Picture was taken in CZ, August 31, 2019. No astro mod. Nikon Z7 + Canon 70-200/2,8 @ 100 + Kipon FEZ adapter. Exposure 30 s, ISO 1000, f 2,8. Light frames 93 x, No Dark, No Bias, No Flat. Tracking iOptron SkyGuider Pro, Stacked in AstroPixelProcessor, adjusted in Adobe PS. North America Nebula (NGC7000) has apparent dimensions 120 x 100 arcmins and apparent magnitude 4.

I was/am so pleased with how my de-bayered SIGMA fp has performed that I couldn't resist going for a de-bayered SIGMA fp L (61MP). I finally go the chance to try it out in November, having managed to chase down a small hole in the clouds in northern Italy. The conditions were hard: The wind-side of the car was covered with ice before I had finished the set-up, so that I run out of juice before I could get all the data I wanted, nevertheless im still really pleased with the result. There is some really nice "smoking gun" effects in the S-II data that I wasn't aware of before (and didn't see in the 5 minute subs) so I will definitely be looking for an off-center composition next time i'm out ...

Celestron RASA 11 / 10Micron GM1000 / Sigma fp L monochrome

Star colour from a SIGMA fp shot separately.

Images processed in AstroPixelProcessor and completed to taste in Photoshop. Total time around 2,5 hours ...

PS start point: Ha Red / S-II Red+Green / O-III Green+Blue / star colours are uncalibrated.

100% views: markjamesford.prodibi.com/a/g66rrwd4xmx27m1/i/75zj2kg65r6...

If you are old enough to remember the cult UK TV series ‘The Prisoner”, you certainly didn’t want to see one of these coming towards you. Especially one this big!

The Bubble Nebula is 7 light-years across – about one-and-a-half times the distance from our sun to its nearest stellar neighbour, Alpha Centauri – and resides 7,100 light-years from Earth in the constellation Cassiopeia.

The seething star forming this nebula is 45 times more massive than our sun. Gas on the star gets so hot that it escapes away into space as a "stellar wind" moving at over 4 million miles per hour. This outflow sweeps up the cold, interstellar gas in front of it, forming the outer edge of the bubble much like a snowplow piles up snow in front of it as it moves forward.

As the surface of the bubble's shell expands outward, it slams into dense regions of cold gas on one side of the bubble. This asymmetry makes the star appear dramatically off-centre from the bubble, with its location in the 7 o'clock position in the this view. Dense pillars of cool hydrogen gas laced with dust appear at the upper left of the picture, and more "fingers" can be seen nearly face-on, behind the translucent bubble.

The gases heated to varying temperatures emit different colours: oxygen is hot enough to emit blue light in the bubble near the star, while the cooler pillars are yellow from the combined light of hydrogen and nitrogen. The pillars are similar to the iconic columns in the "Pillars of Creation" in the Eagle Nebula. As seen with the structures in the Eagle Nebula, the Bubble Nebula pillars are being illuminated by the strong ultraviolet radiation from the brilliant star inside the bubble.

The Bubble Nebula was discovered in 1787 by William Herschel. It is being formed by an O star, BD +60°2522, an extremely bright, massive, and short-lived star that has lost most of its outer hydrogen and is now fusing helium into heavier elements. The star is about 4 million years old, and in 10 million to 20 million years, it will likely detonate as a supernova.

Taken on contiguous nights 6 to 10 August 2020. Moon was 50% to 96% but nice and low and setting during the sessions. Challenging to process, and I think more revisions will come out to this data, but finished for now.

HOO + LRGB

RGB Stars 60s x 30 for each filter

L 60s x 180 + 120s x 51

Ha 300s x 118

Oiii 300s x 68

Just under 22hrs

Astromiks 36mm SHO 6nm Filters

30 x Darks, Flats (for each filter) and Dark Flats

ZWO ASI294MM Pro 120 gain, -10C

ZWO 7x36mm EFW

ZWO EAF

Stellalyra 8” Ritchey-Chrétien Carbon

HEQ6

ASIAIR Plus

Astro Pixel Processor

Pixinsight

Photoshop 2022

A beautiful emission nebula in the constellation of Cepheus.

SIGMA fp (monochrome)

Celestron RASA 11"

10 Micron GM 1000 Mount

Ha and SII narrowband filters

ISO 1600, ca. 3 hrs, F2.2, 620mm

Registration in AstroPixelProcessor further processing to taste in Photoshop.

Full Image: markjamesford.prodibi.com/a/g66rrwd4xmx27m1/i/jvvkl7we7l0...

Exifs :

- Bortle 3-4

- Signal 1h23 (166x30s), F2, 1600iso

- 50 flats

- D7100A, Samyang 135mm

- Star Adventurer, Nisi Natural Night

- Lightroom, DSS, AstroPixelProcessor, Photoshop, Topaz Denoise

Comet C/2021 A1 (Leonard) continues to brighten. Early this morning (3 December) it danced with the nice globular cluster M3. From suburban Bloomington, Indiana, with no Moonlight but plenty of light pollution.

75 frames, each 90 sec. (nearly 2 hours total exposure), processed in Astro Pixel Processor, once to register on the comet, again to register on the stars, processed in Lightroom and composited in Photoshop.

Explore Scientific 102mm f/7 refractor, ZWO ASI294MC camera, UV/IR cut fillter, iOptron CEM25P mount, ASIAir Pro controller.

Taken 6 to 10 August 2022 on consecutive nights, a wide field of the Cygnus region containing The Tulip, Crescent, Soap Bubble, WR 134 and Sh2-104 Nebulae. This image comprises 18hrs of capture of narrowband Sii, Ha, and Oiii plus LRGB for the stars. So many elements in this image to bring out in processing, starting from scratch 5 times now, but this is the finished version for now anyway. Whilst there are many individual nebulae in this image, a few of the more identifiable due to structure are listed below.

The Tulip Nebula – Sh2-101 The emission from the Tulip Nebula is powered by ultraviolet radiation of the hot young star HD 227018. The O6.5III class star belongs to the Cygnus OB3 association and has a visual magnitude of 9.02. In images, it can be seen near the nebula’s centre.

The Soap Bubble Nebula, or PN G75 is a planetary nebula in the constellation Cygnus, near the Crescent Nebula (NGC 6888). It was discovered by amateur astronomer Dave Jurasevich using an Astro-Physics 160 mm refractor telescope with which he imaged the nebula on June 19, 2007 and on July 6, 2008. Can you see it? It is underneath the Crescent Nebula, a little to the left in this image.

WR 134 is a variable Wolf-Rayet star located around 6,000 light years away from Earth in the constellation of Cygnus, surrounded by a faint bubble nebula blown by the intense radiation and fast wind from the star. It is five times the radius of the sun, but due to a temperature over 63,000 K it is 400,000 times as luminous as the Sun.

NGC 6888, the Crescent Nebula, is about 25 light-years across blown by winds from its central, bright, massive star. The oxygen atoms produce the blue hue that seems to enshroud the detailed folds and filaments. Visible within the nebula, NGC 6888's central star is classified as a Wolf-Rayet star (WR 136). The star is shedding its outer envelope in a strong stellar wind, ejecting the equivalent of the Sun's mass every 10,000 years.

Sh2-104 is a very faint emission nebula in the constellation Cygnus. This is located due east of the popular Crescent Nebula. Sh2-104 is viewed by professional astronomers as a good illustration of the "collect and collapse" model of star formation triggered by the rapid expansion of a Helium II region.

Sky Quality 19.67 Magnitude Class 5 Bortle.

Astromiks 50mm SHO 6nm Filters and LRGB Filters

30 x Darks, Flats and Dark Flats

ZWO ASI6200MM Pro

ZWO 7x2" EFW

ZWO EAF

Williams Optics GT81 IV

WO 6A III Field Flattener 0.8

HEQ5 Pro Rowan

ASIAIR Pro

Astro Pixel Processor

Pixinsight

Photoshop 2022

Have you ever had a meal that was a little too big so you saved the leftovers? That's what solar systems do with leftover dust, rock, and ice… they freeze 'em. If that material doesn't get pulled in to make stars or planets, it continues flying around as big frozen balls of dust & rock (aka comets). Comet Leonard had a similar path (flying through space in 2021) until it had a close encounter with our sun. This encounter was so close it resulted in the eventual breakup and disintegration of Comet Leonard.

Calibrated images of Comet Leonard were provided by Blake Estes from iTelescope.net. In addition to providing access to their telescopes, iTelescope.net provides subscribing members with a combination of premium image sets (with the rights to use & post them) and webinars that show how to process them. Itelescope.net captured the images and I did the post-processing with Astro Pixel Processor, Photoshop and Topaz Denoise. Star spikes are natural.

Exposure Settings

• 18 images (6 red, 6 green & 6 blue)

• Exposure Time: 2 minutes (each image)

• Total Exposure Time: 36 minutes

I've been watching this comet for the last month and have seen some nice images. We got some clear skies, so I decided to dust off my astro equipment and give it a try. It's been awhile since I astrophotographed (last time I imaged was Sept. 2021), so I wondered if I'd remember the process - setting up equipment, camera settings, polar alignment, focusing, post processing, etc. Thankfully it came back to me.

The nucleus is quite bright - easily seen in 10x binoculars. The tail is not so bright - I really pushed the data to bring out the hint of a tail seen here.

Acquisition details: Fujifilm X-T10; Samyang 135mm f/2.0 ED UMC @ f2.0, ISO 1600; tracking with iOptron SkyTracker Pro; 20 x 60 sec; stacking with DeepSkyStacker (stacked on stars, so comet is slightly blurred - it's moving fast); editing with Astro Pixel Processor; and curves adjustment/star reduction/editing with GIMP; imaged around 4 am on January 29, 2023 from my backyard (Bortle 4). I almost drove out of town to slightly darker Bortle 3/4 skies but didn't want to brave the cold (10 deg F).

OBJECT: IC 5146, The Cocoon Nebula, Constellation Cygnus (Swan), apparent magnitude 7,2 apparent diameter 12 arcmin, FOV 1 x 0,7 arcdeg, cropped 16,6 x.

GEAR: Nikon Z7 Kolari Full Spectrum + Nikkor 500/5,6 PF, no filter, tracking mount iOptron CEM60EC - 3 star alignment, no auto guiding, dew heater.

ACQUISITION: August 1st, 2020, Struz, CZ, Exposure 300s, f 5,6, ISO 400, Light 13x, Dark 5x, Bias 5x, Flat 10x. Total exposure time 65 min. Night, breeze, wind 17 C.

STACKING AND POST PROCESSING: AstroPixelProcessor (stacking, background neutralization, light pollution removal, calibrate background and stars colors), Adobe Photoshop CC 2020 (stretching, black and white point settings, star reduction, enhance DSO, noise reduction, contrast setting, sharpening and cropping).

Despite being only 5 degrees above the horizon when I imaged it, both the broad yellow tail and the fainter blue ion tail are apparent. And the tails are long - this image, taken with a 135mm lens (~200mm 35mm equivalent on the X-T10), is uncropped.

Acquisition details: Fujifilm X-T10, Samyang 135mm f/2.0 ED UMC @ f2.0, ISO 1600, 40 x 15 sec, tracking with iOptron SkyTracker Pro, stacking with DeepSkyStacker, editing with GIMP and Astro Pixel Processor (I removed the heavy background gradient using Astro Pixel Processor's 'remove light pollution' tool.). Taken July 13, 2020 from Bortle 3/4 skies at 11:15 pm Pacific (the beginning of astronomic dark).

Picture was taken in CZ, August 30, 2019. Nikon Z7 + Sigma 135/1,8 Art @ 2,2. Exposure 60 s, ISO 400. Light frames 40 x, Dark 15 x, Bias 15 x, No Flat. Tracking iOptron SkyGuider Pro, Stacked in AstroPixelProcessor, adjusted in Adobe LR + PS. Cropped 11x. M31 has apparent dimensions 190 x 60 arcmins and apparent magnitude 4,3. In low light pollution area you can see it by naked eyes, but small binocular is recommended. Enjoy....

My first successful astro mosaic! It's a total of 380 minutes of imagery, 11 different panels, so panel integrations average 34 minutes. The Orion, Running Man, Horsehead, and Flame Nebulae area has the most imagery behind it, as well as the Witch Head Nebula.

Imagery was acquired in 2019 and 2020 on 9 different nights from the same location under rural skies (Bortle 3/4). All subs were taken with my Fuji X-T10 and Samyang 135 mm on the iOptron SkyTracker Pro. Each sub is 60 seconds, taken at ISO 1600 with the Samyang 135mm open to f2.

I integrated individual panels using DeepSkyStacker, and used the 'remove light pollution' tool of Astro Pixel Processor to flatten integrations, which had substantial vignetting from being shot at f2. These flattened panels were then mosaiced with Astro Pixel Processor using the process outlined here: www.astropixelprocessor.com/part-3-register-normalize-int.... Curves adjustment, star reduction, and color tweaking were then done with GIMP. This image is downscaled 50%.

It's not a perfect process and the data has issues, but I'm happy with the result. It was fun to explore the less-imaged nebulosity between the Orion and the Witch Head Nebulae, and around Saiph.

I'm sure I'll keep tinkering with this, and I still plan to shoot the entirety of Orion this winter, but this is a nice mosaic in and of itself, so I wanted to post it.

Aug. 2021 update: I've been looking through my astro photos, ramping up for some imaging this fall and winter (hopefully I'll complete this Orion mosaic). I decided this image could use a little lightening.

M31 ist die uns nächst gelegene Spiralgalaxie in ca. 2,5 Mio Lichtjahren Entfernung. Sie ist die größte (massereichste) Galaxie in unserer lokalen Gruppe und wie unsere eigene Milchstrasse auch eine Spiralgalaxie. In einigen Milliarden Jahren wird sie mit unserer Milchstrasse kollidieren (d.h. eigentlich sich durchdringen und gravitativ wechselwirken).

In klaren und dunklen Herbst- und Winternächten ist sie leicht mit bloßem Auge im Sternbild Andromeda zu sehen.

Aufgenommen mit Teleskop T20 von iTelescope.net in Mayhill, New Mexico, USA. T20 ist ein 106 mm APO mit 530 mm Brennweite, f/5. Bestückt mit einer SBIG STL-11000M CCD Kamera.

Daten aus 2 Nächten. Bearbeitet mit AstroPixelProcessor und Photoshop CC.

125 min Gesamtbelichtungszeit:

6 x 300 sec Luminanz

6 x 300 sec Rot

6 x 300 sec Grün

7 x 300 sec Blau

Dati: 89 x 300 sec ( 7.42ore) gain 5 @ -10° c + 36 dark + 30 flat e darkflat

Filtro: Astronomik UV/IR Block L2

Montatura: EQ6 pro

Ottica: Takahashi FSQ106

Sensore: QHY168C

Cam guida e tele: asi120mm su Scopos 62/520

Software acquisizione: nina e phd2

Software sviluppo: AstroPixelProcessor e Photoshop

Temperatura esterna: 22 ° C - Umidità 58%

Dati: 57 x 300 sec a gain 10 e offset 50 a -15° c + 36 dark + 25 flat e darkflat

Filtro Astronomik UV/IR Block L2

Montatura: EQ6 pro

Ottica: Takahashi FSQ106

Sensore: QHY168C

Cam guida e tele: magzero mz5-m su Scopos 62/520

Software acquisizione: nina e phd2

Software sviluppo: AstroPixelProcessor e Photoshop

Temperatura esterna: 3 ° C - Umidità 40%

On this night the skies were beautifully clear and I was able to capture the data to create this image of Centaurus A (aka NGC5128 or 'The Hamburger Galaxy').

This is one of the closest radio galaxies to earth and is the fifth-brightest in the sky thanks to the supermassive black hole at the centre. This black hole has an estimated mass of around 55 million solar masses and ejects cosmic rays from it's core which can be captured in images taken at different wavelengths.

🌀🌠🌌🌟

Image Information

Telescope: Planewave 17" CDK | f6.8

Camera: FLI Proline 16803 CCD

Mount: Planewave Ascension 200HR

Exposure Details: L 12 x 300 sec (bin 1x1), R 6 x 200 sec (bin 2x2), G 6 x 150 sec (bin 2x2), B 6 x 300 sec (bin 2x2),

Observatory: Siding Spring, NSW, Australia

Date Taken: 15 April 2020

Post-Processing: AstroPixelProcessor, Lightroom Classic CC

Using Astro Pixel Processor to calibrate photographs taken with the OMD EM5

Cygnus rose pretty late at the last new moon, so I was collecting this data over several early mornings (until good light stopped play :-D ) after having chased the Tadpole Nebula down to the horizon ...

This is a H-alpha / O-III / S-II narrowband image using the SIGMA fp (monochrome) with the SIGMA TC1411 1.4 x converter / SIGMA fp L (for the stars) / RASA 11" / GM1000 Mount.

Total time 50 x 5 mins, ISO 1600, F3.1, 868mm

The narrowband results are distributed into R/G/B as HS/HSO/HO

Registration in AstroPixelProcessor further processing to taste in Photoshop.

100% image: markjamesford.prodibi.com/a/rd6jv5qzrx67079/i/o5lxm1y26ol...

Went out Monday night, M45

Orion 80mm ED refractor, Zwo 183MC Pro cooled color camera, Used an electronic focuser

Zwo IR/cut filter

#SharpCap Pro, PoleMaster

Ioptron i45 Pro EQ mount, PHD2 guiding

Orion 60mm guidescope SSAG

120 Gain offset 20 -10c cooling,

M45 was 90 minutes, 1 minute exposure each...

Weather was ok, Getting cooler too with some dew forming.... High thin clouds trying to cover up M45

75 darks 100 flats and 75 bias frames

Astro Pixel Processor and PS

The Orion Nebula (NGC 1976, M42) taken on a cold November night.

> The Orion Nebula is a diffuse nebula situated in the Milky Way, being south of Orion’s Belt in the constellation of Orion. It is one of the brightest nebulae, and is visible to the naked eye in the night sky. — Wikipedia

This image was created from around 30 exposures between 40 seconds and 3 minutes long, at ISO 800, Stacked in AstroPixelProcessor. I used the same data as in the original I shared, but using AstroPixelProcessor instead of DeepSkyStacker and some alternative processing. I prefer the colours in this one!

I used a SkyWatcher Esprit 100 telescope on a HEQ 5 Pro tracking mount, and the Nikon z 50 which coped admirably.

I recently looked at my previous image of the Witch Head nebula (flic.kr/p/2hd49Qs), and thought I could improve upon it with the additional data from my recent Orion mosaic (flic.kr/p/2k5jMXc). This is a reprocessing and crop of the mosaic.

Fuji X-T10 + Samyang 135mm + iOptron SkyTracker Pro. Bortle 3/4 skies. Data acquired in 2019 and 2020. More acquisition and processing details at flic.kr/p/2k5jMXc.

A supernova remnant from a star the exploded between ten to twenty thousand years ago. It is ca 2400ly distant.

H-alpha / O-III narrowband filters / Celestron RASA 11" / 10 Micron GM1000 HPS / SIGMA fp L (monochrome)

Stars: TS94EDPH (0.8 reducer) / Optolong L-Pro Filter / SIGMA fp L (uncalibrated)

Calibration/Registration/Integration in AstroPixelProcessor, all further processing to taste in Photoshop.

100% view: markjamesford.prodibi.com/a/g66rrwd4xmx27m1/i/kv8exgvkwwe...

NGC 7822 is an emission nebula located in Cepheus, about 3,000 lightyears away.

It’s a violent, chaotic deep-sky region where young stars are being born, their powerful radiation ionising the surrounding gas and causing it to glow.

These energetic stellar winds are also carving out the dusty streams and pillars seen throughout the nebula.

Within these dark, dusty regions, new stars are likely being born, but the powerful radiation that’s fuelling NGC 7822’s light emission is also destroying the cosmic gas and dust necessary for stellar birth, effectively cutting them off at the source.

(source: www.skyatnightmagazine.com/astrophotography/nebulae/ngc-7...)

This image was made from a combination of data taken in 2014 and 2017 using a Takahashi FSQ106 with a SXV-H9 in 2014 and my TMB92ss with a QSI583ws in 2017. Using recent improvements in astropixelprocessor I was able to finally combine this data into one result improving details in the central part of the nebula.

Processing was fully done using astropixelprocessor and adobe photoshop.

This region is quite interesting and I think my next project will be to expand the range around the nebula because there is much more nice nebulosity in this region.

DESCRIPTION: Wide field photo of IC 1396 region in Cepheus constellation. All comments and tips are welcome.

OBJECT: IC 1396, Constelation Cepheus, apparent magnitude approx. 5, apparent dimension 170 x 140 arcmin, FOV 15 x 10 arcdeg, sampling rate 6,61 arcsec / px, no cropped image.

GEAR: Nikon Z7 Kolari Full Spectrum + Sigma 135/1,8, Kolari UV/IR/H+ filter, tracking mount iOptron CEM60EC - 3 star alignment, no auto guiding, dew heater.

ACQUISITION: July 12, 2020, Struz, CZ, Exposure 60s, f 2, ISO 400, Light 30x, Dark 10x, Bias 10x, Flat 20x. Total exposure time 30 min. Astronomical twilight.

STACKING AND POST PROCESSING: AstroPixelProcessor, Adobe Photoshop CC 2020.

The popular Pleiades star cluster from Atascadero, California. Not as dark as the less populated location in Arizona where I made the previous photo, but getting a lot of faint structure in interstellar dust with a total of 6 hours of exposure. And something I never noticed before, a faint galaxy just to the right of the rightmost bright star, shining through the dust from 280 million light-years away at a faint 16th magnitude. This could use a bit more processing to remove some artifacts, but I'm stunned by the detail.

72 total exposures, 5 min. each (total 6 hours) in two overlapping tiles. Explore Scientific ED102 102mm f/7 refractor, 0.8x reducer/flattener, ZWO ASI294MC one-shot color CMOS camera, UV/IR cutoff filter, iOptron CEM25P mount, ASIAir controller, auto-guided. Processed in Astro Pixel Processor and Lightroom.

Dati: 60 x 300 sec a gain 5 e offset 25 a -15° c + 33 dark + 25 flat e darkflat

Filtro Astronomik UV/IR Block L2

Montatura: EQ6 pro

Ottica: Takahashi FSQ106

Sensore: QHY168C

Cam guida e tele: magzero mz5-m su Scopos 62/520

Software acquisizione: nina e phd2

Software sviluppo: AstroPixelProcessor e Photoshop

Temperatura esterna: 13 ° C - Umidità 80%

H-alpha, S-III narrowband and photometric g’ filters

Taking with the SIGMA fp (monochrome) / SIGMA fp L / Celestron RASA 11" / 10 Micron GM1000 Mount.

Total acquisition time ca. 2.5 hrs, ISO 1600, F2.2, 620mm

Registration in AstroPixelProcessor further processing to taste in Photoshop. Full Image: markjamesford.prodibi.com/a/rd6jv5qzrx67079//i/g6gw2vkedk...

www.astropixelprocessor.com/complete-lrgb-tutorial-of-ngc... Small Magellanic Cloud, NGC292, LRGB composite shot with iTelescope T08. Total exposure time is 13,25 hours. data was completed processed with Astro Pixel Processor from calibration of the raw exposures to the final stretched star color calibrated image by me.

Here's another remarkable performance from the RASA f/2 astrograph under urban skies. Totally amazing what you can accomplish in just 2 hrs!

Image details:

60x2min

=2 hrs integration time

Celestron RASA 8" f/2 Astrograph

Celestron RASA Light Pollution Reduction filter

ZWO ASI294MC-Pro Camera @ -15-degrees C

QHY Mini guide scope with ZWO178MC guide camera.

Sequence Generator Pro

PHD2

Stacking, HDR Composition, and additional processing with PixInsight

Background gradient removal with AstroPixelProcessor

Location: Central District, Seattle

Comète C/2020 E3 ZTF

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J’ai enfin pu photographier l’évènement tant attendu pour la communauté astronomique. Vous l’aurez compris, il s’agit de la comète ZTF qui survole actuellement notre ciel !

Dans ce cliché vous pourrez également voir les pléiades (M45), des nébuleuses sombres mais aussi un bout de la constellation du Taureau avec une de ses étoiles phares à savoir Aldébaran !

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Coté technique nous sommes sur 1h de pose cumulée en 60 clichés d’une minute (+60 flats) réalisé grâce à l’aide de cet iconique Samyang 135mm f2 ! Ciel du Lévézou en Aveyron, France dans une zone en Bortle 3 ;)

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Logiciel utilisés Stack et pré-traitement avec AstroPixelProcessor, Traitement avec Photoshop, Starnet++ et Topaz Denoise ; Touche finale avec Lightroom

DESCRIPTION: NGC 6992, Veil Nebula in constellation of Cygnus has been taken by 135 mm lens. If you have comment or tips I would very appreciate your advise…

OBJECT: NGC 6992, Veil Nebula, Constelation Cygnus (Swan), apparent magnitude 7, apparent diameter approx. 3 degrees, FOV 7,7 x 5,2 degrees, sampling rate 6,61 arcsec / px, cropped 3,8 x.

GEAR: Nikon Z7 Kolari Full Spectrum + Sigma 135/1,8, Kolari UV/IR/H+ filter, tracking mount iOptron CEM60EC - 3 star alignment, no auto guiding, dew heater.

ACQUISITION: July 12, 2020, Struz, CZ, Exposure 60s, f 2,0, ISO 400, Light 31x, Dark 10x, Bias 10x, Flat 20x. Total exposure time 31 min. Taken during Astronomical twilight, breeze, 15 C.

STACKING AND POST PROCESSING: AstroPixelProcessor, Adobe Photoshop CC 2020

There's something about the combination of both pink and blue colors from a single nebula that I find really interesting. This is the Trifid Nebula (aka M20) located in the Sagittarius Constellation near the core of our Milky Way galaxy.

For years shooting with a dslr camera, I saw this nebula appear really small against the vast Milky Way core. Now that I'm using telescopes and I can capture the rgb colors independently, the results are very different. With about two hours of total capture time using iTelescope's T32 wide deep field telescope based at the Siding Spring Observatory in Australia, I shot 24 images (over 3 separate nights of shooting) before processing them with Astro Pixel Processor and Photoshop.

Sh2-157 and Sh2-162 are HII regions in the constellation Cassiopeia. The bubble is a shockwave created by an unstable star nearing it's death as a supernova. The shockwave collides with the nearby cold gas, sweeping it up and causing it to glow.

Image Details:

3-Panel Mosaic

Scope: A-P 130mm EDFS @ f/4.9 (reduced with 27TVPH)

Camera: QSI 6120

Mount: Takahashi EM-200

Guiding: QHY 5LII-M & Mini Guidescope (PHD2)

Image Capture: Sequence Generator Pro

Processing:

AstroPixelProcessor - Calibration, Mosaic Stitching, and HOO Pallete blending

PixInsight - Noise Reduction and Final Edits

Location: Central District, Seattle, WA

Each Panel

Ha: 12x10min

OIII: 18x10min

Total integration time = 900 min ~ 15 hours

comet C/2017 K2 (PANSTARRS), one of the brightest comets in the sky now, though still not very spectacular but with a prominent coma and nucleus but not much tail. It's nicely situated among the dense field of stars in the constellation Ophiucus.

Imaged over 27 nights, near Cambridge UK, during June, July and August 2018.

Image Details:

75 hours 35 mins total exposure.

82 x 1200s HA 1x1 (27 hours 20 mins)

66 x 900s OIII 2x2 (16 hours 30 mins)

57 x 1200s SII 1x1 (19 hours)

57 x 300s Red 1x1 (4 hours 45 mins)

49 x 300s Green 1x1 (4 hours 5 mins)

47 x 300s Blue 1x1 (3 hours 55 mins)

Scope - Altair Astro Wave Series 115mm Refractor, Planostar 0.79x reduced to 642mm/F5.54.

Sensor - Atik 383l+ Mono CCD + Baader Ha/OIII/SII and RGB filters. -20degC.

Scale - 1.73 arcsec/pixel.

Mount - Altair Astro Pier mounted iOptron CEM60.

Guiding - Lodestar X2 and SX OAG with PHD2.

Acquisition - Sequence Generator Pro

Proessing - AstroPixelProcessor (mosaic build only), all other processing with PixInsight.

Thanks for looking.

A few rare clear, frosty nights allowed me to setup my gear and grab some more data on M31 our giant "neighbouring" galaxy and its satellite systems M32 and M110.

Usual battle against annoying light pollution (Bortle Class 6).

Imaged with a focal reduced ED80 mounted on a Skywatcher HEQ5Pro mount.

Stock (unmodified) Nikon D5300

Imaged over three nights giving a total of 81x5min usable guided subs. with Flats, Darks & Bias files

All guided with Finder guider/ZWO 224MC combo.

Processed using AstroPixelProcessor and Photoshop.

I almost continued work on my Orion mosaic last night, but ultimately decided to image the Cone Nebula region again. My previous image of this area from a year ago always bugged me - the focus was off and I didn't like the processing.

So I reshot this area last night - this time my focus was on, the skies were better, and I like the color I ended up with more. Not as happy with the framing, but at least the data is good so I can potentially add more data to this at a later date to improve framing or create a mosaic.

Fujifilm X-T10, Samyang 135mm f/2.0 ED UMC @ f2.0, ISO 1600, 47 x 60 sec, tracking with iOptron SkyTracker Pro, stacking with DeepSkyStacker, editing with Astro Pixel Processor and GIMP, taken on Jan. 13, 2021 under Bortle 3/4 skies.

48x300sec.

The start with the new mount is done. All went very very well and all was working perfectly :-)

This is the Messier 101 (The Pinwheel Galaxy).

The Pinwheel Galaxy (also known as Messier 101, M101 or NGC 5457) is a face-on spiral galaxy 21 million light-years (6.4 megaparsecs)[5] away from Earth in the constellation Ursa Major. It was discovered by Pierre Méchain in 1781[a] and was communicated that year to Charles Messier, who verified its position for inclusion in the Messier Catalogue as one of its final entries.

On February 28, 2006, NASA and the European Space Agency released a very detailed image of the Pinwheel Galaxy, which was the largest and most-detailed image of a galaxy by Hubble Space Telescope at the time.[10] The image was composed of 51 individual exposures, plus some extra ground-based photos.

{Wikipedia)

Mount: SkyWatcher HEQ5 Pro

Guiding: ZWO ASI 120MM Mini USB 2.0 Mono Camera - Orion 50mm Guide Scope

Filter: Astronomik CLS CCD EOS APS-C Clip-Filter

Camera: Canon EOS 70D (full spectrum modified)

Sigma 150-600mm f/5-6.3 DG OS HSM (Contemporary)

Focal length: 600mm

130 x 120 seconds frames - ISO 500 - f6.3

4hr 20" total Integration

Darks: 15 frames

Flats: 25 frames

Bios: 15 frames

DarkFlats: N/A

Bortle 5.5

Apps: N.I.N.A. > PHD2 > ASCOM

Processing: AstroPixelProcessor > Photoshop >Topaz > Photoshop

OMGOMGOMG. I had a chance to try out the new Celestron RASA 8! For those of you who are familiar with our weather in Seattle, you'll understand our excitement about getting a 4-day stretch of PERFECT (and cold) weather during new moon.

Because the RASA is f/2, I collected a TON of data which I will process in the coming cloudy days, but I wanted to post this one photo of M42 ASAP because it is a true testament of what this astrograph can do.

This is a mere ~1 hr of data from a Bortle 8-9, urban sky. For you f/7 imagers out there, YOU would have to expose for 14.4 hours to get the same signal to noise! To help with the massive amount of light pollution in my area, I used the Celestron RASA LPR filter that just threads in to the top of the RASA corrector.

I'm VERY excited about the potential of this scope. It's an extremely fast, high performing, and affordable scope, AND it's probably one of the easiest systems I've used.

More tips in future posts (including a "how-to" on flat taking), but here's a good one to start out with: Make sure you have the right spacing between the camera and the RASA corrector for best optical performance. Incorrect spacing will really hurt imaging quality. If your stars are in focus in one part of the field, but out of focus elsewhere in the field, you should suspect that spacing might be the culprit.

Image details:

34x2min

12x5sec exposures (HDR Composition)

=69 min

Celestron RASA 8" f/2 Astrograph

Celestron RASA Light Pollution Reduction filter

ZWO ASI294MC-Pro Camera @ -15-degrees C

QHY Mini guide scope with ZWO178MC guide camera.

Sequence Generator Pro

PHD2

Stacking, HDR Composition, and additional processing with PixInsight

Background gradient removal with AstroPixelProcessor

21,600 seconds

This is the first milkyway of this season ! Shot while the aurora borealis in France. Night of friday 10 to saturday 11 may.

30min, Bortle 3

AstroPixelProcessor, Topaz Deoise, Photoshop.

One of my favorite regions of the sky - the Dark Shark Nebula (LDN 1235), LDN 1251, and the Wolf's Cave Nebula (vdB 152). It's a tricky region to process - the dust is faint and the stars are plentiful. If I shoot this again with the my Samyang 135, I think I'll stop down to f 2.8 to flatten the field and shoot 90-120 sec subs. I had problems with the not-too-flat field in post processing. I've cropped it to minimize the non-flat-field color artifacts.

Acquisition details: Fujifilm X-T10, Samyang 135mm f/2.0 ED UMC @ f2.0, ISO 1600, 84 x 60 sec, tracking with iOptron SkyTracker Pro, stacking with DeepSkyStacker, editing with Astro Pixel Processor and GIMP, taken August 14, 2020 from Bortle 2 skies.

Nov. 2020 update: I added my Sept. 26 2019 imagery (50 x 90 seconds, better color) to my 2020 imagery (84 x 60 seconds, better skies). There's still some color weirdness, but the addition of the 2019 with better color helped modulate the color weirdness of the 2020 data. I might still end up cropping it, but at least the color is a bit better. Perhaps I'll shoot this area again next August or Sept.

Reprocesado de flic.kr/p/24x8KFv

Star Adventurer - Canon 6D - Lente Canon EF 50mm f/1,4 USM

16 lights - f/4 - 300s - ISO 1600 - 4000K - 12 darks - 24 flats - 24 dark flats - masterbias de 300 tomas.

Procesado: AstroPixelProcessor - Adobe Lightroom

Dati: 33x 300 sec a gain 5 e offset 25 a -10° c + 70 dark + 30 flat e darkflat

Filtro: Astronomik UV/IR Block L2

Montatura: EQ6 pro

Ottica: Takahashi FSQ106

Sensore: QHY168C

Cam guida e tele: magzero mz5-m su Scopos 62/520

Software acquisizione: nina e phd2

Software sviluppo: AstroPixelProcessor e Photoshop

Temperatura esterna: 20 ° C - Umidità 70%

ZWO ASI2600MM, Chroma 3nm Ha/O3 filters, Stellarvue 70mm scope with .8 FR on Orion Atlas Pro mount. Guiding. SGPro, PHD2, 18 x 5 min = 90 min Ha and 8 x 5 min = 40min O3. Pixinsight, Astropixelprocessor and Photoshop CC.

The beginning of my winter astro project, a test to see if my process will work. So far so good - I'm impressed by how well Astro Pixel Processor blends images together.

This mosaic consists of the 6 panels that I have of the Orion region so far - all taken with my Fuji X-T10, Samyang 135, and iOptron SkyTracker Pro over the last couple years under Bortle 3/4 skies. I've downscaled the mosaic by 50% for upload to Flickr.

I plan to image the entire Orion constellation this winter, so that every area has at least 30 x 1 minutes of data behind it, preferably more like 60 x 1 minutes of data.

This panoramic view of the Andromeda Galaxy (Messier 31) shows the bright yellow nucleus, dark winding dust lanes, luminous blue spiral arms, and bright red emission nebulas.

17.4 hours RGB and 19.5 hours luminance data recorded during 2018 and 2019 have been used for this image crop.

(68x300sec red, 67x300sec green, 74x300sec blue, 233x300sec lum. 432 exposures total)

Esprit 100 refractor+QHY16200 CCD /10 Micron GM2000 HPS / Scopedome 2M.

Astropixelprocessor with 2x drizzle integration+ Pixinsight.