The Astro-Imaging Thread

[Epox75]

So... transparency was great as expected with such jet stream, I had wind gusts at 35 km/h, guide was going crazy but never broke (CGEM-DX ftw, it's a pier!). Not a single exposure was saved by the wind and in the end I didn't take bias, darks and flats but was happy anyway because I took confidence with the scope. 

The result is impressive:  

Tech Card: https://www.astrobin.com/304991/?nc=user

And..... sorry but i had to post this too: https://youtu.be/VTmJJ0lUyQc 

 

 

[PakledHostage]

On 7/27/2017 at 0:19 PM, kurja said:

What camera & lens did you use for this?

I used my 20 megapixel Canon 70D with a Sigma 150-600 mm lens mounted on it. Fully zoomed in and mounted on an APS-C sensor camera, that lens has a field of view of about 2.5° x 1.5°.

The ISS passed almost directly overhead that night, so it was as pretty much as close as it could ever be when I took the photo. It was on the order of 1 arc minute across in the image. The picture I posted was cropped down to 640 x 480 but not resized.

Shooting without a tripod at that focal length is tough, but I bumped up the ISO (to yield a  quicker shutter speed) and turned on the image stabilisation to improve my odds of getting a sharp image. I also used automatic exposure bracketing to shoot a range of exposures.

Ultimately, I think getting the right exposure is the most challenging thing about photographing the ISS. There seems to be so much variation in brightness over it's expanse, that parts of the image are blown out while other parts are only barely visible.

I think there is room for improvement though. It could be sharper and better exposed but this was only my first try. I will try again. 

Edit: For what it is worth, the settings were 1/400 f/8 ISO 800

Edited July 29, 2017 by PakledHostage
Added exposure settings

[kurja]

2 hours ago, PakledHostage said:

I used my 20 megapixel Canon 70D with a Sigma 150-600 mm lens mounted on it. Fully zoomed in and mounted on an APS-C sensor camera, that lens has a field of view of about 2.5° x 1.5°.

The ISS passed almost directly overhead that night, so it was as pretty much as close as it could ever be when I took the photo. It was on the order of 1 arc minute across in the image. The picture I posted was cropped down to 640 x 480 but not resized.

Shooting without a tripod at that focal length is tough, but I bumped up the ISO (to yield a  quicker shutter speed) and turned on the image stabilisation to improve my odds of getting a sharp image. I also used automatic exposure bracketing to shoot a range of exposures.

Ultimately, I think getting the right exposure is the most challenging thing about photographing the ISS. There seems to be so much variation in brightness over it's expanse, that parts of the image are blown out while other parts are only barely visible.

I think there is room for improvement though. It could be sharper and better exposed but this was only my first try. I will try again. 

Edit: For what it is worth, the settings were 1/400 f/8 ISO 800

Nice. I actually thought the ISS would seem even smaller (or, you'd need an even longer lens), I've never given it too much thought because at my high-ish latitude the ISS hardly rises above horizon - spotthestation.nasa.gov tells me that today I could view the ISS for <1minute, peaking 11 degrees above the horizon.

[_Augustus_]

I don't know if I'd call this decent, but considering the horrible specs of my camera this is pretty good.

[ProtoJeb21]

18 minutes ago, _Augustus_ said:

I don't know if I'd call this decent, but considering the horrible specs of my camera this is pretty good.

Kind of blurry, but not bad! You can still see the Cassini Division and what looks like Saturn's dark side - probably just caused by the camera and image processing, but cool nonetheless.

[_Augustus_]

1 hour ago, ProtoJeb21 said:

Kind of blurry, but not bad! You can still see the Cassini Division and what looks like Saturn's dark side

Yeah, those are definitely there. Not artifacts.

You can sort of even see some color variation on Saturn's disk.

[_Augustus_]

[Cabbink]

11 minutes ago, _Augustus_ said:

Is that the moon?

[tater]

3 minutes ago, Cabbink said:

Is that the moon?

Unless he has his own space probe in orbit around another world, then yeah  .

[_Augustus_]

2 hours ago, Cabbink said:

Is that the moon?

Yep.

The crater on the left is Aristillus.

[munlander1]

I think I'm imaging the crescent nebula... if not, a star field in Cygnus.

 

 

[munlander1]

Charging camera battery, will try to make off on less than a full charge. Moved on to M31.

Saw 3 meteors so far. Plus an orbiting object.

Edited August 5, 2017 by munlander1

[_Augustus_]

Someone needs to image Pluto before it's gone for the season. Just 'cause.

[_Augustus_]

[Green Baron]

Venus, i assume ?

(before somebody asks if its Pluto)

Edited August 6, 2017 by Green Baron

[_Augustus_]

9 minutes ago, Green Baron said:

Venus, i assume?

Yep.

[RoadRunnerAerospace]

another star field

[Epox75]

Yesterday night I had finally a completely clear night, no stray cloud, no humidity.. just the full Moon but I was very happy anyway, it was low enough and shined over the scope for only 1 hour. So I managed to do my first color image from narrowband filter! The Image is Bicolor L-RGB (Ha-HaOIIIOIII) and 5.2 hours of integration (Ha 55x180sec - OIII 50x180sec)

Technical card : http://www.astrobin.com/304991/F/?nc=user

Oh! And by the way... I've "been" there a couple of year ago  :

 

Edited August 8, 2017 by Epox75

[Green Baron]

Impressive, thanks !

Which colour have you mapped the oxygen to (i miss the usual greenish blue) ?

You said the moon was shining bright, for that it is an extraordinary outcome. Did you do that with the background extraction tool in pixinsight ?

Here the moon overshines the whole sky, only the very brightest stars are visible. I doubt i could take any useful photographs from nebulae during full moon. Otoh, landscape might be nice :-)

 

Edited August 8, 2017 by Green Baron

[Epox75]

4 hours ago, Green Baron said:

Impressive, thanks !

Which colour have you mapped the oxygen to (i miss the usual greenish blue) ?

You said the moon was shining bright, for that it is an extraordinary outcome. Did you do that with the background extraction tool in pixinsight ?

Here the moon overshines the whole sky, only the very brightest stars are visible. I doubt i could take any useful photographs from nebulae during full moon. Otoh, landscape might be nice :-)

 

Thank you! Oxigen is mapped to green and blue. The greenish/blue color should be obtained with the Hubble Palette (SII-Ha-OIII) and i still miss the SII channel. I applied the background extraction to both channels before combining. Also the background neutralization is a very nice tool and improved the contrast a lot. 

Consider that when I was taking this picture I could count just a bunch of stars and the sky was greyish. When I took the first picture of if, one week ago, the sky was dark and I could see an hint of the milky way which is a very rare event here , guiding was full of errors thou because of the strong wind. 

 

[Green Baron]

Thanks a lot ! So my doubts might be pointless; will try next time the weather is suitable. Right now we have Calima again, 35°, a yellow/grey sky and a dull sun ... :-/

[_Augustus_]

12 hours ago, Epox75 said:

Yesterday night I had finally a completely clear night, no stray cloud, no humidity.. just the full Moon but I was very happy anyway, it was low enough and shined over the scope for only 1 hour. So I managed to do my first color image from narrowband filter! The Image is Bicolor L-RGB (Ha-HaOIIIOIII) and 5.2 hours of integration (Ha 55x180sec - OIII 50x180sec)

Technical card : http://www.astrobin.com/304991/F/?nc=user

 

 

Really nice job!

Edited August 8, 2017 by _Augustus_

[_Augustus_]

Saturn tonight

Edited August 10, 2017 by _Augustus_

[ProtoJeb21]

12 hours ago, _Augustus_ said:

Saturn tonight

"You are only allowed to give 25 likes per day. You cannot give any more likes today."

[_Augustus_]

6 hours ago, ProtoJeb21 said:

"You are only allowed to give 25 likes per day. You cannot give any more likes today."

I wonder what your ASI185MC would produce with my scope. I imagine it'd be quite a bit better than this.

Edited August 10, 2017 by _Augustus_