somma di 60 frame effettuati con SharpCap, CCD 183c sensore a -10 allineati calibrati con deconvoluzione in PixInsight,elaborazione finale Phoshop CC19 e Topaz Labs plugin (Detail 3) telescopio di ripresa rifrattore acromatico Skywatcher 120/ 1000, su montatura AZEQ6 GT,cielo con leggere velature che hanno un pò influito sui dettagli fini della superficie...

Messier 33.

Located in the constellation of Triangulum.

M: iOptron EQ45-Pro

T: William Optics GTF81

C: ZWO ASI1600MC-Cooled

F: L-eNhance filter (Dual Ha,Hb & Oiii Narrowbands)

G: PHD2

GC: ZWO ASI120mini

RAW16; FITs

Temp: -20 DegC

Gain 139; Exp 400s

Frames: 25 Lights; 4 Darks; 20 flats

100% Crop

Capture: SharpCap

Processed: DSS; PS

Sky: New moon, calm, no cloud, cold, fair seeing.

2.73 million light years distant.

You're looking at the solar chromosphere through a narrowband hydrogen-alpha telescope. The seeing was pretty good today and it was unusually warm with a high of 26C.

Imaged with a Lunt LS50THa solar telesope double-stacked with an LS50C front etalon and captured with a ZWO ASI178MM monochrome camera using Sharpcap. Stacked in AutoStakkert! (best 15 images out of 500) and processed with IMPPG and Photoshop.

Taken from Bortle 7 skies in Sydney Australia. Using ASI2600MC camera and Espirit 150mm scope. No LP filter used.

Exposure consisted of 48 x 5 minutes exposures stacked and calibrated on the fly using the LiveStacking feature in SharpCap Pro.

Genova, Italy (28 Oct 2022 21:25 UT)

Planet: diameter 48.0", mag -2.8, altitude ≈ 44°

Telescope: Orange 1977 vintage Celestron C8 (203 F/10 SC)

Mount: EQ5 with ST4 hand controller (no GoTo)

Camera: QHY5III462C Color

Barlow: GSO APO 2.5x

Filter: QHY UV/IR block

Recording scale: 0.150 arcsec/pixel

Equivalent focal length ≈ 3990 mm F/19.7

Image resized: +50%

Recording: SharpCap 4.0

(640x480 @ 60fps - 120 sec - RAW16 - Gain 120)

9 videos: 21:07, 21:12, 21:17, 21:21, 21:25, 21:29, 21:34, 21:39, 21:45

Best 25% frames of about 7200 for each video

Alignment/Stacking: AutoStakkert! 3.1.4

Wavelets/Deconvolution: AstroSurface T5

Derotation: WinJUPOS 12.1.2

Final Elaboration: GIMP 2.10.30

Around 78% Waxing Gibbous.

T: WO GTF81

C: ZWO ASI1600MC-Cool

M: iOptron iEQ45-Pro

G: No guiding

Format: SER; Raw16

Gain: 139

Temp: -15 DegC

Lights: 1000 x 0.01s

Darks: No

Flats: No

Bias: No

Capture: Sharpcap

Processing: AS2!; PS.

I've been trying for years to get a decent globular cluster image that really depicts the "globular" and dense inner structure. This image gets me there! This data was collected last month, but the new version of BlurXTerminator (v4) has really done the cluster justice! It did a very nice job of working with star sizes to bring out that true view of this amazing star cluster.

This cluster lies just outside of our Milky Way galaxy at a distance of around 25,000 light years away and contains around 300,000 stars!

Image Details:

- Imaging Scope: Celestron C8 SCT

- Imaging Camera: ZWO ASI183MC Color with ZWO IR cut filter

- Guider: Celestron Starsense Autoguider

- Mount: Celestron CGEM

- Acquisition Software: Sharpcap

- Guiding Software: Celestron

- Capture Software: SharpCap Pro (LiveStack mode with dithering)

- Light Frames: 30*1 min @ 100 Gain, Temp -20C

- Dark Frames: 30*1 mins

- Stacked in Deep Sky Stacker

- Processed in PixInsight, Adobe Lightroom, and Topaz Denoise AI

Sadr region

Luglio 2022

Località: San Romualdo - Ravenna

Askar 200 F/5

Avalon M1 - QHY5III 174M su OAG Celestron

QHY294C - Gain 1600 - Offset 5 - raffreddata -10

Filtro Optlong L-extreme - 77x10min.

Acquisizione: SharpCap - Calibrata con Dark e Flat.

Elaborazione: Astroart8, MaximDL. StarTools1.8 e Paint Shop Pro 2022.

www.cfm2004.altervista.org/astrofotografia/nebulose/sadr....

M: iOptron EQ45-Pro

T: William Optics GTF81

C: ZWO ASI1600MC-Cooled

F: No Filter

G: PHD2

GC: ZWO ASI120mini [OAG]

RAW16; FITs

Temp: -15 DegC

Gain 200;

25 x Exp 15s

Frames: 25 Lights; 50 Darks; 50 Flats

60% Crop

Capture: SharpCap

Processed: APP; PS

Sky: No moon, calm, 30%cloud, mild, good seeing.

IC1805 Heart Nebula. ZWO ASI6200MC Pro. L-eNhance. TSAPO65Q. SkyWatcher EQ6-R Pro. Guiding: 130M GPCAM + SkyWatcher EvoGuide. 10 x 10 Mins. Captured in SharpCap Pro. Processed in APP. Finished in Adobe CC.,

AT65EDQ

Nikon D5300

QHY5LII-M guide camera

Orion Mini Guide scope 50mm

Celestron CG5 with OnStep GOTO electronics

18@5 minutes ISO 400

100 Bias

APT, PHD2, ASCOM POTH, Sharpcap, CdC

Stacked and processed in Pixinsight

Finish in PS/ACR

AUTORE: Aldo Rocco Vitale (Gruppo Astrofili Catanesi “Guido Ruggieri”)

DATA: 28 dicembre 2017

ORA: 20:15

LOCALITA’: S. Agata Li Battiati (CT) 250 m. s.l.m.

TEMPERATURA: 10°

UMIDITA’: 60%

SEEING: 4

TRASPARENZA: 3

FASE: 77%

DISTANZA: 370.544,157 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

Small solar prominence yesterday, July 13, 2019.

Tech Specs: Williams Optics Redcat 51, ZWO ASI290MC, Daystar Quark Chromosphere + Daystar 2" UV/IR filter, SharpCap Pro v3.0, best 10% of 2k frames, AutoStakkert, Registax. Image date: 13 July 2019. Location: The Dark Side Observatory in Weatherly, PA, USA.

Image taken with ASI2600MC camera and an old 90mm film camera lens and Optolong L-Pro filter.

The final image consists of 12 x 5 minutes that were stacked on the fly using SharpCap Pro software.

The old camera lens was never designed for today's digital cameras and caused me many headaches to try and correct the star red color bloat and distortions.

NGC 7023: The Iris Nebula in the constellation of Cepheus.

Second run at this target on a moonless night. I'm pleased with more dust detail in this image.

M: iOptron EQ45-Pro

T: William Optics GTF81

C: ZWO ASI1600MC-Cooled

F: No Filters

G: PHD2

GC: ZWO ASI120mini

RAW16; FITs

Temp: -20 DegC

Gain 139

67 x Exp 180s

Frames: 67 Lights; 10 Darks; 100 flats

80% Crop

Capture: SharpCap

Processed: APP; PS; Grad Exterminator.

Sky: No Moon, calm, no cloud, cool, good seeing.

NGC7023: 1.3 thousand light years distant.

The Pleiades, known as the Seven Sisters, Subaru or Messier 45 (M45), is an open star cluster in the Taurus constellation. It lies relatively close to us at ~439 light-years away from Earth. This cluster consists of many stars; its brightest shine vibrantly in our sky and is easily recognizable.

Astronomically, the Pleiades spans ~12 light-years and is about 100 million years old—young in stellar terms as dinosaurs went extinct ~45 million years before this cluster began to shine. One of the coolest things about the Pleiades is that it is a reflection nebula. Glowing clouds surround the stars due to dust reflecting the blue light of the bright, young stars.

Easily visible in the winter sky, the Pleiades are worth looking at with your naked eye, binoculars, or telescope.

Equipment:

SkyWatcher EQ6-R

Nikkor 500mm f/4 P AI-S at f/5.6

Sony a7rIII (unmodified)

ZWO 30mm Guide Scope

GPCAM2 Mono Camera

Acquisition:

Taos, NM: my front yard - Bortle 3

51 x 120-second exposures for 1 hour, 42 exposure time.

4 dark frames

15 flats frames

15 bias frames

Guided

Software:

SharpCap

PHD2

PixInsight

Photoshop

Lightroom

My a7rIII and adapted Nikon 500mm f/4 lens were mounted to my SkyWatcher EQ6-R mount using a vixen rail. The guidescope/camera was fixed to the front of the rail. I used SharpCap to achieve "excellent" polar alignment. I shot ISO 1600 at f/5.6. I took 120-second exposures using PHD2 with my guidescope to keep tracking accurately. I brought the lights/darks/flats/bias frames into PixInsight for stacking and aligning and then used: STF, Cropping, Dynamic Background Extraction, BlurXTerminator, plate solving, color correction, NoiseXTerminator, and then the galaxy was separated from the stars using StarXterminator, and both files processed and stretched separately and then recombined using PixelMath. That file was brought into Lightroom for Metadata and EXIF tags, light post-processing, and cropping. I used Photoshop to sharpen the final image.

altra immagine elaborata in mineral-moon , somma di 40 frame catturati con SharpCap,su QHY 183c CCD sensore settato a -11, processati con PixInsight FFTR, Ragistration. Telescopio di ripresa FS60CB Takahashi con spianatore, tutto su montatura AZEQ6GT SW, cielo di casa con fastidiose velature di passaggio che hanno un pò inficiato sul risultato finale.

Taken from Oxfordshire, UK with a William Optics 70mm refractor, 2x Barlow and ASI120MC camera, when the Moon was a 40% illuminated Waxing Crescent.

This is a 3 pane mosaic, each pane was a 2,000 frame video shot with SharpCap Pro, the best 75% of the frames were stacked with Autostakkert! 3. The images were stitched using Microsoft ICE, then processed in Lightroom and Fast Stone Image Viewer

Moon 60.5% Waning Gibbous. LRGB (270 Frames Each) Captured in SharpCap Pro. ASI1600MM, SharpStar 107PH Triplet. Processed in Siril. Wavelets in Registax. Enhanced Colour in Lightroom CC.

Messier 78 Reflection Nebula in the Constellation Orion

Messier 78 or M 78, also known as NGC 2068, is a reflection nebula in the constellation Orion. It was discovered by Pierre Méchain in 1780 and included by Charles Messier in his catalog of comet-like objects that same year.

M78 is the brightest diffuse reflection nebula of a group of nebulae that includes NGC 2064, NGC 2067 and NGC 2071. This group belongs to the Orion B molecular cloud complex and is about 1,350 light-years distant from Earth. M78 is easily found in small telescopes as a hazy patch and involves two stars of 10th and 11th magnitude. These two B-type stars, HD 38563 A and HD 38563 B, are responsible for making the cloud of dust in M78 visible by reflecting their light.

(Wikipedia.org)

Technical Information for Image

Telescope: William Optics Zenithstar 81 Refractor

Mount: iOptron CEM25P

Imaging Camera: ZWO ASI294MC. Gain 120. Cooled to -5C.

Filter: Optolong L-Pro

Guiding: William Optics 50mm, 200mm FL, ASI290MC camera

Exposures: 6 x 240s Bin 2x2

Capture: APT

Guiding: PHD2

Polar Alignment: SharpCap Pro

Site: Borrego Springs, CA USA, Bortle 4

Processing: Pixinsight with Final Touchup in Photoshop CC

IC410, NGC2244 and NGC2264 with the ES 80mm ED triplet refractor and Zwo ASI294MC Pro cooled color camera

Was trying out the focuser from Zwo EAF, Works flawless with SharpCap Pro

Had high thin clouds, tracking soo soo, better on NGC2244

Optolong L eNhance 2' filter

#SharpCap Pro, PoleMaster

Ioptron i45 Pro EQ mount, PHD2 guiding

Orion 60mm guidescope SSAG

220 Gain offset 10, -10c cooling,

IC410 was 90 minutes, 1 minute exposure each

NGC2244 was 90 minutes, 1 minute each

NGC2264 was 15 minutes, 1 minute each

50 darks 50 flats and 50 bias frames

For NGC2264 was 8 darks, 8 flats and 8 bias frames

Astro Pixel Processor and PS

Ecco un mosaico di Luna Gibbosa Crescente al 78% del 1° gennaio 2023.

Usando la tecnica della "Mineral Moon", ho aumentato la saturazione in ognuna delle parti per evidenziare le piccole differenze cromatiche, le quali indicano una diversa concentrazione di elementi chimici sulla superficie del nostro satellite. Quindi il blu dei mari lunari indica una maggiore presenza di ferro e titanio, le zone di colore arancio o giallo sono ricche di ferro ma povere di titanio e quelle rosse sono povere di entrambi gli elementi. I crateri da impatto più recenti tendono all’azzurro o blu chiaro, mentre quelli più antichi al rosso e blu scuro. Il colore marrone indica la presenza di antico materiale vulcanico.

Dati:

Telescopio Celestron 114/910 Newtoniano

Montatura Eq2 motorizzata Sky-Watcher

Camera planetaria QHY5L-ll-C

Filtro UV IR cut

Sharpcap 3.2 per l’acquisizione di 25 video ognuno da 30 secondi e contenente 443 fotogrammi

Autostakkert! 3.1.4 e Astrosurface T5-TITANIA per le elaborazioni

GIMP per aumentare la saturazione dei colori

Autostitch per assemblare le 25 parti

Astrosurface per il bilanciamento del bianco e per regolare luminosità e contrasto

Condizioni del cielo: ottima trasparenza e seeing sufficiente

Luogo: Cabras, Sardegna, Italia

Data e ora delle riprese: 01-01-2023 dalle 22:30 UTC alle 22:55 UTC

Here is a feature called the Vallis Alpes, or Alpine Valley. It is a valley that bisects the Montes Alpes range and runs from Mare Imbrium to Mare Frigoris. This feature is over 80 miles in length and widens to almost 6 miles. While I have imaged this feature in the past, to date, this is the best resolution I have obtained.

Tech Specs: ZWO ASI290MC camera and Meade 12” LX90 telescope mounted on a Celestron CGEM-DX mount. Software used included Sharpcap v2.9, AutoStakkert! Alpha Version 2.3.0.21, ImagesPlus v5.75a, and Registax v6.1.0.8. Photographed on January 7, 2017 from Weatherly, Pennsylvania.

Composite including full moon data for the ‘dark side’ of the moon from 27.02.21

Shot using a 70-200 + 1.4 extender for 280mm on a ZWO 533

Capturing using Sharpcap

50% of 10,000 frames, stacked in Autostakkert3

While I have the equipment disarmed to make some improvements especially on the focuser to avoid tilts on the imaging train and guidescope mount to avoid differential flexing, I set about reprocessing some recent images, trying to apply everything I have learned lately.

I Hope you enjoy it, clear skies!

Ariel

Equipo Principal: ZWO ASI 1600 mm-pro + SW Explorer 200p + SW Coma Corrector 0.9x + EQ6-R-Pro + Long Perng 2" Dual Speed Low Profile Crayford Focuser + ZWO EAF

Equipo guía: guidescope 60/240 mm, camara guia ZWO ASI 120mm mini

*Gain 139, -20 º C, Ha 7nm 2" Optolong, 71x180"

*Gain 139, -20 º C, Oiii-CCD 6.5 nm 2" Optolong, 71x180"

100 Darks

100 Flats por filtro

Polar Align: SharpCap 3.2

Adquisición: SGP 3.1

Procesado: Pixinsight 1.8.8, PS

Here is a three panel mosaic of the moon last evening, February 28, 2020. 24% illuminated.

Tech Specs: Meade 12" LX-90, ZWO ASI071mc-Pro, three panels, best 25% of 100 frames at max resolution. Captured with SharpCap Pro v3.2, spliced with Microsoft Image Composite Editor (ICE). Image date: February 28, 2020. Location: The Dark Side Observatory, Weatherly, PA, USA.

Pinwheel galaxy M101 is a bright and large galaxy. It is larger than our Milky way galaxy 170,000 light years across. It’s distance from Earth is about 27 Million light years. The image also shows the newly discovered supernova SN2023ixf in the upoer arm. Gear setup: Celestron HD 8 @ f/7, iOptron GEM45 guided by OAG & ZWO174MM, ZWO 2600MC @ 0, Optolong L-Pro 2”. Light subs 25 x 300 sec, Flats 20, Darks 10, Bias 50. Total integration 2 hours. Captured by APT, Sharpcap pro, PHD2. Processed by PI & PS. Imaged from Bortle sky class 4.

Andromeda Galaxy with M110, M32

William Optics 61 APO refractor

Zwo ASI183MC Pro cooled color camera

Ioptron i45 EQ mount

SharpCap Pro

Deep Sky Stacker

PS

Darks flats and bias frames

PoleMaster

NGC 2194 is a rich moderately concentrated open cluster found in the arm of Orion. It has a magnitude of 8.5 and is about 12,300 light years away from Earth. The cluster has 140+ stars down to magnitude 15. The bright star on the lower left is 73 Orionis, a main sequence star, magnitude 5.43.

Tech Specs: Sky-Watcher Esprit 120mm ED Triplet APO Refractor, Celestron CGEM-DX mount (pier mounted), ZWO ASI071MC-Pro running at -25C, 20 x 60 second exposures, GAIN 200, guided using a ZWO ASI290MC and Orion 60mm guide scope. Captured using SharpCap v3.2. Image date: January 1, 2020. Location: The Dark Side Observatory, Weatherly, PA, USA.

L'activité solaire est très forte ces jours-ci...la région action AR3664 est retour selon les analyses de Spaceweather, maintenant sous l'appellation AR3697

Soleil du 1er juin avec 8 régions actives et 135 taches solaires.

The Sun is very active these days. The famous active area AR3664 seems to be back, not tagged as AR3697.

==

Risingcam IMX571 color

William Optics Zenithstar73ii

iOptron CEM26

Filtre UV/IR cut

Filtre Thousand Oaks Solarlite ND5

Exp. 18ms / Gain 100

Best 500 de 3000

Aquisition: Sharpcap

Traitement: PIPP, AutoStakkert 4.0, Registax et Gimp

@Astrobox 2.0 / St-Jean-sur-Richelieu, Québec

AstroM1

Core of the Orion Nebula-The Trapezium

It has been over a month since skies were clear enough to image. I usually don't image while the moon is so bright, but

I decided to try live stacking in Sharpcap. I'm impressed with the results.

This was 30-10second frames taken with a QHY462C & 11" Celestron Edge HD@F/10.

Resolution ............... 0.218 arcsec/px

Rotation ................. 18.006 deg

Focal distance ........... 2740.10 mm

Pixel size ............... 2.90 um

Field of view ............ 3' 45.5" x 6' 52.8"

Image center ............. RA: 5 35 16.873 Dec: -5 23 09.11

M42 Orion Nebula Core & De Mairan's Nebula M43

This is a 3 panel mosaic using "Live Capture" in Sharpcap.

QHY462C(w/1.25" x.5 reducer) & 11" Celestron Edge HD @F/10

Each panel consists of 60-5 second images. Stacked in Live Stack, hand-aligned, merged & tweaked in Photoshop & Pixinsight

Center (RA, Dec): (83.821, -5.385)

Center (RA, hms): 05h 35m 16.941s

Center (Dec, dms): -05° 23' 04.819"

Size: 11.2 x 17.7 arcmin

Radius: 0.175 deg

Pixel scale: 0.379 arcsec/pixel

Aberkenfig, South Wales

Lat +51.542 Long -3.593

A sequence of images taken over a period of 9 years which display the proper motion of this well known binary star system. It's apparent movement is about 5" (arc seconds) per year.

Images captured using a Skywatcher 254mm Newtonian with a modified Philips SPC 900NC Webcam. Exposure time 10s on LX Mode. The telescope was initially mounted on an EQ6 HD then EQ6 Syntrek for the later captures.

I am pleased to say that the webcam used is still in working order after all these years.

Hot pixels removed before final levels slightly adjusted with G.I.M.P.

G.I.M.P. layers tool used to align, slightly crop, arrange images and add annotations.

Another page from my observations log.

Best viewed in intermediate expanded mode.

Webcam Settings using an old version of Sharpcap:

[Philips SPC 900NC PC Camera (LX Mode)]

Resolution=640x480

Colour Space / Compression=YUY2

Exposure (s)=10.0466495818267

Output Format=PNG files (*.png)

Brightness=90

Contrast=40

Saturation=72

Gamma=3

ColorEnable=255

BacklightCompensation=0

Gain=30

crab-122x30-g37-o15_-20C-qhy183c-uhcs-85f5_6-v3a.jpjg

Taken on Feb 22, 2020. 122x30 seconds, Gain 37, Offset 15, QHY183c cooled to -20C, UHC-S filter, Televue TV-85 at F/5.6. SharpCap 3.2 LiveStacking with Dither for acquisition. Metro area location (Bortle Red Zone.)

You have to zoom in on this one to appreciate the amount of detail an 85 mm objective can deliver when aggressively enhanced with modern image processing software.

While scanning the night sky in search of Saturn in August of 1665, the German amateur astronomer Abraham Ihle made an amazing discovery: the globular cluster M22. It was one of the first objects of its kind ever detected. Located 10,000 light-years from Earth in the constellation Sagittarius, the cluster’s relatively bright apparent magnitude of 5.1 makes it a popular target for today’s amateur astronomers.

Image Details:

- Imaging Scope: Astrotelescopes ED 80mm Refractor

- Imaging Camera: ZWO ASI183MC Color with UV/IR Blocking filter

- Guiding Scope: William Optics 66mm Petzval

- Guiding Camera: Orion Starshoot Auto Guider

- Acquisition Software: Sharpcap

- Guiding Software: PHD2

- Light Frames: 14*3 mins @ 100 Gain, Temp -15C

- Dark Frames: 14*3 mins

- Stacked in Deep Sky Stacker

- Processed in PixInsight and Adobe Lightroom

Luna 2018-08-21 - 22:10 T.U.

Mare Imbrium, Plato, Sinus Iridum

Telescopio: Celestron C6-A XLT 150/1500 f10

Cámara: ZWO ASI120MM

Montura: EQ5 Bresser EXOS2 motorizada sin goto

Filtros: Astronomik ProPlanet 742 IR-pass filter

Software: SharpCap, AutoStakkert, Registax y Fitswork

Fecha: 2018-08-21

Hora: 22:10 T.U.

Fase lunar: 82.2% 10.7 días Creciente

Lugar: 42.615 N -6.417 W (Bembibre Spain)

Vídeo: 4 minutos

Resolución: 1280 x 960

Gain: 50

Exposure: 0,006726

Frames: 4383

Frames apilados: 20%

FPS: 18

Ecco il pianeta Giove del 15 dicembre 2023 con i satelliti Europa, Ganimede e Io visibili sulla sinistra. In una serata con turbolenza elevata ho approfittato dei pochi momenti di calma per fare qualche ripresa. L'immagine comunque sembra di buona qualità e sono visibili alcuni dettagli sulle bande e la grande macchia rossa.

Telescopio Celestron 114/910 Newton

Montatura eq2 motorizzata Sky-Watcher

Camera QHY5L-II-C

Barlow 2,5X Tecnosky

Filtro UV IR cut

Sharpcap 4 per la ripresa

PIPP, AS!4, Registax 6, Astrosurface V1 per l'elaborazione

Data e ora: 15-12-2023 19:31 UTC

Luogo: Cabras, Sardegna, Italia

Messier 31 The Andromeda Galaxy. Our Closest Galaxy Neighbor. This object never gets old to me. The things it reveals to us are amazing. The small lighter colored area in the left side of the galaxy is NGC 206. It is a star cloud of more than 300 large blue stars. Zooming in to the feature can reveal some of the individual stars. M31 has many such intriguing discoveries to explore.

Technical Information: This image was taken from a Bortle 4 site in Landers, CA, USA on a New Moon night. Telescope: Explore Scientific ES80 APO Refractor with a FL 480mm and an Orion .67 Reducer. Guiding was with Orion 50mm Guide Scope FL 242mm with a ZWO ASI290MC for the guide camera. Mount: Celestron Advanced VX. Main imaging camera: ASI294MC PRO cooled to -5C. Exposures: 24 x 120s with Gain at 120. No darks, flats or bias frames. Processed in PixInsight with use of Masked Stretch, Star Masks, Inverted and Non-Inverted Range Masks. Slight crop. Polar alignment was with SharpCap Pro.

The strongly shining, waxing gibbous moon was too hard to ignore last night. I had again intended to do some deep sky work but a combination of strong moonlight and annoying clouds made this very difficult!

So I decided I had to image our beautiful natural satellite which was now over 97% illuminated.

Towards the left of the image the blue colour of the bright crater Aristarchus is very noticeable.

I have slightly boosted the natural colour of the lunar surface to highlight the different mineral composition present in the lunar regolith. Trying to keep the colour variations and transitions as subtle as possible.

Regions which are a muddy brown are more rich in iron compounds in comparison to those areas which have a more blue cast being richer in titanium compounds.

The prominent lunar highland crater Tycho's huge ray system is well displayed.

Many thanks for looking!

Imaged with a Skywatcher Esprit 120ED scope and a ZWO 2600MC camera.

Captured using SharpCap PRO. Sharpened in Registax with final processing being done in Photoshop 2021.

Jupiter, captured through a brief window of very good seeing before midnight of November 22, 2023. 12.5" f/5.1 home built newtonian (driven by OnStep), TeleVue 3x barlow, ZWO ASI290 mc, UV/IR blocking. I captured the video clips for creating this image using SharpCap Pro with a gain of 300 and an exposure of 8.2ms. I captured string of about 20 1-minute video clips, processed using Astrostakkert!3, using only 50% of the frames. I chose 11 consecutive 1-minute videos. I used an altazimuth mount, so I had to carefully correct for frame rotation before derotating in WinJupos. I processed the image(s) using Pipp, Registax, and Photoshop.

This galaxy lies approximately 21 million light years away. It is interacting/colliding with another galaxy (smaller object to the top, NGC 5195) which has been continuing for millions of years. Several supernovas have been spotted here in recent years.

Several hours of data taken over two nights. I tweaked PHD2 Guiding to be a little more aggressive and really worked on focusing for both sessions. A pleasing result.

Image Details:

- Imaging Scope: Astrotelescopes ED 80mm Refractor

- Imaging Camera: ZWO ASI183MC Color with UV/IR Blocking filter

- Guiding Scope: William Optics 66mm Petzva

- Guiding Camera: Orion Starshoot Auto Guider

- Acquisition Software: Sharpcap

- Guiding Software: PHD2

- Light Frames: 41*5 mins @ 50 Gain, Temp -25C

- Dark Frames: 41*5 mins @ 50 Gain, Temp -25C

- Stacked in Deep Sky Stacker

- Processed in PixInsight and Adobe Lightroom

= Acquisition info =

William Optics Zenithstar 73ii (FL 430mm)

Risingcam IMX571 color

iOptron CEM26

Sharpcap

= Séance photo =

13 juillet 2024 à 20h10

Filtre UV/IR

Best 450 de 3000 x 10ms

= Traitement/processing =

PIPP, Autostakkert, Registax & Gimp

@Astrobox 2.0

St-Jean-sur-Richelieu, Québec

Bortle 9

AstroM1

First attempt at this object from last night, which was clear and wonderful! Another tricky one to process but a decent end result. Some nice dusty action here.

This beautiful, blushing nebula is unique amongst its counterparts. While many of the nebulae visible in the night sky are emission nebulae — clouds of dust and gas that are hot enough to emit their own radiation and light — Caldwell 4, otherwise known as the Iris Nebula or NGC 7023, is a reflection nebula. This means that its color comes from the scattered light of its central star, which lies nestled in the abundant star fields of the constellation Cepheus. Located some 1,400 light-years away from Earth, the Iris Nebula’s glowing gaseous petals stretch roughly 6 light-years across.

Image Details:

- Imaging Scope: Astrotelescopes ED 80mm Refractor

- Imaging Camera: ZWO ASI183MC Color with UV/IR Blocking filter

- Guiding Scope: William Optics 66mm Petzval

- Guiding Camera: Orion Starshoot Auto Guider

- Acquisition Software: Sharpcap

- Guiding Software: PHD2

- Light Frames: 20*5 mins @ 100 Gain, Temp -15C

- Dark Frames: 20*5 mins

- Stacked in Deep Sky Stacker

- Processed in PixInsight and Adobe Lightroom

M8 The Lagoon Nebula

I haven't done any imaging since March....on Friday, despite the bright moon, I took some close up images of M8 using "Live Stack" in Sharpcap, 10 minutes with a QHY462C. I added this to a previous image of M8 and also added some OIII

Setup#1(for FOV)

Camera: QHY163M

Telescope: 11" Celestron Edge HD w/V4 Hyperstar

Mount: Orion HDX-110

Optolong LUM filter: 50x30sec

Setup#2(for star color & OIII)

Camera: QHY128C

Telescope: Astrotech AT65EDQ

Mount: Orion HDX-110

8x600sec Optolong LUM filter

11x480sec Optolong OIII filter

Setup#3(for core area) LIVE STACK

Camera:QHY462c

Telescope: 11"Celestron Edge HD

Mount: Orion HDX-110

LUM:30x20sec

Images processed in PixInsight, combined and tweeked in PS2020. Qhy 128 OSC data cropped and combined with QHY163M Luminance data, QHY462C LUM added for core area

The Lagoon Nebula is 8 in Charles Messier's "not a comet" list, 25 in the Sharpless catalog and 6523 in the New General Calalog.(NGC) It is a cloud of ionized hydrogen estimated to be 4000-6000 light years from earth. It can be seen with the naked eye as a gray/green patch in the constellation of Sagittarius..Almost in the center of the photo can be seen NGC 6530, an open cluster of young stars formed from material within the nebula. The entire nebula is roughly 110 x 50 light-years wide.

Here is a quick capture of the planet Jupiter and an overexposed image of Jupiter on the top showing the four Galilean moons.

Tech Specs: Sky Watcher Esprit 120ED, Celestron CGEM-DX pier mounted, ZWO ASI290MC, and ZWO EAF, Televue 1.5x Barlow. Captured in SharpCap Pro, processed in Autostakkert and Registax, top image single 3-second exposure, bottom image is best 20% of 9000 frames. Image date: October 13, 2021. Location: The Dark Side Observatory, Weatherly, PA, USA (Bortle Class 4).

Messier 1 ... The Crab Nebula Supernova Remnant

The Crab Nebula (catalogue designations M1, NGC 1952, Taurus A) is a supernova remnant and pulsar wind nebula in the constellation of Taurus. The common name comes from William Parsons, 3rd Earl of Rosse, who observed the object in 1842 using a 36-inch (91 cm) telescope and produced a drawing that looked somewhat like a crab. The nebula was discovered by English astronomer John Bevis in 1731, and it corresponds with a bright supernova recorded by Chinese astronomers in 1054. The nebula was the first astronomical object identified that corresponds with a historical supernova explosion. (Wikipedia.org)

Technicals:

Telescope: Orion 8 inch f4 Astrograph

Mount: Skywatcher HEQ5

Imaging Camera: ASI294MC Pro cooled to -5C . Gain 120. Captured 34 exposures of 180 seconds each.

Used the excellent Televue Paracoor Type-2 corrector.

Guiding: PHD2 with ASI178MC Camera on a ZWO 30mm, 120mm focal length, guidescope.

Filter Used: STC Astro Duo Narrowband

No Darks or Calibration Frames.

Processed in Pixinsight with Finishing Touches in Corel Paintshop Pro. Captured with APT. Polar Aligned with Sharpcap Pro.

Site: Landers, California, USA. Bortle 4 zone.

Did a little comet hunting last night. This chap is currently magnitude 14, so a tricky target. It's approximately 211,500kms away from Earth.

Image Details:

- Imaging Scope: Astrotelescopes ED 80mm Refractor

- Imaging Camera: ZWO ASI183MC Color with UV/IR Blocking filter

- Guiding Scope: William Optics 66mm Petzval

- Guiding Camera: Orion Starshoot Auto Guider

- Acquisition Software: Sharpcap

- Guiding Software: PHD2

- Light Frames: 14*3 mins @ 100 Gain, Temp -15C

- Dark Frames: 14*3 mins

- Stacked in Deep Sky Stacker

- Processed in PixInsight and Adobe Lightroom

Here is a view of the most distant globular cluster in the Milky Way, NGC 2419, some have postulated that this may be an extra-galactic object. I have seen distances listed as high as 285,000 light-years away from Earth. It appears small and dim, but it is actually very large and very bright (if it was a bit closer to us), there are estimates of 300-400 million solar masses in this cluster.

You can also make out the galaxy NGC 2424, a barred spiral galaxy with a magnitude of 12.6. The view is dominated by the red giant star HD61294 in the lower right, magnitude 5.75, and 41 times larger than our Sun.

Tech Specs: Sky-Watcher Esprit 120mm ED Triplet APO Refractor, Celestron CGEM-DX mount (pier mounted), ZWO ASI071MC-Pro running at -25C, 30 x 60 second exposures, GAIN 200, guided using a ZWO ASI290MC and Orion 60mm guide scope. Captured using SharpCap v3.2. Image date: December 20, 2019. Location: The Dark Side Observatory, Weatherly, PA, USA.

The Great M13 Hercules Globular Cluster. This cluster contains over 300,000 stars and lies around 25,000 light years away, situated just outside of our galaxy. It is about 11.65 billion years old, making it almost three times older than our Earth.

This is one of my sharpest images of this object I have made so do zoom in and check out the resolution of the stars in the cluster itself.

Image Details:

- Imaging Scope: Astrotelescopes ED 80mm Refractor

- Imaging Camera: ZWO ASI183MC Color with UV/IR Blocking filter

- Guiding Scope: William Optics 66mm Petzval

- Guiding Camera: Orion Starshoot Auto Guider

- Acquisition Software: Sharpcap

- Guiding Software: PHD2

- Light Frames: 20*3 mins @ 100 Gain, Temp -40C

- Stacked in Deep Sky Stacker

- Processed in PixInsight and Adobe Lightroom

Messier 47 (M47) is a bright open cluster that can be found in the constellation Puppis, to the upper left of the star Sirius in Canis Major. The cluster is about 1,600 light years away from Earth and has an apparent magnitude of 4.2, there are about 50 members in this cluster.

Tech Specs: Sky-Watcher Esprit 120mm ED Triplet APO Refractor, Celestron CGEM-DX mount (pier mounted), ZWO ASI071MC-Pro running at -25C, 7 x 120 second exposures, GAIN 200, guided using a ZWO ASI290MC and Orion 60mm guide scope. Captured using SharpCap v3.2. Image date: January 21, 2020. Location: The Dark Side Observatory, Weatherly, PA, USA.