al Căii Lactee. Roiul deschis cuprinde cam opt mii de stele dintre care una binară (HD 168076), este de 1 milion de ori mai luminoasă ca Soarele.
