Deep Sky Archives - Page 3 of 33

March 26, 2023March 26, 2023

3/25/2023 A Night at the Observatory

After waking up at 2:30 AM for no good reason and painting some walls Saturday, I headed to the River Ridge Observatory after dinner to do some imaging. I switched my 11″ SCT to f/1.9 and started with a dual narrowband NBZ filter for a few hours before switching to a broadband light pollution filter.

I started with the Flame and Horsehead nebulas in Orion. As mentioned, this is a dual narrowband view but there was precious little Oxygen III around so it is mostly monochromatic. Something like 80 60-second images stacked together and processed in Photoshop.

Then it was time for the primary target, M81 and M82 in Ursa Major. First, I shot the scene with the dual narrowband for an hour to bring out the red in the smaller M82. Then I switched to the light pollution filter and shot another hour. Two hours is not really enough but by this time I had been up for close to 24 hours and two hours was all I had to give. Processed each separately, then combined and tweaked a little more.

M81 is spiral galaxy, of course, while M82 is a “starburst” galaxy. They are actually close to each other and the larger galaxy’s gravity has caused the starburst activity seen in the other.

March 12, 2023March 12, 2023

3/12/2023 The Andromeda Galaxy do over

I took this image in the summer of 2021. It remains the best shot of the Andromeda Galaxy I’ve ever taken, until this coming summer at least. I decided to reprocess it today. The differences are small but the core is not blown out this time. Also, last time I had issues with the satellite galaxies and ultimately left them out, this time they are okay.

The original can be found here.

March 5, 2023March 5, 2023

3/5/2023 Melotte 15 – Center of the Heart Nebula

Technically, I think Melotte 15 is the star cluster here that is carving the nebulosity that you see from the larger Heart Nebula (here) but I think most people think of this nebulosity when they hear the name.

This was taken Saturday night at the River Ridge Observatory under a nearly full moon. The scope was pointed away from the Moon and I used a dual narrowband filter to reduce it’s impact. I had just swapped out my Hyperstar adapter with the secondary mirror and returned to imaging in a more conventional way, albeit with a 0.63 reducer/corrector. F/6.3 and focal length of 1760mm instead of f/1.9 and 530mm. 28 5 minute subs went into this image, stacked with DSS and processed in Photoshop.

I also used the evening to test a new power supply. You’ve heard of Jackery and Bluetti. They have entry level models with about 250 WHrs for about $250. I couldn’t justify that as I almost always have electricity handy. Then I saw an ad from Walmart for their Onn house brand offering a 220 Whr power supply for $99. I got one and after it arrived and I had a chance to check it out, ordered another. One powered the mount, the dew straps, and the camera for four hours using up just over 50% of capacity. I did not include my laptop because I did not yet have a way to run it off of 12V. I think the two will be more than enough to run everything all night if I find myself without electricity like at a dark site.