Share and discuss your astrophotography

[davenn]

Totality was heralded by the Diamond ring effect and the solar filters came off the scopes and cameras

Totality was spectactular and from our location we had 2mins and 2 sec of "lights out"

and before you knew it it was all over and the moon was moving off the sun

Pentax, K5 DSLR; 500mm telephoto witha 2 x teleconverter (1000mm total f/l) f12.6,
iso 3200, exp 125th sec for diamond ring and totality.
ISO 400 and exp 80th sec for solar filtered pics before and after totality

Now if if I manage to aviod "kicking the bucket" in the 16 years, there is another total eclipse that passes right over home in Sydney (Australia) ~2028 - 2029

cheers
Dave

 

[Drakkith]

Very nice Dave!

 

[davenn]

thanks mate :)

that was my 3rd total eclipse and my second one in Australia

my first total eclipse was 30 something yrs ago back in New Zealand

cheers
Dave

 

[Drakkith]

I have yet to see a total solar eclipse, and only saw my first partial this past summer right at sundown.

 

[Borek]

We have seen the total eclipse of 1999 over the lake Balaton in Hungary (I planned the vacation in such a way we got there on our way back home from the Croatia/Venice). From what I remember no next total eclipse in my lifetime in Europe.

 

[spark802]

Hi here is my rendition of Orion, Jupiter, and part of Taurus imaged Sept 23/2012 from approx 49n 97w. 0900UTC. I used a Canon P and S G-12 with CHDK hacked onto flashcard. I was able to bump my ISO up to 10,000 and had my lens at 6mm. f4.0, approx 35 secs.
(there is also a link to view it in larger format)

http://www.flickr.com/photos/49843779@N08/8301509367/

 

[Drakkith]

Nice Spark!

 

[spark802]

thanks drak!

 

[Drakkith]

NGC 3372, The Carina Nebula.
Shot in narrowband. Red-Sulfur II, Green-Hydrogen Alpha, Blue-Oxygen III

9x300s - HA
10x300s - OIII
14x300s - SII

Edit: Didn't realize it would be so big in the post. Forgive me as I have no idea how to make a small thumbnail and the file is too large to upload. (Had to shrink it down 50% just to upload it to imageshack)

http://img688.imageshack.us/img688/3316/ngc3372hubblepalette6re.jpg

 

[spark802]

Nice image Drak!... Rich color, lots of detail.

Dave

 

[russ_watters]

That's pretty awesome.

 

[davenn]

That's pretty awesome.

I second that !

well done drakkith !

Dave

 

[Borek]

Wow.

 

[Drakkith]

Thanks guys! BTW this nebula is home to Eta Carinae, an extremely luminous blue supergiant, with a mass of at least 100 solar masses and shining with at least 1 million times more luminosity than the Sun.
It is only one of a handful of stars of this size known to exist in the Milky Way. A little history of the star:

When Eta Carinae was first catalogued in 1677 by Edmond Halley, it was of the 4th magnitude, but by 1730, observers noticed it had brightened considerably and was, at that point, one of the brightest stars in Carina. In the middle of the 18th century, Nicolas Louis de Lacaille mapped and gave the stars of Argo Navis Bayer designations. He assigned the then second-magnitude star the Greek letter Eta.[9]

Subsequently Eta Carinae dimmed, and by 1782 it appeared to have reverted to its former magnitude. In 1820, it was observed to be growing in brightness again. By 1827, it had brightened more than tenfold and reached its greatest apparent brightness in April 1843. With a magnitude of −0.8, it was the second brightest star in the night-time sky (after Sirius at 8.6 light years away), despite its enormous distance. (To put the relationship in perspective, the relative brightness would be like comparing a candle (representing Sirius) at 14.5 meters (48 feet) to another light source (Eta Carinae) about 10 kilometers (6.2 mi) away, which would appear almost as bright as the candle.)

That's one heck of a bright star! As of April 2012 it's around magnitude 4.6, much dimmer.

 

[Damo ET]

That is spectacular! Nice work.

Damo

 

[QuantumPion]

Finally a nice clear night to try out my new XT8.

I took these with my Canon EOS 20D by just holding it up to the eyepiece. I didn't have the exposure set very well though, Jupiter was much too dim. In the view it was extremely bright and I could see 6+ moons quite clearly.

 

[davenn]

hey QuantumPion

well done for your first efforts :)
You will always find imaging the moon when it is full or near full to be difficult
The details always get washed out
The only time I photo the full moon is during eclipses :)

wait for try again during the earlier phases like first quarter and you will be amased at the detail in the craters and mountains you can get along the day/night terminator line

pretty good on Jupiter too, some of the bands are easily visible :)

Dave

 

[94JZA80]

hey Drakkith, i see you used narrowband filters, but what camera and telescope did you use for the Carina Nebula shot?

TIA,
Eric

 

[QuantumPion]

Madness!

p.s. I do have on order a T-adapter for my camera so I can bypass the camera lens and directly attach the EP to it. Not sure which method is better though. Just waiting for some clear weather now!

p.p.s. I think I'm going to need a counterweight for this thing.

 

[Jokmal]

My frist Astropic

Early this year I took my first photographs of the moon I did it with a friend's telescope and my iPad

 

[94JZA80]

Early this year I took my first photographs of the moon I did it with a friend's telescope and my iPad

very nice considering the equipment you had to work with

 

[spark802]

M101 with new 6" imaging newt

Heres my Messier 101 with my new Astro-tech imaging newt (6")and Canon 550, shot thru a laptop with BYEOS. April 13/2013.

 

[Drakkith]

Heres my Messier 101 with my new Astro-tech imaging newt (6")and Canon 550, shot thru a laptop with BYEOS. April 13/2013.

Not bad. All you need is more exposure time. Take more subs!

 

[spark802]

Not bad. All you need is more exposure time. Take more subs!

Hey Drak...yes i went through the stacking process with DSS and saved as fits per advice from an AP friend. All i could get was grey scale after stacking, so i may stack my 15 subs again and save as tifs...


Dave

 

[glappkaeft]

After stacking DSS automatically applies a contrast curve but you need to manually increase the color saturation before saving the image if you want more than just a tiny amount of color.

 

[spark802]

Ngc 7000

Here's my rendition of ngc 7000, I left the exif data in if you want to look.

 

[davenn]

Here's my rendition of ngc 7000, I left the exif data in if you want to look.

nice one :)
Had to think for a moment about what object I was looking at then remembered that NGC 7000 is the North American Nebula, in you photo lying on its side ;)
Maybe there's been a huge tectonic shift haha

Dave

 

[sas3]

What was that?

I was out trying to catch some shooting stars and seen a flash 2 times once while the camera was resetting and then caught the second flash with the camera, was it an Iridium flare?

Look to the left and down from the last 2▼ stars in the dippers bowl.

 

[czelaya]

NGC 3372, The Carina Nebula.
Shot in narrowband. Red-Sulfur II, Green-Hydrogen Alpha, Blue-Oxygen III

9x300s - HA
10x300s - OIII
14x300s - SII

Edit: Didn't realize it would be so big in the post. Forgive me as I have no idea how to make a small thumbnail and the file is too large to upload. (Had to shrink it down 50% just to upload it to imageshack)

Why would you even apologize? I just made that my background picture for my laptop. Thanks.

 

[davenn]

I was out trying to catch some shooting stars and seen a flash 2 times once while the camera was resetting and then caught the second flash with the camera, was it an Iridium flare?

The Iridium Flares I have seen generally tend to be short bright streaks rather than the faint pinpoint you have caught there.
Maybe it was a rotating satellite that you caught its bright side reflecting the sun ?


Dave