Our Deep Space

Whirlpool Galaxy

First combined exposures using Bry's Observatory! Equipment: Scope: Celestron Edge HD 9.25 (with 0.7x reducer) Mount: Celestron CGX-L mount Imaging Camera: ZWO ASI 1600mm-Pro camera (Cooled to -20, unity gain 139/50). Off-axis Guider: Celestron OAG with a Touptek Guide Camera Filter/Filterwheel: Astromania Manual Filter wheel, Astromania LRGB Filters 14 x 300s Red 15 x 300s Green 11 x 300s Blue 200 total minutes of integration shot from a Bortle 7/6 zone near Salt Lake City, Utah. Software: PHD2 for guiding Sharpcap for Polar Alignment Sequence Generator Pro for exposure acquisition Celestron PWI for mount interface PixInsight for: Exposure registration and integration Dynamic cropping Mono channel registration Dynamic cropping Background extraction LinearFit to Blue Channel Channel combination Dynamic background extraction ScreenTransferFunction Curves and histogram manipulation to generate contrast SCNR to remove background green and blue noise MultiscaleLinearTransfer to increase detail/sharpness Export as Tiff to upload

Melotte 15

An artistic edit of our first narrowband image, the heart of the heart nebula, shot in h-alpha. This is 39x 600 second exposures shot with an ASI1600mm Pro and Celestron Edge HD 9.25" Telescope (w/ 0.7x reducer) on a Celestron CGX-L Mount. We're waiting for our Oiii filter to arrive so I figured I'd play around with the data we have so far to. Probably will add more to this to reduce noise, this is a "starless" (although not totally, lol) version.

Heart Nebula

I've been working on this shot for a few weeks now, the heart nebula is a tough one to image with a DSLR, signal is faint and any light pollution makes it very tough without narrowband filters. I recently got an Optolong L-enhance filter which has made doing narrowband a lot easier with my modified D5300. This is 50 x 10minute exposures shot with a full-spectrum D5300 and Astrotech AT65EDQ on a Sirius EQ-G mount.

Pelican Nebula

A 50 x 10minute stack of the Pelican Nebula, shot with a Nikon D5300 (modified) and L-enhance filter with an Astrotech AT65EDQ telescope on a Sirius EQ-G mount. Calibrated, stacked, and mostly edited in PixInsight with final touches in Photoshop.

Flaming Star Nebula

Pleiades

This is a difficult target with moderate amounts of light pollution, from where my mount is setup I only get a ~2-3 hour window to shoot the nebula this time of year and give the light pollution in the area I really need to get 15 hours of integration or more. This is a stack of 87 x4 minute exposures for a little less than 6 hours total, if I get some clear skies during the new moon phase I want to get at least double that to bring the noise down and more of the details out. Nikon D5300 (modified) with an Astrotech AT65EDQ telescope on a Sirius EQ-G mount (Rowan Belt Modified). 87 x5 minute, ISO 400, calibrated with flats and bias, stacked, and edited in PixInsight with final edits in Photoshop.

North America and Pelican Nebula Mosaic

This is a 2 panel mosaic of the North America and Pelican Nebula shot with a modified Nikon D5300 (plus Optolong L-eNhance filter), Astrotech AT65EDQ Telescope on a Sirius EQ-G Mount (Rowan Belt Modified). Each panel is a 50 x10minute stack of exposures at ISO 200, images were acquired with BackyardNIkon/Sequence Generator Pro, guiding performed with PHD2 (dithered every frame), editing performed in PixInsight.

Heart and Soul

Over the last month I've been cranking away on my telescope, weather has been cooperative during nights when the moon is up of course. So I've been using my Optolong L-enhance filter with my Nikon D5300, collecting 10 minute exposure after 10 minute exposure. I've collected quite a bit of data on several targets, finally finished a 3 panel mosaic of the Heart and Soul Nebula. Not perfect, still learning how to properly combine bi-color shots with Pixinsight and the Oiii response from a DSLR is very very difficult to integrate. This is a notoriously tough target for a DSLR as well, especially narrowband and especially during a full moon. All in all this is 25 hours of exposure, 3 panels shot with a Nikon D5300 (modified) and Astrotech AT65EDQ telescope on a Sirius EQ-G mount. Each panel is a stack of 50 x 10 minute exposures at ISO 200. All the calibration, stacking, background extraction, stretching, channel combination, and curves manipulation was done in PixInsight. A slight star size reduction was performed in Photoshop.

Triangulum Galaxy

Did some imaging of the Triangulum Galaxy with my Astrotech AT65EDQ and Nikon D5300 from our bortle 6 zone house, got 25 x 5 minute exposures at ISO 200 for a little more than 2 hours of total integration. Will probably try and get this up to 6+ hours when the moon allows, not too bad for limited integration time and decent light pollution levels.

Andromeda Final Edit

Decided to give this data another go-through, wasn't entirely happy with the original edit I did, think this one turned out much better.

Rho Ophiuchi Complex

A very up and down start to this crazy huge Milky Way core region project, decided to put together 4 panels this last weekend while up in the Uinta Mountains. I also tried using the NikonHacker black point firmware for my D800E for the first time, I had previously used it for my D600 and D7000, but it's always tricky to get it to load right (and stay loaded throughout the entire imaging session). Focus also drifted a bit as it cooled down into the low 40's which caused the left 2 panels to not stitch/mosaic perfectly, plus I fudged the alignment on the upper left panel, but that will be no problem once I get the rest of the panels done. Lastly, I had to take 3 different sets of flat frames because of issues with the master flat calibration of the lights, frustrating stuff. So 4 panels down, around 20-22 panels to go, this is going to be a tough project. Each panel is a stack of 7 to 10 exposures taken with my Nikon D800E and Samyang 135mm f2 lens on a Sky Watcher Star Adventurer tracking mount. Each exposure was 3 minutes at ISO 800 and f2.8.

Heart Nebula H-alpha

Be still my beating heart.... Just moved into a new home and with even more snow/rain/clouds over the last 2-3 weeks I haven't had time to image since I did the Horsehead and Rosette shots. Snowed all day today and when I got home it miraculously cleared up. I hurried and setup all my equipment, ending up having the best guiding I've ever had (sub 1" RMS) and about the only thing I could image from my back patio was the Heart Nebula. Did 16 x 10 minute exposures at ISO 1600 with my Baader 7nm H-alpha filter on my Nikon D7000 (full spectrum mod), shot with my Astrotech AT65EDQ on a Sirius EQ-G mount from a bortle 8/9 zone.

The Core of Our Galaxy

This was supposed to be the start of my Ridiculously Huge and Way Too Much Work(TM) summer Milky Way project. Instead I get to start all over thanks to some stupid lens/camera artifact that showed up in all the images I took this last weekend. When finished the picture will be roughly 8 times bigger than this and will require around 10-12.5 hours of exposures. This is about the best I could edit out of the 2.5 hours of exposures I took Saturday night. This is 3 of the 5 panels for the mosaic I shot that night, each panel is a stack of 15 exposures taken with my Nikon D800E and Samyang 135mm lens on a Sky Watcher Star Adventurer tracking mount. Each exposure is 2 minutes at ISO 800 and f2. Also did 38 flat frames and 15 dark frames for calibration, done in PixInsight before exporting and stitching with PTGui followed by more editing in Photoshop.

Horsehead and Flame H-alpha

A very noisy beginning to my h-alpha imaging of the horsehead and flame nebula, this is such a tough target to shoot even in normal RGB with my DSLR, doing it in H-alpha from the city with a near full moon is a tough task with my modest equipment. I'll hopefully be able to add to this a bit more tomorrow if the weather stays clear. 17 x 10 minute exposures at ISO 1600 with my Nikon D7000 (full spectrum modified) and Astrotech AT65EDQ and Baader 7nm H-alpha filter, Orion Sirius EQ-G mount (Rowan Belt Modded).

Rosette final edit

Final edit of my H-alpha Rosette, 32 x 10 minute exposures at ISO 800 with my Nikon D7000 (full spectrum modded) and Astrotech AT65EDQ with a Baader 7nm H-alpha filter on an Orion Sirius EQ-G Mount (Rowan Belt Modded).