View allAll Photos Tagged SharpCap
The Moon, about 3 days before full moon (Colongitude 61°).
Object: Moon
Colongitude: ~61°
Optics: Celestron 9.25 F10
Mount: Sky-Watcher EQ6-R
Camera: ZWO ASI 183MM Pro @-20°C
Filter: ZWO EFW 7x36mm, ZWO 36mm Filters
Panels: 7
Exposure: R 10% of 400 Frames
Date: 2018-10-21 21:50:00Z
Location: Schwaig
Capture: SharpCap 3.1
Image Acquisition: Stephan Schurig
Image Processing: Stephan Schurig
AutoStakkert 3.0.14: Analysis, Stack
Photoshop 20.0.0: Unsharp Masking, Smart Sharpen w. Denoise, HighPass Sharpening, Color Balance
First attempt at this object. Several hours of data here taken during a very cold, clear evening. I guess the monkey is looking up to the upper right here. Okay then...
NGC 2174 is an H II emission nebula located in the constellation Orion and is associated with the open star cluster NGC 2175. It is thought to be located about 6,400 light-years away from Earth.
Image Details:
- Imaging Scope: William Optics 61mm Zenithstar II Doublet
- Imaging Camera: ZWO ASI183MC Color with UV/IR Blocking filter
- Guiding Scope: William Optics 66mm Petzval
- Guiding Camera: Orion Starshoot Auto Guider
- Filter: ZWO Duo Band (HA & OIII)
- Acquisition Software: Sharpcap
- Guiding Software: PHD2
- Capture Software: SharpCap Pro (LiveStack mode with dithering)
- Light Frames: Set One: 10x5 mins @ 250 Gain, Temp -30C. Set Two: 40x2 mins @ 250 Gain, Temp -30C
- Dark Frames: 10*5 mins, 40x2 mins
- Stacked in Deep Sky Stacker
- Processed in PixInsight, Adobe Lightroom and Topaz Denoise AI
Technical data:
Celestron 114/900 Newton
camera QHY5L-II-C
filter Uv -Ir cut
Sharpcap, Autostakkert 3, Registax 5.1
Autostitch, Camera raw, Adobe
Photoshop
Date: 2021 December 16
Location: Cabras, Italy
Taken from Oxfordshire, UK with a William Optics 70mm refractor, Celestron 3x Barlow and ASI120MC camera, when the Moon was a 40% illuminated Waxing Crescent. A 2,000 frame video shot with SharpCap Pro, the best 25% were stacked with Autostakkert! 3 then processed in Lightroom and Fast Stone Image Viewer
Only 1.8% of the named lunar craters are named after women, but this segment of the Moon shows two of them.
Hypatia was born sometime around 350 - 370 BC, and she was a very well respected mathematician and astronomer from Egypt who taught philosophy and astronomy at her father's school. She became a martyr for philosophy following her murder.
St. Catharina was a Christian martyr. However, what's interesting is that Catharina was a legendary figure who is thought to have been based on Hypatia, so technically Hypatia has two craters named after her. I find it funny that the mythical figure got the larger of the two craters!
The western edge of the Veil Nebula supernova remnant in Cygnus is known as the Witch's Broom. Its Hydrogen and Oxygen regions are entwined in a lacy red, white and blue structure which flies high in the summer night sky.
Tech Stuff: Borg 71FL at native 400mm focal length; IDAS LPS-V4 filter; Baader MPCC; ZWO ASI1600MC; 99 minutes of 12 second exposures stacked live in SharpCap Pro; iOptron CubePro 8200 mount guided with PHD; Processed with PixInsight. Imaged from my yard 10 miles north of New York City.
Skywatcher 200p on NEQ6 mount. ASI294MC Pro camera. Optolong CLS-CCD filter.
Approximately 2000 0.75ms images at gain 121 and sensor temperature -20C. Recorded as a .ser video and the best 50% of the images used by Registax to align and stack.
30th October 2020
Test image using the new ZWO Duo Band Filter of the Sword of Orion Region. this is in HA and OIII. Getting decent data. There's a lot of "stuff" in this image, so it's hard to tell if the filter is picking up extra dust and gas or if I have some sort of issue. Now I need to learn how to process these (splitting channels etc.) and merge with RGB...
Image Details:
- Imaging Scope: William Optics 61mm Zenithstar II Doublet
- Imaging Camera: ZWO ASI183MC Color with UV/IR Blocking filter
- Guiding Scope: William Optics 66mm Petzval
- Guiding Camera: Orion Starshoot Auto Guider
- Filter: ZWO Duo Band (HA & OIII)
- Acquisition Software: Sharpcap
- Guiding Software: PHD2
- Capture Software: SharpCap Pro (LiveStack mode with dithering)
- Light Frames: 12*5 mins @ 100 Gain, Temp -20C
- Dark Frames: 12*5 mins
- Stacked in Deep Sky Stacker
- Processed in PixInsight, Adobe Lightroom, Photmatix Pro HDR and Topaz Denoise AI
m31_core-252x8-g2098-imx224-85f5_6
I was playing around here and wanted to see how much of M31 I could pick up in under 35 minutes.
Technical:
252x8 sec @ 2098 Gain (100-5000 range.)
Televue TV-85 at F/5.6
Rising Tech Sony IMX224 Eyepiece/Guider Cam
Atlas EQ-G w/EQMOD
Orion 30mm Ultra-Mini/Orion Starshoot, PHD Guiding2
Sharpcap 2.9
Bortle Red zone conditions.
Leo Triplet (M65, M66, NGC 3628) - A cosmic sad face!
5/4/21 and 6/4/21
A triplet of gravitationally bound galaxies approximately 35 million light-years away in the constellation of Leo
Equipment:
- Skywatcher HEQ5-pro (Rowan Belt Mod)
- Canon 800d (modded)
- Explore Scientific ED APO 102mm F7 FCD-100 Triplet Carbon Fibre
- Hotech SCA 1x field flattener
- ZWO ASI-120MM-mini guide camera
- Skywatcher Evoguide 50ED guidescope
- 2 inch mounted Optolong L-Pro
Acquisition:
- Sharpcap polar alignment, ASCOM guiding/dithering with PHD2
- APT image acquisition
- Lights - 67 x 300s ISO400 (5 hours 35 minutes)
- Darks – 25 + 25
- Bias - 30 + 30
- Flats - 30 + 30
Instagram @paradoxctor and @inourcosmos
I have previously imaged this emission/reflection nebula, which like the Rosette shows a circular red region around a cluster of young, hot stars. I had doubts however regarding capturing the dark nebula (Barnard 168) that forms a tail leading off to the west. I generally prefer using a color camera for simplicity but in this case tried a mono astrocam with LRGB filters, which successfully revealed the tail. Conditions in my yard were as good as they get, with my SQM-L meter reading 18.6 to 19.1 during the course of the evening -- still Red Zone (or typical light polluted suburb).
Tech Stuff: Borg 71FL at native 400mm focal length; IDAS LPS-D2 filter; Baader MPCC; QHY163M; 80 minutes of 8 second exposures (20 min each of L, R, G, B) stacked live in SharpCap Pro; iOptron CubePro 8200 mount guided with PHD2; Processed with PixInsight. Imaged from my yard 10 miles north of New York City.
Feb 2, 2020. 21x30 sec, Gain 42, Offset 15, -20C, QHY183c, UHC-S filter, Televue TV-85 at F/5.6. Bortle Red zone. SharpCap 3.2 livestack w/dither.
I tracked the comet for 2 hours on Feb 1. I could not see it visually, but the camera revealed the comet moving swiftly against the background stars and clouds. Here I have assembled the 90 frames as a 5 second timelapse.
Borg 55FL/ZWOASI1600MC/IDAS LPS-V4/ 90 X 1 minute stacks of 4 second exposures using SharpCap. Processed with PixInsight, PIPP, and ACDSee Luxea. From my yard in Yonkers, NY.
Third attempt at this. Better than the last, but a long way to go. I couldn't tell if there was some high-level cloud in the area, which would have affected quality.
NGC 7635, also known as the Bubble Nebula, Sharpless 162, or Caldwell 11, is an H II region emission nebula in the constellation Cassiopeia. It lies close to the direction of the open cluster Messier 52. The "bubble" is created by the stellar wind from a massive hot, 8.7 magnitude young central star, SAO 20575.
Image Details:
- Imaging Scope: William Optics 61mm ZenithStar APO
- Imaging Camera: ZWO ASI183MC Color with ZWO Duo band filter
- Guiding Scope: William Optics 31mm Uniguide
- Guiding Camera: Orion Starshoot Auto Guider
- Acquisition Software: Sharpcap
- Guiding Software: PHD2
- Light Frames: 20*5 mins @ 100 Gain, Temp -10C
- Dark Frames: 20*3 mins
- Stacked in Deep Sky Stacker
- Processed in PixInsight, Adobe Lightroom and Topaz Denoise
M13 is one of the brighter and more prominent Messier objects, found in the constellation Hercules. The cluster includes hundreds of thousands of stars about 22,000 ly from earth. It's a good target for trying new equipment combinations. Here I've tried guided imaging again with my Questar and a mono astrocam. I usually recommend that people try imaging with a color camera because the improvement in image quality that can be achieved with mono imaging comes at the expense of greater capture and processing complexity. Indeed, in this case the target dropped into the trees before I could capture any data with the blue filter, so the colors here may be a bit off from a fully successful imaging session.
Tech Stuff: Questar 3.5" telescope at native 1400mm focal length (f/16)/QHY 163 mono/guided/8 second exposures captured in SharpCap live stacks/ L 14 min; R 14 min; G 7 min/G used in both green and blue channels/Processed with PixInsight and GIMP. From my yard in Westchester County, NY.
Strong winds and way too much cloud made imaging a rare transit of Mercury a challenge but then this is November so we were lucky to capture anything at all. I hadn’t fully appreciated until now just how low the Sun is in the sky at this latitude in early November. The window of opportunity to get a shot was short as the transit started around 12:35 and the Sun set behind houses at around 15:30 after ducking behind chimney pots and trees. After constant, cloud-induced pauses we managed only to get about 3 minutes of video but that was enough to capture Mercury crossing the photosphere of the Sun. We measured Mercury's diameter to be 4802.06 km from a distance of 101.096 million km which is not far off the 4880 km stated in Wikipedia.
377 x frames of video
Exposure - 0.012499 secs
Sensor temperature - 9.5 °C (uncooled)
Gain - 50%
No calibration frames
Captured with SharpCap Pro
Processed in PIPP, Registax and Photoshop
Equipment:
Telescope: Celestron NexStar 127 SLT
Mount: Skywatcher EQ5
Camera: ZWO ASI 120MC
Filters: Baader Solar Filter,
Orange filter (for purely aesthetical reasons)
Celestron NexStar 6SE, ZWO asi224mc with IR cut filter, 2.5x TeleVue Powermate and ZWO ADC. 3 minute video Captured in SharpCap, processed in PIPP, AutoStakkert, RegiStax Wavelets then Lightroom.
NGC 7822
Canon 200mm f/2.8 @ f/2.8
ASI 1600MM-C -20C gain 139
ZWO filters
4 minutes
51x Ha
Sharpcap
Sequence Generator Pro
Cartes Du Ciel
Pixinsight 1.8
Horsehead and Flame Nebulae in HOO
-
Gear:
Imaging Camera: ASI294MM-Pro
Filters: Astrodon 1.25" 3nm Ha
Main Scope: Orion 8" f4 Newt
Guidescope: Williams Optics 50mm Uniguide
Guidecam: ASI120MM mini
Mount: SW EQ6R-Pro
ZWO EAF, EFW
-
Image Details:
HA-140x180s, gain 120, bin 2x2, -10c
OIII-130x180s, gain 120, bin 2x2, -10c
13.5 hrs total integration
-
Location: Parker, CO, USA
Bortle 5/6 sky
-
Acquisition/Edits:
SharpCap, NINA, PHD2, Stellarium, Pixinsight, Photoshop CC
Saturn about 3 weeks after reaching opposition (August 1-2). We were hoping to catch it closer to opposition but August 24th was the best we could manage. However, it still appears big and bright in our skies at the moment. Because of Saturn's fast rotation (10.6 hrs), there is a limit of about 2 minutes to get a shot without risking a blurring of details. I exceeded this limit by some margin, trading slight smearing of barely perceptible detail for increased exposure and signal strength. 7,098 frames from 4 videos taken in close succession were stacked to make this image. This was in order to get as much exposure and signal strength as possible in the stack and was worth doing as any blurring seemed negligible.
Captured with SharpCap
Processed in PIPP and AutoStakkert
Post-processed in Photoshop
Image made from 7,098 stacked video frames (75% quality and above)
Average Gain - 67.5%
Average Exposure - 0.067015 seconds
Total integration - 7 minutes 51 seconds
Equipment:
Telescope: Sky-Watcher Explorer-150PDS
Mount: Skywatcher EQ5
Imaging Camera: ZWO ASI120 MC
x2 Barlow with extension tube (equivalent to x3.3)
Celestron NexStar 6SE, ZWO asi224mc with IR cut filter, 2.5x TeleVue Powermate and ZWO ADC. 2 minute video Captured in SharpCap, processed in PIPP, AutoStakkert, RegiStax Wavelets then Lightroom.
Nébuleuse du voile (NGC6960 et NGC6992).
Zwo ASI224 MC + Leica-R Apo-Telyt 180mm f3.4 (@f4) adapted through DIY 3D printed adapter.
Dual narrowband with Optolong l-Enhance filter in bortle 7 area.
Post-processed with Gimp and Lightroom.
180 x 15 sec light pictures (total
time 2700 sec) stacked wth Sharpcap.
Updated Nov. 24, 2021 - Images of Saturn taken the same night as those of Jupiter shown here can be found at the following link - www.flickr.com/photos/homcavobservatory/51702432756/
Object Details: The attached shows Jupiter as it appeared during one evening in September through one of our longer focal-length scopes. Oriented with north up, at the time the Great Red Spot was in the process of crossing the central meridian (i.e. an imaginary line drawn from pole to pole bisecting the planet), while the Jovian moon Europa's orbit brings it closer to the planet, and as can be seen in the last frame, begins a transit of Jupiter. The Jovian moon Callisto can be seen at far left of each frame.
In addition, several large 'white ovals' are visible at lower left, culminating with five in a row as shown in the last luminance frame. Along with a variety of festoons and smaller storms, two giant 'brown barges' can be seen just above center as they rotate on from the left hand limb in the first image and lie on either side of the central meridian in the final image.
Taken in succession using luminance, infrared & methane filters, given it's ability to somewhat counteract the detrimental effects of seeing, an incredible amount of detail can be seen in the infrared images; while the Great Red Spot shows as the extremely prominent, bright white oval in the methane shots and Europa stands out clearly against the planets limb as it begins it's transit in the final luminance image.
Since humans tend to see detail in an image via it's brightest and contrast (as opposed to it's color), I have extracted the lightness channel from each individual image and appended them below the one-shot-color frames. As would be expected, the extracts from the infrared shots are the most detailed (and in this case, when viewed at full resolution, may be some of the most detailed Jupiter images I have ever captured using this setup, even showing a bit of detail within the Great Red Spot itself).
Image Details: Taken by Jay Edwards during the early UT hours of September 20, 2021 at the HomCav Observatory using a 3X Televue barlow with set of specialized planetary filters on a vintage 1970, 8-inch, f/7 Criterion newtonian reflector with an ASI290MC' planetary camera / autoguider'. Like other planetary images posted previously, the scope was mounted on and tracked with a Losmandy G-11 running a Gemini 2 control system.
Taken using SharpCap Pro and processed using a combination of Registax & PaintShopPro, as presented here the individual shots have been resized down to approximately 50% of their original size and the entire composite has then been resized down to 2X HD resolution. With Jupiter reaching only 32 degrees above our southern horizon, I was pleasantly surprised at the results.
Similar planetary & solar composites can be found at the attached links:
Jupiter:
www.flickr.com/photos/homcavobservatory/51489515877/
www.flickr.com/photos/homcavobservatory/51307264271/
www.flickr.com/photos/homcavobservatory/50303645602/
www.flickr.com/photos/homcavobservatory/50052655691/
www.flickr.com/photos/homcavobservatory/50123276377/
www.flickr.com/photos/homcavobservatory/50185470067/
www.flickr.com/photos/homcavobservatory/50993968018/
www.flickr.com/photos/homcavobservatory/51090643939/
Saturn:
www.flickr.com/photos/homcavobservatory/51489515877/
www.flickr.com/photos/homcavobservatory/51417055085
www.flickr.com/photos/homcavobservatory/51345118465/
www.flickr.com/photos/homcavobservatory/51007634042/
www.flickr.com/photos/homcavobservatory/51316298333/
www.flickr.com/photos/homcavobservatory/50347485511/
www.flickr.com/photos/homcavobservatory/50088602376/
Mars:
www.flickr.com/photos/homcavobservatory/50425593297/
www.flickr.com/photos/homcavobservatory/50594729106/
www.flickr.com/photos/homcavobservatory/50069773341/
www.flickr.com/photos/homcavobservatory/50223682613/
Solar:
www.flickr.com/photos/homcavobservatory/50815383151/
www.flickr.com/photos/homcavobservatory/50657578913/
Telescopio: Refractor Bresser Messier Acro 102/460 f4.5
Cámara: ZWO ASI178MM
Montura: EQ5 Bresser EXOS2 motorizada sin goto
Filtros: Baader Green CCD Filter
Software: SharpCap, AutoStakkert, Registax y Photoshop
Fecha: 2019-04-10
Hora: 20:59 T.U.
Fase lunar: 28.5% 5.2 días Creciente
Lugar: 42.615 N -6.417 W (Bembibre Spain)
Vídeo: 2 minutos
Resolución: 3096 x 2080
Gain: 90
Exposure: 0,005052
Frames: 1679
Frames apilados: 20%
FPS: 13.98
Capture of Melotte 15 using Sequence Generator Pro, Sharpcap with electronic finder, Cartes du Ciel planetarium software and PHD2 guiding.
Hurried shot of partial solar eclipse 25th October 2022. Taken through the back bedroom window. Complete with wispy clouds ! Sharpcap and Autostakkert Starwave 102ED and Altair 294C
My first narrowband image! I lost track of exactly how I did the integration, but it is about 10hours of Hydrogen alpha and 5 hours of Oxygen III.
Equipment:
TS 130 Photoline APO
Starlight Xpress H9
Baader OIII filter 8.5nm, 15min SFs
Astronomik Ha filter 12nm, 10min SFs
Altair 0.6x focal reducer
Imaged at f4.2
Guiding: SSAG on finderscope
Mount: EQ6R
I used PixInsight, Sharpcap, PHD2 and fitsworks to create this image.
IC 2169 is a large reflection nebula in the constellation Unicornus. It forms one of the central regions of the association of massive stars known as Monoceros R1. It is located in the northern part of the constellation, on the border with Orion and west of the Cone Nebula and the "Christmas Tree" cluster
Image Details:
- Imaging Scope: William Optics 61mm Zenithstar II Doublet
- Imaging Camera: ZWO ASI183MC Color with IR Cut filter
- Guiding Systeme: Celestron StarSense Autoguider
- Guiding Camera: Orion Starshoot Auutoguider
- Acquisition Software: Sharpcap
- Capture Software: SharpCap Pro
- Light Frames: 20*4 mins @ 100 Gain, Temp -20C
- Dark Frames: 10*4 mins
- Stacked in Deep Sky Stacker
- Processed in PixInsight, Adobe Lightroom and Topaz Denoise AI
AUTORE: Aldo Rocco Vitale (Gruppo Astrofili Catanesi “Guido Ruggieri”)
DATA: 31 dicembre 2017
ORA: 20:15
LOCALITA’: S. Agata Li Battiati (CT) 250 m. s.l.m.
TEMPERATURA: 14°
UMIDITA’: 80%
SEEING: 3
TRASPARENZA: 3
FASE: 98%
DISTANZA: 358.592,438 Km
OBIETTIVO: Celestron Nexstar C11; D=280 mm; F=1764 mm; f/6.3
CAMERA DI RIPRESA: ZWO ASI 120MC
SOFTWARE DI ELABORAZIONE: Sharpcap + Avistack2 + Pixinsight + Astroart
AR12832 is about to rotate out of view but I got this faint photo of it in H-alpha, where it is just a faint pale spot. Photo taken from Oxfordshire, UK with a Coronado PST and ASI120MC fitted with a 2x Barlow. A 2,000 frame video was captured using SharpCap and the best 75% of the frames were stacked using Autostakkert! 3. Stacked image was processed in Lightroom, Fast Stone Image Viewer, Photoshop CS2 and Focus Magic.
Photo taken from Eskilstuna - Sweden. 2023 March 15
Equipment used:
Telescope: Lunt LS50THa single stack, Camera: Apollo-M Mini, Mount: Sky-Watcher Solarquest
Software used:
SharpCap 4.0, AutoStackert3, imPPG, AffinityPhoto 2
November 29 2020
Coronado Personal Solar Telescope (PST) 400mm f10 telescope specifically designed to only pass a very narrow slice of the Hydrogen Alpha wavelength.
ZWO ASI183 monochrome USB camera
Best 50% of 500 high speed video frames captured using SharpCap software, analyzed and stacked using Autostakkert3! software, sharpened in imppg free software, false color added in Photoshop.
Technical card
Imaging telescope or lens: Lunt Solar Systems LS60THa/B1200C
Imaging camera: QHYCCD QHY5III174
Mount: Skywatcher AZ EQ-6 GT
Software: HEASARC fv, Planetary Imaging Pre-Processor PIPP, Emil Kraaikamp AutoStackert! 2 , Astro Capture Software SharpCap, Pleiades Astrophoto PixInsight
Resolution: 1121x1148
Date: July 5, 2017
Time: 18:42
Frames: 8593
FPS: 75.00000
Focal length: 500
Locations: Berga Resort, Berga, Barcelona, Spain
Riprese effettuate il 23/27/28 Luglio 2024 da Ariccia Provincia di Roma
Zenith sky brightness info (2015)
SQM 19.20 mag./arc sec2
Brightness 2.25 mcd/m2
Artif. bright. 2080 μcd/m2
Ratio 12.2
Bortle class 6
Elevation 302 meters
Luna : Da Luna calante a Ultimo quarto
Magnitudine visuale: da -12.4 a -11.2
Dimensione: da 0° 32' 55.9" a 0° 32' 34.7"
Illuminazione: 96.4% a 49.3%
Età: 16.5 giorni a 22.2 giorni
Dati di scatto, Strumentazione e Software:
Telescopio : Tecnosky LUX60 60mm 360mm F/6 APO FPL53 doppietto
Fotocamera : ZWO ASI 2600MC
Montatura : Skywatcher EQ6-R Pro
Autoguida : ASI 120MMini & Svbony SV165 30mm 120mm F/4
Luci : 66x600s @100 Guadagno, -5°C, 40 Dark, 40 Flat
Acquisizione : SharpCap
Guida : PHD2
Filtri : IDAS NGS1 + IDAS NBZ
Elaborazione : Siril, GraXpert, Starnet++, Photoshop CC, NoiseXterminator
Autore: Carlo Mollicone
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Nebulosa Nord America
La Nebulosa Nord America (anche nota con le sigle NGC7000 e C20) è una nebulosa a emissione visibile nella costellazione del Cigno, vicino a Deneb (la coda del cigno e la sua stella più brillante).
La forma della nebulosa disegna il continente nordamericano, soprattutto la costa est, tra il Golfo del Messico e la Florida.
La scoperta della Nebulosa Nord America è attribuita all'astronomo William Herschel.
Essa costituisce assieme alla vicina Nebulosa Pellicano un unico complesso nebuloso, situato a circa 1960 anni luce, in cui è attiva la formazione stellare, come è testimoniato dalla presenza di diversi oggetti stellari giovani e oggetti HH; questi fenomeni riguardano principalmente stelle di piccola e media massa.
Osservazione
La Nebulosa Nord America si estende su un'area apparente pari a circa 10 volte la grandezza della Luna piena, ma la sua luminosità è debole e non può essere vista a occhio nudo; si individua circa 3° a ESE della brillante stella Deneb (α Cygni), in direzione di un tratto molto ricco e luminoso della Via Lattea boreale.
Con un binocolo ad ampio campo visivo (di circa 3°) appare come una macchia nebbiosa di luce dalla forma arcuata, appena percepibile e solo con la condizione di avere un cielo sufficientemente scuro; con un telescopio è possibile individuare qualche dettaglio in più, ma il forte ingrandimento non consente di osservare la nube nella sua interezza.
Il dettaglio maggiormente riconoscibile è proprio il grande arco situato nella parte meridionale, che delinea idealmente la figura del "Golfo del Messico".
La nebulosa nella sua interezza e soprattutto i suoi colori sono visibili solamente nelle fotografie dell'area.
Caratteristiche
La Nebulosa Nord America e la vicina Nebulosa Pellicano (IC5070), sono parte della stessa vasta nube interstellare di idrogeno ionizzato (Regione HII); la regione nebulosa che assieme costituiscono è indicata con le sigle W80 e DR27 e si estende per circa 3°. Le due nebulose brillanti appaiono separate da una banda di gas oscura appartenente allo stesso complesso nebuloso noto come LDN 935. La regione ospita anche alcuni ammassi aperti, come NGC6996.
Questo complesso nebuloso costituisce di fatto la parte illuminata del grande sistema di gas e polveri noti come Fenditura del Cigno, ben evidente in quanto oscura completamente la luce delle stelle situate al di là di esso e quindi il chiarore della Via Lattea. Tra noi e la nebulosa si trova una banda di polvere interstellare che assorbendo la luce delle stelle e della nebulosa alle sue spalle, è responsabile della forma che vediamo. Per lungo tempo la stella responsabile della ionizzazione dell'idrogeno della nube non era nota con certezza; se fosse stata Deneb, come sostengono alcune fonti, la distanza sarebbe approssimativamente 1800 anni luce, e la sua grandezza assoluta sarebbe di 100 anni luce (6° di diametro apparente). Questa ipotesi però appare piuttosto irrealistica. Studi condotti a diverse lunghezze d'onda hanno permesso di individuare una ventina di sorgenti coincidenti con altrettante stelle profondamente immerse nei gas o da essi nascoste; fra queste spicca 2MASS J205551.25+435224.6, una sorgente particolarmente isolata situata oltre la banda oscura di LDN935 ben visibile nella banda del vicino infrarosso, coincidente con una giovane stella blu di classe spettrale O5V. La sua posizione è particolarmente interessante poiché viene a trovarsi esattamente al centro geometrico del complesso nebuloso, rendendola di fatto la principale responsabile della ionizzazione dei gas circostanti.
La distanza del complesso nebuloso è stata indicata in vari studi come compresa fra i 500 e i 1000 parsec (1630-3260 anni luce) dal sistema solare; una simile imprecisione è dovuta principalmente alla difficoltà oggettiva che si riscontra nell'osservare questa regione di cielo, che appare estremamente congestionata a causa della sovrapposizione sulla stessa linea di vista di un gran numero di regioni nebulose differenti. Ciò accade perché questa direzione coincide con l'asse mediano del Braccio di Orione, il braccio di spirale galattico in cui è compreso anche il Sole. Le stime di distanza più recenti hanno comunque ridotto enormemente le incertezze sulle stime, indicando valori il linea di massima concordanti fra loro; queste stime indicano una distanza pari a 600±50 parsec (1956±163 anni luce).
Nebulosa Pellicano
La Nebulosa Pellicano (anche nota come IC5067/70) è una regione HII visibile nella costellazione del Cigno, vicino a Deneb; appartiene alla stessa nube molecolare gigante della vicina Nebulosa Nord America ed è facilmente fotografabile.
La sua distanza è stimata attorno ai 600±50parsec (1956±163 anni luce).
Al suo interno sono attivi fenomeni di formazione stellare, come testimoniato specialmente dalla presenza di oggetti HH; questi fenomeni riguardano principalmente stelle di piccola e media massa.
Osservazione
La Nebulosa Pellicano, anche se più piccola e meno appariscente della vicina Nebulosa Nord America, appare con facilità in un telescopio amatoriale meno di un grado a sudovest di quest'ultima, da cui è separata da una banda oscura nota come LDN935; fotografie eseguite con ingrandimenti via via maggiori consentono di rilevare sempre più particolari, sebbene se ne perda la visione d'insieme.
Nonostante la sua luminosità, comunque, quest'oggetto resta al di fuori della portata della gran parte dei binocoli, ad eccezione di quelli più potenti.
Grazie alla sua particolare forma, è uno degli oggetti nebulosi più noti e fotografati nell'emisfero nord.
Caratteristiche
La nebulosa ricorda un pellicano, a causa di una nebulosa oscura che segna il bordo settentrionale dell'oggetto, facendolo così assomigliare ad un becco di pellicano; si tratta da un punto di vista astronomico di una nebulosa ad emissione, molto studiata a causa dei fenomeni di formazione stellare che avvengono al suo interno. A causa delle forti dinamiche dei suoi gas, la nebulosa varierà forma relativamente in fretta.
La Nebulosa Pellicano appartiene allo stesso complesso nebuloso molecolare della Nebulosa Nord America.
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#astrofotografia #astrophotography #zwo #deepsky #deepspace #universetoday #nebulae #nightsky #astronomy #astrophoto #nightphotography #longexposure #cosmos #space #universe #sky #dark #stars #stargazing
astrofotografia astrophotography zwo deepsky deepspace universetoday nebulae nightsky astronomy astrophoto nightphotography longexposure cosmos space universe sky dark stars stargazing
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Celestron NexStar 6SE, ZWO asi224mc with IR cut filter, 2.5x TeleVue Powermate and ZWO ADC. 2 minute video Captured in SharpCap, processed in PIPP, AutoStakkert, RegiStax Wavelets then Lightroom.
Messier 27 - The Dumbbell Nebula
Approx. 2 hours of RGB captured with the LPRO-Max Filter, with a further 1.5 hours of RGB captured with the AA Triband filter. RGB processed with Astro Pixel Processor, Ha and Oiii extracted using APP and recombined with LPro RGB data. One processed using RGBHOO palette and the other RGBHSO palette.
EQUIPMENT:
Altair Astro 72EDF (f/6)
AA Lightwave x1.0 flattener
AA IMX183C PROTEC Hypercam
AA #LPROMAX light pollution suppression filter
AA #TRIBAND filter
AA 50mm Guider with AA GPCAM2 130M
iOptron CEM25P mount and iPolar alignment camera
AA Portable Pier
CAPTURE SOFTWARE:
SharpCap 3.3Pro Beta
PHD2 Guiding
DATA:
All lights captured at unity gain (398)
Black Level = 24
TEC Temp = -10°C
58x 120sec using LPRO-MAX Filter
60x Flats (LPro)
40x Darks
60x Dk Flats
30x 180sec using TRIBAND Filter
60x Flats (triband)
45x Darks
60x Dk Flats
INTEGRATION & PROCESSING:
Astro Pixel Processor 1.080
PixInsight 1.8.8-6 Ripley
Photoshop 2020
Image Details: The attached composite shows how the Total Lunar Eclipse of May 15 & 16, 2022 appeared from the RoR observatory we built at our home here in upstate, NY. The "twelve o'clock position" shows it's full phase just prior to the start of the partial eclipse and the images then progress chronologically clockwise thru the partial phases and into totality; a closeup of which is shown at center.
As is often the case when approaching totality, it takes on a 'candled-egg' appearance; or as one of my friends called it that night, 'The Mars Effect' ;) - looking quite like Mars with it's brilliant white polar cap often does when viewed through some of our longer length scopes !
Image Details: The individual frames making up the attached composite were taken though the ever-changing density of fog we experienced here on the late evening and early morning hours of May 15th & 16th, 2022 using twin unmodded Canon 700D (t5i) DSLRs; one utilized a 300mm telephoto lens placed on a static tripod, while the other was connected to an Orion ED80T CF (i.e. an 80MM, f/6, carbon-fiber, triplet apochromatic refractor) and a 0.8X Televue field flattener / focal reducer with the camera controlled by APT and the scope tracked at a lunar rate. With each being a single-frame, camera settings varied from 1/200 of a second at ISO 100 during the full phase to 15 seconds at ISO 1600 during totality.
I also made some time that evening to observe it visually with five different 'grab-and-go' scopes. Some with classic optics dating back decades to the 50's & 60's, they included a variety of refractors & reflectors ranging in size from a vintage 1962, 76mm, f/16 refractor with a fabulous RAO lens, to a 10-inch, f/4.5 newtonian dob I constructed last year out of Meade optics I've had since the 1980s.
As shown here the entire composite has been resized down to HD resolution (approximately one-fifth it's original size) and the bit depth lowered to 8 bits per channel. In addition to the two imaging setups used for this composite, my friend also imaged the event with his beautiful new Williams Optics Redcat and an ASI2600MC on a EQR-6 mount controlled by an ASIair; while we also took a short video of the Tycho region during totality through a vintage 1970, 8-inch, f/7 Criterion newt. and an ASI290MC controlled by SharpCap Pro on a Losmandy G-11 running a Gemini 2 control system (this mount also tracked the 80mm apo. used for many of the shots in the attached composite as it rides piggyback on the 8-inch Criterion mounted in our observatory ).
I'm looking forward to seeing what we can pull out of those additional data sets once they are processed. I hope others got to witness this wonderful event.
Wishing clear, calm & dark skies to all !
27% Waxing Crescent Moon. Taken from Oxfordshire, UK with a William Optics 70mm refractor with ASI120MC camera + Celestron 3x Barlow. The telescope was on an EQ5 Pro mount on a permanent pier.
Between 21:17 and 21:35 BST, 11 x 2,000 frame videos were captured covering the whole Moon using SharpCap, the best 30% of the frames were stacked using Autostakkert! 3. 7 of the stacked images were stitched using Microsoft ICE then processed in Lightroom and Fast Stone Image Viewer. The first video I shot was pretty clear but then thin cloud was moving across the Moon for the remainder of the imaging session.
Mars as it looked on the night of 6th-7th August. With an orbital period of 686.971 days, Mars only appears as more than a red dot every couple of years so its appearance is something I always look forward to. Mars reaches opposition on October 13 and at that time it will appear significantly larger, brighter and rounder than it looks now (in this image it is 87.1% illuminated, at opposition we will see the full disk). However, despite being two months away from opposition, Mars is very dominant in the night sky and well worth observing.
Captured with SharpCap
Processed in PIPP, AutoStakkert and Registax
Post-processed in Photoshop
3,540 stacked video frames at 30 fps
Gain - 50%
Exposure - 0.008607 seconds
Total integration - 30.47 seconds
Equipment:
Sky-Watcher Explorer-150PDS
Sky-Watcher EQ5 Mount
ZWO ASI120 MC camera
x2 Barlow with extension tube (equivalent to x3.3)
This was a tough one to image because the moon was at like 90% illumination. It was more washed out than I wanted, so details were lost. Also had some weird field rotation, so this is about a 30% crop. Happy with the results though.
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Astrobin: www.astrobin.com/g8pn5o/
Instagram: www.instagram.com/colorado_astro/
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Gear:
Imaging Camera: ASI294MM-Pro
Filters: Astrodon 1.25" 3nm Ha, OIII
Imaging Scope: Celestron C8 with .63x reducer
Guider: ZWO OAG
Guidecam: ASI290MM mini
Mount: SW EQ6R Pro
Pegasus Astro Pocket Power Box
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Image details:
90x300s HA, Gain 200, -10c, bin 2x2
75x300s OIII, Gain 200, -10c, bin 2x2
20 darks
13.75 hrs total integration
Bortle 5/6 sky
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Acquisition/Edits:
SharpCap, NINA, PHD2, Stellarium, Pixinsight, Photoshop
IC1396 is located in the constellation Cepheus ~2400 light years from Earth. This image was captured from my back yard (7 on Bortle light pollution scale) with narrow band Sulfur, Hydrogen Alpha, and Oxygen filters. It's processed in the classic Hubble Palette (Sulfur assigned to Red, Hydrogen Alpha to Green, and Oxygen to Blue).
Equipment and acquisition info below:
Light frames (All @ 200 gain; -10C ):
○ 46 x 300" Ha
○ 34 x 300" Oiii
○ 28 x 300" Sii
Calibration frames for each
○ 25 flat frames
○ 20 dark frames (from master library)
○ 200 bias frames (from master library)
Camera: ZWO ASI1600mm Pro
Filters: Astrodon 5nm Ha; ZWO 7nm Oiii and Sii
Scope: Stellarvue SV70t with SV .8 reducer/flattener
Guiding: Stellarvue 50mm guide scope w/ QHY5L-II m
Mount: Celestron AVX
Acquisition software: SGP, PHD2, SharpCap for polar alignment
Processing software: Pixinsight 1.8, Lightroom
Processing details here.
The Pleiades (also known as the Seven Sisters and Messier 45). This is one of my favourite autumn targets and one I feel compelled to image every year in order to try and improve on previous attempts. Their rising heralds the arrival of the constellation of Orion which pursues them. I love the mythology associated with the Pleiades and Orion and different cultures have their own stories to explain them. M45 always seems like it should be a fairly easy object to image and it is, however processing it is another matter. This image was made over two nights (24/09/18 and 03/10/18). The original idea was to capture all the data in one night but the first night, although being very clear, was a full Moon and many of the subs were washed out making processing a nightmare. The second night the Moon wasn't an issue but conditions were still less than ideal and we were shooting into a murky sky with high cloud. Ultimately I combined the best shots from both nights and this is the result...by no means perfect but as good as I can get it, not too noisy and a reasonable amount of nebulosity coming through.
The Pleiades are an open star cluster containing middle-aged, hot B-type stars located in the constellation of Taurus. It is among the nearest star clusters to Earth and is the cluster most obvious to the naked eye in the night sky.
The cluster is dominated by hot blue and luminous stars that have formed within the last 100 million years. A faint reflection nebulosity around the brightest stars was thought at first to be left over from the formation of the cluster (hence the alternative name Maia Nebula after the star Maia), but is now likely an unrelated foreground dust cloud in the interstellar medium, through which the stars are currently passing.
Computer simulations have shown that the Pleiades were probably formed from a compact configuration that resembled the Orion Nebula. Astronomers estimate that the cluster will survive for about another 250 million years, after which it will disperse due to gravitational interactions with its galactic neighborhood.
Information courtesy of Wikipedia:
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pleiades
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pleiades_(Greek_mythology)
060 x 300 second exposures at Unity Gain (139) cooled to -20°C
030 x dark frames
063 x flat frames
100 x bias/offset frames
Binning 1x1
Total integration time = 5 hours
Captured with APT
Guided with PHD2
Polar Alignment with SharpCap Pro
Processed in Nebulosity, Fitsworks, Microsoft ICE and Photoshop
Equipment
Telescope: Sky-Watcher Explorer-150PDS
Mount: Skywatcher EQ5
Guide Scope: Orion 50mm Mini
Guiding Camera: ZWO ASI120MC
Imaging Camera: ZWO ASI1600MC Pro
Baader Mark-III MPCC Coma Corrector
Light pollution filter
Celestron NexStar 6SE, ZWO asi224mc with IR cut filter, 2.5x TeleVue Powermate and ZWO ADC. 3 minute video Captured in SharpCap, processed in PIPP, AutoStakkert, RegiStax Wavelets then Lightroom.
Messier 81 (also known as NGC 3031 or Bode's Galaxy) is a grand design spiral galaxy about 12 million light-years away, with a diameter of 90,000 light years, about half the size of the Milky Way, in the constellation Ursa Major. Due to its proximity to Earth, large size, and active galactic nucleus (which harbors a 70 million solar masses supermassive black hole), Messier 81 has been studied extensively by professional astronomers. The galaxy's large size and relatively high brightness also makes it a popular target for amateur astronomers.
(Wikipedia.org)
Technical Information for This Image: Messier 81, Bode's Galaxy, taken from a Bortle 4 site in Landers, CA, USA on a New Moon night. Telescope: TPO Ritchey-Chretien 6 inch with a FL 1370mm. Guiding was with Orion 50mm Guide Scope FL 242mm with a ZWO ASI183MC for the guide camera. Mount: SkyWatcher EQ6-R Pro. Main imaging camera: ASI294MC PRO cooled to -5C. Exposures: 31 x 180s with Gain at 120 and Bin 2 x 2. No darks, flats or bias frames. Processed in PixInsight. Cropped. Polar alignment was with SharpCap Pro.
Not bad. Processing this was hard work for some reason. I like pixInsight, but there are too many pathways to remember.
Image Details:
- Imaging Scope: William Optics 61mm Zenithstar II Doublet
- Imaging Camera: ZWO ASI183MC Color with UV/IR Blocking filter
- Guiding Scope: William Optics 66mm Petzval
- Guiding Camera: Orion Starshoot Auto Guider
- Filter: ZWO Duo Band (HA & OIII)
- Acquisition Software: Sharpcap
- Guiding Software: PHD2
- Capture Software: SharpCap Pro (LiveStack mode with dithering)
- Light Frames: 30x4 mins @ 100 Gain, Temp -20C
- Dark Frames: 30*4 mins
- Stacked in Deep Sky Stacker
- Processed in PixInsight, Adobe Lightroom and Topaz Denoise AI
Crater Gassendi (Colongitude 56°)
Object: Crater Gassendi
Colongitude: ~56°
Optics: Celestron 9.25 F20
Mount: Sky-Watcher EQ6-R
Camera: ZWO ASI 120MM-S
Filter: RGB 1,25" Filters
Exposure: R 10% of 2000 Frames, G 10% of 2000 Frames, B 10% of 2000 Frames
Date: 2019-02-16 21:00:00Z
Location: Schwaig
Capture: SharpCap 3.1
Image Acquisition: Stephan Schurig
Image Processing: Stephan Schurig
AutoStakkert 3.0.14: Analysis, Stack
Fitswork 4.47: RGB Combine
Photoshop 20.0.3: Unsharp Masking, Smart Sharpen w. Denoise, HighPass Sharpening, Unsharp Masking, Nik Dfine 2 Denoise, Dynamic (Dynamic, Saturation)
Last spring while testing the resurrection of an old newtonian reflector from the 1950's and the upgrade of a dobsonian I built out of optics from the 80's, I pull out my vintage 1962 refractor and was impressed by it's display of the 'Lunar X' (a link to an image of the scopes and my observation of the 'X' that day can be found attached here - www.flickr.com/photos/homcavobservatory/49623259012/
Object Details: The 'X' and 'V' are of course a result of pareidolia (i.e. per wiki '... the tendency for perception to impose a meaningful interpretation on a nebulous visual stimulus. Common examples are perceived images of animals, faces, or objects in cloud formations, or lunar pareidolia like the Man in the Moon or the Moon Rabbit ...').
Visible for only a few hours prior to first quarter phase, the 'X' results from the illumination of the rims of the craters Blanchinus, La Caille & Purbach; while the 'V' is the crater Ukert and several smaller ones in the surrounding region.
Being aware of these examples of pareidolia for decades, and no doubt having observed them many times over the years, I thought at the time I was observing them with the refractor last year that I really should try to image it someday. Therefore, it was quite serendipitous that after imaging the Sun in various wavelengths on May 18th of this year, I found that the moon's phase happen to be such that 'X' & 'V' were fairly apparent. Having been utilizing my vintage 1970, 8-inch, f/7 Criterion newtonian reflector to shoot the unusual sunspot groups AR2824 that afternoon, I decided to use that setup to try to catch the 'X' & 'V' (although I have yet to process the solar data from earlier that day, images from the following afternoon can be found at the link attached here -
www.flickr.com/photos/homcavobservatory/51194703565/ ).
Since I was using filters of various wavelength on the Sun, in order to attempt to reduce the detrimental effects of seeing on the moon, I utilized an infrared filter for the lunar shot. Albeit imho, the pareidolia which causes humans to have the tendency to recognize these types of 'imaginary' lunar features often actually benefits from lower quality optics & / or poorer seeing, as the details of their actual root cause / construction are blurred due to the lower resolution - resulting in a greater 'pareidolic effect'. However with that said, and possibly due to the fact that I have been 'indoctrinated' into always pursuing the 'cleanest' data I can capture ;) , I proceeded forward with the use of IR wavelengths on the fairly high precision optics of our old Criterion newt.
Image Details: The result of this effort can be seen in the attached. It is a stack of several hundred frames selected from a video clip consisting of several thousand, and processed using a combination of AutoStakkert, Registax & PaintShopPro. As presented here has been left at it's original resolution, with the luminance / lightness channel extracted. It was shot at the HomCav Observatory by Jay Edwards at 21:57 EDT on May 18, 2021 using a ZWO ASI290MC at prime focus on the above mentioned 8-inch newt.
Since I tend to shoot simultaneously using multiple scopes in order to maximize any clear skies we might receive, in addition to using SharpCap Pro for video clips, I also took wide-field / 'full disk' images that evening using an unmodded Canon 700D (t5i) DSLR controlled by AstroPhotographyTool (APT) on an 80mm f/6 carbon-fiber triplet apochromatic refractor (i.e. an Orion ED80T CF) connected to a Televue 0.8X field flattener / focal reducer. The 80mm apo. was piggybacked on the 8-inch, along with an 80MM f/5 Celestron 'short-tube' doublet (for guiding when imaging DSOs) as well as a few other items (e.g. a CCD & wide-field camera lens, etc.) and these optics were tracked using a Losmandy G-11 mount running a Gemini 2 control system. That night I also shot several additional video clips using the 8-inch in anticipation of creating a mosaic of the entire terminator, but have yet to examine those nor the 80MM shots.
Although the relatively decent result of the attached image actually leads to the 'X' & 'V' being somewhat resolved into their component sub-structures and thus reduces the pareidolia somewhat, I was fairly pleased with how it turned out. Being a fan of actual geologic lunar features, rather than reducing the image to HD I left it at full resolution. Quickly browsing it I noticed shows some wonderful detail in the lunar rilles which can bee seen to the right of the 'V'.
The two most apparent ones are the 220 km (133 mi) long by 4 km (2 mi) wide rille Rima Hyginus & the 300 km wide x 5 km wide rille Rima Ariadaeus. Rima Hyginus appears to be the result of the collapse of subterranean volcanic structures between smaller craters on either side of the more prominent crater Hyginus - which itself it thought to be volcanic in nature rather than the result of an impact, while Rima Ariadaeus seems to be a section of the Moon's crust which has sunk down between two parallel fault lines.
I also noticed some decent detail in the prominent 136 km (82 mi) diameter crater Albategnius (just lower right of image center). Showing the distinctive ragged shadow of it's rim's peaks silhouetted against it's flat floor up to 4000 meters (13000 ft) below; within the crater itself can been seen it's central peak extending nearly 20 km in length & about 10 km in width and rising 1.5 km above the lava-flooded crater floor.
I'm looking forward to processing the files for the mosaic of the terminator mentioned above and seeing what other interesting features I might be able to pull out of the data.
Wishing all who celebrate it a very Happy Memorial Day !