SkyBrian & Debra's mental meanderings

I finally got around to processing my first images. During a weekend with friends on Lake Erie I got a chance to shoot some images using my Canon T2i and a Nikon 200mm fixed f2.0 lens. I used Nebulosity to control the camera and used no tracking but only short exposures.

The image of the moon was created from a stack of 20 frames. For a first image it went pretty well. The next time I’ll work for greater sharpness.

My images of Jupiter didn’t go as well as the moon. The tripod had some movement issues and Jupiter was so bright that I could get either the moons or some surface detail, but not both. The following image is from a single frame.

The following image of Jupiter and 4 moons was created from 10 images stacked. Jupiter was over exposed which resulted in a lack of detail.

After much searching on the net I FINALLY found a source for self adhesive red transparent film. The only place I could find it in small quantities was through a ebay Store.
No more blinding white apples on a dark night of viewing and astrophotography.

After much research and price shopping I made the decision to start my Astrophotography explorations with a Canon DSLR camera. This was due mostly on cost but image quality was also a large part of the decision. The images I see others taking with a DSLR are equal to those done with a dedicated/cooled one-shot astro camera. The other draw was the Canon’s Mac OS-X friendly nature. Being a mac user I find it annoying that many venders do not provide OS-X drivers.

So I made the decision to start assembling my system.

1. Canon EOS T2i
   • 18.0 Mega Pixels CMOS
   • 22.3mm x 14.9mm APS-C sensor
   • RAW: Approx. 24.5MB (5184 x 3456 pixels)
2. Orion StarShoot Solitaire Auto GUide Camera
3. ShoeString Astronomy DSUSB Shutter Controller
4. IOGear 16’ USB 2.0 Booster cable
5. D-Link 7 port powered USB 2.0 hub
6. Nebulosity software

My goal at this point is to get comfortable with understanding Nebulosity and how the various image types are used. Light, dark, bias and flat frames are all fairly straight forward to understand, but the processing of the frames is still a little complicated and remembering the steps is still not second nature.
I’m also still trying to get a good understanding of exposure adjusting the camera gain and exposure times. I’m sure that will come with practice like it did years ago in large format photography.

Our trip to Kitt Peak this year was a good visit but our time on the telescope was cancelled do to hardware failure. We have our reservations for 2011 already. The feeling of being on the mountain was exciting with being locked into the facility after closing and being able to wander where ever we wanted.

This shot was take from the walk way around the top of the 4.3 meter scope observatory. There are 27 telescopes on the mountain.

The McMath solar scope was down for server while we were there. The structure is huge. We plan on trying to get a better view of the facility next year.

With the revitalization in my Astronomy interest I find I need a place to ramble and take notes without annoying anyone on a public forum.

Our accumulated equipment includes:

• Meade 8” LX200 GPS
• Astro-Tech 72ED
• Lunt LS60THaDS50/B1200
• A collection of eye pieces from 6mm to 30mm both 1.25” and 2”
• Williams Optic Bino Viewer w 20mm eye pieces

Electronic Accessaries:

• Kendrick Dew Control items
• Shoestring Astronomy GPUSB
• Shoestring Astronomy DSUSB
• Elgato Video Capture adapter

Photography Equipment:

• Canon EOS T2i
• Orion Solitaire Guide Camera
• Homemade video capture camera

Astronomy/Imaging OS-X Software:

• Equinox 6
• Astroplanner
• Nebulosity
• Pixelmator
• Imagej

This list does not include the cases of miscellaneous pieces and parts and I’m sure that will continue to grow as we’ve proven over time to be collectors of items used in our hobbies and interests.

My goal is to record my learning experiences and as I explore astrophotography.