1218 replies to this topic

[deSitter]

Wow! Absolutely Wow! It’s astounding that what was intended as a Japanese budget spotter/mini scope with a humble sixty millimeters of aperture can produce such a photo! That rivals pictures I remember seeing on the walls of observatories and planetaria fifty years ago. Bravo!

No doubt. I entertained myself a while back by comparing the 48" Palomar Schmidt camera NGSS photos to modern ones made with a 6" APO. Guess who won! The cameras and software are amazing.

 

Amateurs with good cameras and technique can do invaluable real science work. That includes quasar surveys using a spectroscope. But most particularly, getting large scale images of the regions around galaxy clusters. You can't get any professionals to look at NGC4319 and Markarian 205, so one of us has to do it. Show the matter bridge.

 

-drl

[deSitter]

Thanks everybody! Here's another one from early tonight as the sun was going down. 

Jupiter captured with the Brandon 94mm refractor and ZWO 178MC camera. 

The seeing was garbage, but I was able to gather over 50,000 frames in three minutes to sort through to stack. 

 

I hope to image the Andromeda Galaxy with the Brandon 94 in a bit if the weather cooperates. 

 

V/R

 

Terry

 

Edit and update: Here's one of the Andromeda Galaxy from Friday night using the Brandon Master Birder 80 on a Tak Sky Patrol mount (version 1). I'm still processing the image that I took tonight with the Brandon 94. The Master Birder is a lot of fun and it's super fast imaging-wise. Same technical info as my last post as it and the Double Cluster were captured on the same night. It's not old enough to be considered a classic. Just throwing the image in for fun. It's still a cool versatile, lightweight scope.

 

Those are SUPERB!!!!!

 

-drl
 

[LukaszLu]

Yes amazing! I almost never use a Barlow. The only exception is to get eye relief for really high magnifications. I do use a Powermate but it's a lot of glass.
 

-drl

Thanks, I noticed that the use of Barlow where there is no chance to improve the quality (i.e. the image is too large in relation to the pixel size) not only does not improve the resolution, but even leads to image degradation and unnatural softening. The same applies to large SCT as well as small refractor! I use a website where you can easily calculate the focal length needed for a given diameter and pixel size: http://www.wilmslowa...tm#CCD_Sampling

 

As you can see, for a diameter of 60 mm and a pixel of 2.4 nm (ASI 178), the optimal focal length is 700 mm. Using a Barlow in this situation is absurd - but I had to try :-)

Edited by LukaszLu, 09 March 2023 - 07:16 AM.

[Sky King]

From the same session as the Moon, I used everything the same only switched to a UV/IR filter and took 30s x 150 of M3. 

 

 

 

 

[deSitter]

From the same session as the Moon, I used everything the same only switched to a UV/IR filter and took 30s x 150 of M3. 

 

 

 

 M3_a.jpg

Wow this is really retro! Where is my Sky Observer's Guide? Nice!!

 

-drl

[ETXer]

Do old photo lenses count for this thread? I'll take a chance here, so here's a somewhat reworked version from an earlier post of M42/M43 using a late '60s 300mm f/4 Pentax Super-Takumar (M42 thread mount and Pentax K-mount adapter) mounted on a Pentax KP DSLR on a standard tripod using the Astrotracer feature and the accessory OGPS-1 unit.

 

There were 23 20-second frames (7m 40s total exposure) at f/5.6 in Bortle 8 skies with a waxing gibbous Moon present. 15-second each dark, flat, and bias frames were stacked together with the lights in DSS, then processed in Photoshop CS5 with noise reduction in Topaz AI.

 

 

Yes there are a few flaws still, but all things considered, I was pretty pleased with this.

 

Cheers, Allan

Edited by ETXer, 10 March 2023 - 10:21 AM.

[oldmanastro]

Do old photo lenses count for this thread? I'll take a chance here, so here's a somewhat reworked version from an earlier post of M42/M43 using a late '60s 300mm f/4 Pentax Super-Takumar (M42 thread mount and Pentax K-mount adapter) mounted on a Pentax KP DSLR on a standard tripod using the Astrotracer feature and the accessory OGPS-1 unit.

 

There were 23 20-second frames (7m 40s total exposure) at f/5.6 in Bortle 8 skies with a waxing gibbous Moon present. 15-second each dark, flat, and bias frames were stacked together with the lights in DSS, then processed in Photoshop CS5 with noise reduction in Topaz AI.

 

 

Yes there are a few flaws still, but all things considered, I was pretty pleased with this.

 

Cheers, Allan

Beautiful! This looks like a work of art. 

[jragsdale]

Mars this evening at a diminutive 7.5 arc-seconds captured with a Parks 6" f/6 using a 5x barlow and an ASI462MC.

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[Kasmos]

Mars this evening at a diminutive 7.5 arc-seconds captured with a Parks 6" f/6 using a 5x barlow and an ASI462MC.

Both photos are nice but I see canals again!

[clamchip]

I see canals too.

The only time I see canals is in books and here!

 

Robert 

Edited by clamchip, 12 March 2023 - 10:35 AM.

[ccwemyss]

I just saw a report about the Samsung phone's ability to zoom in and take telescopic quality photos of the moon. They even have it in an ad now. It purportedly uses AI to synthesize up to 20 frames to achieve super resolution.

 

So someone tested it on a carefully Gaussian-blurred moon image on a computer monitor from a distance. There was no detail in the image, but all of the major features were present with the right arrangement and relative brightnesses, and the frames taken by the phone were thus all identical, of course.

 

The phone returned a high resolution image of the moon. It seems that the AI has been trained on enough moon images that it matched the overall pattern in the frame and simply substituted a published moon image, with some adjustment for the illumination in the captured image. 

 

So maybe we will some day be able to take Mars photos with our phones, through our classic telescopes, that show the canals as appropriate to the age of the optics. 

 

Chip W. 

[deSitter]

I just saw a report about the Samsung phone's ability to zoom in and take telescopic quality photos of the moon. They even have it in an ad now. It purportedly uses AI to synthesize up to 20 frames to achieve super resolution.

 

So someone tested it on a carefully Gaussian-blurred moon image on a computer monitor from a distance. There was no detail in the image, but all of the major features were present with the right arrangement and relative brightnesses, and the frames taken by the phone were thus all identical, of course.

 

The phone returned a high resolution image of the moon. It seems that the AI has been trained on enough moon images that it matched the overall pattern in the frame and simply substituted a published moon image, with some adjustment for the illumination in the captured image. 

 

So maybe we will some day be able to take Mars photos with our phones, through our classic telescopes, that show the canals as appropriate to the age of the optics. 

 

Chip W. 

God I hate phones.

 

-drl

[jragsdale]

So someone tested it on a carefully Gaussian-blurred moon image on a computer monitor from a distance. There was no detail in the image, but all of the major features were present with the right arrangement and relative brightnesses, and the frames taken by the phone were thus all identical, of course.

Can you share a link?

[ETXer]

Beautiful! This looks like a work of art. 

Thanks Guido, I'm glad you like it! I think there may be some whose intent it is to not necessarily be artistic but focus on the science and/or tech aspect when it comes to AP. But if one happens to make an image that turns out that way, so much the better! I personally think all AP has an element of beauty in one way or another, even the scientific side.

 

Cheers, Allan

Edited by ETXer, 12 March 2023 - 06:07 PM.

[jragsdale]

Can you share a link?

Found it! Crazy! https://old.reddit.c..._fake_and_here/

[ccwemyss]

Yes, that's it.

 

So the question is, if you use a Samsung phone to shoot an image of Mars, will the AI be smart enough someday to recognize when it is looking through a 1950's telescope, and provide you with canals, but give you Hubble-like features if it detects that the optics are modern?  

 

The future of astro-photography is looking curiouser and curiouser. 

 

Chip W. 

[jragsdale]

So the question is, if you use a Samsung phone to shoot an image of Mars, will the AI be smart enough someday to recognize when it is looking through a 1950's telescope, and provide you with canals, but give you Hubble-like features if it detects that the optics are modern?  

Heh, that would be funny. But sounds like it's exclusively on "moon mode".

[Sky King]

Still trying out the original Fastar lens with different equipment and targets. At F/1.95 and 395 focal length I looked for something big. Here's NGC7000.

 

Taken last night with a 90's black tube C8, original Fastar lens, ASI533MC Pro, and Optolong l'enhance filter. NGC7000, 120s x 90, (3hrs.) Used DSS, Siril and Affinity Photo.

 

 

 

[deSitter]

Still trying out the original Fastar lens with different equipment and targets. At F/1.95 and 395 focal length I looked for something big. Here's NGC7000.

 

Taken last night with a 90's black tube C8, original Fastar lens, ASI533MC Pro, and Optolong l'enhance filter. NGC7000, 120s x 90, (3hrs.) Used DSS, Siril and Affinity Photo.

 

 

 

Wow very cool!!

 

-drl

[Sky King]

Wow very cool!!

 

-drl

 

Well thanks, but when I run ASTAP there are some distorted stars in the corners. But I was happy to be back out under the stars. I got a nice LDN1622, the Boogeyman nebula, but my telephone lines showed through with some dark stripes. And I got a Sh2-274 but it's not large and had to be cropped, and I got this NGC2244. (Actually Asiair Pro got all of these after I told it to.) 

 

C8, original Fastar lens, ASI533MC Pro, and Optolong l'enhance filter, 60s x 100 (1 hour, 40 min)

 

 

 

[Sky King]

Back at this M3 post, that image never looked right to me. I wanted to crop out some distorted stars but ended up magnifying the image. I finally realized it was something with the cropping that was off. I hadn't maintained the original aspect ratio. This lens is wide field and a light bucket at F/1.95. Cropped more accurately: 

 

 

 

 

Edited by Sky King, 22 March 2023 - 12:28 PM.

[tim53]

I posted this image on the astrophotography forum last night.  Its nothing special, especially the processing.  it's a cropped 5 min single frame at ISO 800 with LENR on, of NGC 2903 in Leo, taken with a Panasonic Lumix S5 on a 1982 vintage Tak FC-76 riding on a Tak EM-500 and autoguided with an MGEN 3.  No darks or flats.  The thread is about single frame astrophotos, and I thought what a great way to find out if I can take reasonably decent photos without spending hours on a single object when I have limited time at my observatory.

 

 

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[RichA]

Both photos are nice but I see canals again!

Bonestell Mars.jpg

I kind of really saw them in one of the 26 inch refractor image!

[deSitter]

I kind of really saw them in one of the 26 inch refractor image!

That had to be trippy!

 

-drl

[jgraham]

I enjoy taking full-disk images of the moon using my classic 60mm refractors. Last night I grabbed a quick set of images of the moon as part of my first-light night with my shiny new refurbed Tasco 9F. I have found that the uncooled ZWO ASI294MC is very well suited for this as it is a reasonably high resolution, lightweight, shutterless camera with a nice size sensor (Type 4/3).

 

 

Waxing Gibbous Moon – 9:30pm 4/2/2023 EDT
Telescope: Tasco 9F 60mm f/13.3  (800mm) Refractor
Camera: ZWO ASI 294MC, 1.25” to 0.965” adapter
Filter: GSO IR Cut Filter
Exposure: 512x6msec, Gain 200, saved as SER
Seeing: Good, 4/5
White Balance: Nebulosity Automatic
Software: SharpCap Pro, AutoStakkert, Registax, Nebulosity, Photoshop