ASTRO: B33 Taken in my sleep

Another required object for a newbie to this digital stuff is the
Horsehead. Last night it was clear though seeing wasn't all that good.
I started a series of 3, 30 minute H-alpha shots and went to bed. I
spent all day yesterday stacking many cords of wood and was beat. This
morning I calibrated the images, did a median combine then moved the
image into Elements v1. It doesn't have the power of Photoshop so I
just hit auto levels and saved the result. That's the extent of the
processing! The results so shocked me I quit right there except to
reduce it by one third to hide the lousy seeing. I never came close to
this in my film days. Then I spent hours hunched over a guiding
eyepiece and more hours in the dark room trying to get something for my
efforts. This I did in my sleep and with the couple mouse clicks on the
computer this morning. Technology is amazing! NGC 2023 is just
appearing at top left center of the image.

14" LX200R @ F/10, 3x30 minutes 6nm H-alpha filter, binned 2x2,
STL-11000M, Paramount ME

Rick

"Rick Johnson" wrote in message
...
Another required object for a newbie to this digital stuff is the
Horsehead. Last night it was clear though seeing wasn't all that good.
I started a series of 3, 30 minute H-alpha shots and went to bed. I
spent all day yesterday stacking many cords of wood and was beat. This
morning I calibrated the images, did a median combine then moved the
image into Elements v1. It doesn't have the power of Photoshop so I
just hit auto levels and saved the result. That's the extent of the
processing! The results so shocked me I quit right there except to
reduce it by one third to hide the lousy seeing. I never came close to
this in my film days. Then I spent hours hunched over a guiding
eyepiece and more hours in the dark room trying to get something for my
efforts. This I did in my sleep and with the couple mouse clicks on the
computer this morning. Technology is amazing! NGC 2023 is just
appearing at top left center of the image.

14" LX200R @ F/10, 3x30 minutes 6nm H-alpha filter, binned 2x2,
STL-11000M, Paramount ME

Rick

Amazing image, Rick.

George

Excellent Rick. Very fine detail on the horse. Clear Skyz, LA

"Rick Johnson" wrote in message
...
Another required object for a newbie to this digital stuff is the
Horsehead. Last night it was clear though seeing wasn't all that good.
I started a series of 3, 30 minute H-alpha shots and went to bed. I
spent all day yesterday stacking many cords of wood and was beat. This
morning I calibrated the images, did a median combine then moved the
image into Elements v1. It doesn't have the power of Photoshop so I
just hit auto levels and saved the result. That's the extent of the
processing! The results so shocked me I quit right there except to
reduce it by one third to hide the lousy seeing. I never came close to
this in my film days. Then I spent hours hunched over a guiding
eyepiece and more hours in the dark room trying to get something for my
efforts. This I did in my sleep and with the couple mouse clicks on the
computer this morning. Technology is amazing! NGC 2023 is just
appearing at top left center of the image.

14" LX200R @ F/10, 3x30 minutes 6nm H-alpha filter, binned 2x2,
STL-11000M, Paramount ME

Rick



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Good looking image Rick Ha is very worth while. I am saving up for a new
SBIG with ether net and a bigger chip. I will use an off axis guider in
front of the filters and then start with some narrow band filters.

--
Regards, Doug W.
www.photonsfate.com
--
"Rick Johnson" wrote in message
...
Another required object for a newbie to this digital stuff is the
Horsehead. Last night it was clear though seeing wasn't all that good.
I started a series of 3, 30 minute H-alpha shots and went to bed. I
spent all day yesterday stacking many cords of wood and was beat. This
morning I calibrated the images, did a median combine then moved the
image into Elements v1. It doesn't have the power of Photoshop so I
just hit auto levels and saved the result. That's the extent of the
processing! The results so shocked me I quit right there except to
reduce it by one third to hide the lousy seeing. I never came close to
this in my film days. Then I spent hours hunched over a guiding
eyepiece and more hours in the dark room trying to get something for my
efforts. This I did in my sleep and with the couple mouse clicks on the
computer this morning. Technology is amazing! NGC 2023 is just
appearing at top left center of the image.

14" LX200R @ F/10, 3x30 minutes 6nm H-alpha filter, binned 2x2,
STL-11000M, Paramount ME

Rick

I now have an off axis guider (ST-7) available but didn't need it for
this shot. The Paramount tracks so well I can go at least 5 minutes now
without guiding at 2x2 binning even at the equator so using a dim star
that takes long integration times isn't a problem. In fact most of my
shots taken with 5 minute frames are unguided. With all the blackouts
from passing clouds it prevents the guider from searching far and wide
for the star. I ruined several shots because I used the guider chip so
now don't use it all that much unless I'm sure of the sky.

Yea, one of those new big square chips would be nice but it will be a
while before I can recover from what I did buy! If we had everything we
wanted there'd be nothing to live for I suppose. Still...

Rick


Doug W. wrote:
Good looking image Rick Ha is very worth while. I am saving up for a new
SBIG with ether net and a bigger chip. I will use an off axis guider in
front of the filters and then start with some narrow band filters.

That's a winner Rick. I hope your sleep was as good as the quality of the
image.
I just read that this is "only" 90 minutes, but reducing the size of the
image of course also gets rid of some noise.

I'm not sure if it is necessary to stack your images by median combine
(because of cosmics or other artifacts). I guess you know that median
combining is very bad for S/N (I use "sigma clipping" in Iris, which also
removes cosmics and fainter satellite streaks without harming S/N)?

Stefan

"Rick Johnson" schrieb im Newsbeitrag
...
Another required object for a newbie to this digital stuff is the
Horsehead. Last night it was clear though seeing wasn't all that good.
I started a series of 3, 30 minute H-alpha shots and went to bed. I
spent all day yesterday stacking many cords of wood and was beat. This
morning I calibrated the images, did a median combine then moved the
image into Elements v1. It doesn't have the power of Photoshop so I
just hit auto levels and saved the result. That's the extent of the
processing! The results so shocked me I quit right there except to
reduce it by one third to hide the lousy seeing. I never came close to
this in my film days. Then I spent hours hunched over a guiding
eyepiece and more hours in the dark room trying to get something for my
efforts. This I did in my sleep and with the couple mouse clicks on the
computer this morning. Technology is amazing! NGC 2023 is just
appearing at top left center of the image.

14" LX200R @ F/10, 3x30 minutes 6nm H-alpha filter, binned 2x2,
STL-11000M, Paramount ME

Rick

I've found sigma clipping (at least in the stand alone program I use,
not Iris) doesn't help much with less than 6 frames. By three, what I
had here it seems worse than median combine. And yes, I had a bunch of
cosmic ray hits. They run in spurts here, I don't know why.

I reduced it only because of star size. There is little noise in the
image. In a sense, by using 2x2 binning I'm running at f/5 for noise.
Since seeing rarely supports sub arc second pixel size I normally use
2x2 binning as my "standard".

I've attached the full size image

--
Correct domain name is arvig and it is net not com. Prefix is correct.
Third character is a zero rather than a capital "Oh".

Stefan Lilge wrote:

That's a winner Rick. I hope your sleep was as good as the quality of
the image.
I just read that this is "only" 90 minutes, but reducing the size of the
image of course also gets rid of some noise.

I'm not sure if it is necessary to stack your images by median combine
(because of cosmics or other artifacts). I guess you know that median
combining is very bad for S/N (I use "sigma clipping" in Iris, which
also removes cosmics and fainter satellite streaks without harming S/N)?

Stefan

"Rick Johnson" schrieb im Newsbeitrag
...

Another required object for a newbie to this digital stuff is the
Horsehead. Last night it was clear though seeing wasn't all that good.
I started a series of 3, 30 minute H-alpha shots and went to bed. I
spent all day yesterday stacking many cords of wood and was beat. This
morning I calibrated the images, did a median combine then moved the
image into Elements v1. It doesn't have the power of Photoshop so I
just hit auto levels and saved the result. That's the extent of the
processing! The results so shocked me I quit right there except to
reduce it by one third to hide the lousy seeing. I never came close to
this in my film days. Then I spent hours hunched over a guiding
eyepiece and more hours in the dark room trying to get something for my
efforts. This I did in my sleep and with the couple mouse clicks on the
computer this morning. Technology is amazing! NGC 2023 is just
appearing at top left center of the image.

14" LX200R @ F/10, 3x30 minutes 6nm H-alpha filter, binned 2x2,
STL-11000M, Paramount ME

Rick

Very nice, Rick. The best time for astrophotography is while sleeping, in
my opinion.


Regards,


Jon Christensen

"Rick Johnson" wrote in message
...
Another required object for a newbie to this digital stuff is the
Horsehead. Last night it was clear though seeing wasn't all that good.
I started a series of 3, 30 minute H-alpha shots and went to bed. I
spent all day yesterday stacking many cords of wood and was beat. This
morning I calibrated the images, did a median combine then moved the
image into Elements v1. It doesn't have the power of Photoshop so I
just hit auto levels and saved the result. That's the extent of the
processing! The results so shocked me I quit right there except to
reduce it by one third to hide the lousy seeing. I never came close to
this in my film days. Then I spent hours hunched over a guiding
eyepiece and more hours in the dark room trying to get something for my
efforts. This I did in my sleep and with the couple mouse clicks on the
computer this morning. Technology is amazing! NGC 2023 is just
appearing at top left center of the image.

14" LX200R @ F/10, 3x30 minutes 6nm H-alpha filter, binned 2x2,
STL-11000M, Paramount ME

Rick

"Jon Christensen" wrote
...
Very nice, Rick. The best time for astrophotography is while sleeping, in
my opinion.

I generally sleep while driving home from the observatory!

Actually, I often do visual observing at the same time with a second
scope or my 20x80 binocs.

BTW...... Great Horse Rick!!

George N

George Normandin wrote:

"Jon Christensen" wrote
...

Very nice, Rick. The best time for astrophotography is while sleeping, in
my opinion.


I generally sleep while driving home from the observatory!

Actually, I often do visual observing at the same time with a second
scope or my 20x80 binocs.

BTW...... Great Horse Rick!!

George N



My 10" f/5 Cave is in the same roll off roof observatory so when it
isn't cold or the skeeters aren't bad in summer I can do both at the
same time as well. Though to keep the computer from fogging the
exposure I usually still do the photography from the house though there
is a computer port in the observatory if I'm shooting south the computer
isn't a problem.

When I lived in Lincoln NE. our club owned a viewing site about a 25
minute drive south. One morning on the way back to town I had a couple
riders. Both were sleeping soundly when I had to swerve to avoid a
drunk driver who couldn't figure out which side of the median he
belonged on. They only sort of woke up. So I said in my most groggy
voice: "Wake me up when we get back." Boy were they wide awake the rest
of the way. Now I really do astronomy while I sleep! I'll not try it
while driving however.

Rick

--
Correct domain name is arvig and it is net not com. Prefix is correct.
Third character is a zero rather than a capital "Oh".