The Sun is ending 2022 as actively as it started. Hoping for more in 2023!
Photo Details
December 18, 2022
Lunt Ha 60mm double-stacked solar telescope
ZWO ASI178MM
SharpCap - 8 Bit Mono
Image Stacking in AutoStakkert
Adjustments in ImPPG and Registax
Final Adjustments in Photoshop
The Soul Nebula (Westerhout 5 / IC 1848) is a massive emission nebula located in Cassiopeia. If it were bright enough to see with the naked eye, it would cover about 5 times the width of a full moon. Emission nebulae are clouds of gas that have been ionized such that that emit their own light. The stars in this region are relatively young (just a few million years old) while our own Sun is about 5 billion years old.
Looking at the Soul Nebula, for me, it doesn't immediately conjure up thoughts related to souls, so where does the name come from? A wider view would reveal a nearby neighbor called the Heart Nebula resembles a Valentine heart, so together they are the Heart and Soul Nebulae. Who says astronomers and scientists aren't poetic or romantic?
The night before the partial occultation of Mars by the Moon, I went out to experiment with exposure settings, etc. to be ready for the big event. The clouds had other ideas and I ended up shooting these with the fisheye lens on the ZWO camera.
One of my favorite winter sites, whether through the eyepiece or to photograph, is this double cluster which lies in close proximity to the constellation Cassiopeia but actual lies within Perseus. My first attempt at photographing the double cluster was one of my first astrophotos back in 2013. You can see it here. Many years later, with a lot more experience and some better equipment yielded dramatic improvement.
This was my first serious attempt at capturing Jupiter and its four largest moons. These were first seen by Galileo, are often known as the Galilean Moons, and helped establish celestial motions independent of Earth in support of the controversial (at the time) Copernican theory. Jupiter is so bright that it proves difficult to get both the planet and its moons since you have to boost the exposure to image the relatively dimmer moons. The solution was to take two sets of exposures, one for Jupiter and one for the moons. After that, it's a matter of overlaying the two to create a composite image.
All told, Jupiter had 80 moons with 57 having official names with another 23 awaiting official naming. Of the four shown above, Ganymede is the largest and exceeds the size of the planet mercury.
Photo Details
On December 7, 2022, Mars partially occulted the Moon. At locations north of mine, it Mars completely disappeared behind the Moon for a time which is known as occultation. We had tough sky conditions which made it difficult to get the closest approach, or to have time to shoot through color filters, so the Moon/Mars images above are all in grayscale. Nonetheless, it was fun to see this pairing through a telescope and the naked eye views were spectacular, too.
The short video clip is the little project I was working on while waiting for the Moon & Mars to clear my trees and be close enough to fit in the telescope view. Luckily, Jupiter was in prime position with the Great Red Spot transiting the disk. I took images about 10 minutes apart to make a time-lapse which covers a total time of about 40 minutes but is sped up to be just a few seconds. I'm hoping to try this same technique again on Jupiter, as well as some of solar prominences.
Photo Details
December 7, 2022
Astrotech AT65-Q
ZWO ASI178MM
SharpCap - 8 Bit Mono through RGB filters
Image Stacking in AutoStakkert
Adjustments in Registax 6
Final Adjustments in Photoshop
This was my first attempt at imaging Mars with the new setup. I quickly encountered significant dew on the front corrector lens so I only got one shot at it with binning = 2. I'm looking forward to correcting the dew problem and making more attempts, but this was a pretty good first try, I think.
Photo Details
November 28, 2022
Celestron 7" Mak-Cas
ZWO ASI178MM
SharpCap - 8 Bit Mono through RGB filters
Image Stacking in AutoStakkert
Adjustments in Registax 6
Final Adjustments in Photoshop
I hadn't imaged the Sun since mid-July so it was pretty fun to see it just as active as where I left it back then.
Photo Details
November 21, 2022
Lunt Ha 60mm double-stacked solar telescope
ZWO ASI178MM
SharpCap - 8 Bit Mono
Image Stacking in AutoStakkert
Adjustments in ImPPG
Final Adjustments in Photoshop
These were captured back in July and I tried some new post-processing techniques using ImPPG on these. Rather than wavelet filtering in Registax it uses some deconvolution tools. I think I get a smoother result.
Photo Details
July 17, 2022
Lunt Ha 60mm double-stacked solar telescope
ZWO ASI178MM
SharpCap - 8 Bit Mono
Image Stacking in AutoStakkert
Adjustments in ImPPG
Final Adjustments in Photoshop
I've been targeting a lot of single objects lately (Moon, Sun, Jupiter, Saturn), but finally got back to some data gathered in mid-June. This is Messier 51 and contains roughly 100 billion stars. It would be pretty amazing to investigate those star systems.
These images are from back in mid-June and show significant activity on the surface of the Sun. Things have quieted down quite a bit since then, but still fairly active.
Photo Details
June 19, 2022
Lunt Ha 60mm double-stacked solar telescope
ZWO ASI178MM
SharpCap - 8 Bit Mono
Image Stacking in AutoStakkert
Wavelet Filtering in Registax
Final Adjustments in Photoshop
Another clear night, Jupiter well positioned and a new focuser on the Mak-Cas culminated in the image above. It was really great to pull out more details in the clouds. More to come, but off to a satisfying start.
An early birthday present and clear skies combined for some good planetary imaging. Still need to work on focusing and color balance, but super happy with the new equipment.
On Monday, September 26, at 5 PM (CDT) Jupiter reached its annual opposition (orbit opposite of the Sun as seen from Earth). This also coincided with Jupiter's closest approach to Earth since 1951 and won't be that close again until 2129 (107 years from now). The photo above was taken one night before which will just have to be good enough for now ;-). Not to be outdone, Saturn was also putting on a great show with the rings at a good angle of inclination for viewing from Earth.
Finally getting around to finishing out processing images from back in May, 2022. Lots of good activity, hoping for some more clear skies but not looking good.
Photo Details
May 29, 2022
Lunt Ha 60mm double-stacked solar telescope
ZWO ASI178MM
SharpCap - 8 Bit Mono
Image Stacking in AutoStakkert
Wavelet Filtering in Registax
Final Adjustments in Photoshop
Skip ahead about a month and the sun is just as, if not more, active than back in April. Lots of prominences, sunspots, filaments, and plages. Incredible stuff.
Photo Details
May 28, 2022
Lunt Ha 60mm double-stacked solar telescope
ZWO ASI178MM
SharpCap - 8 Bit Mono
Image Stacking in AutoStakkert
Wavelet Filtering in Registax
Final Adjustments in Photoshop
