Posts Made By: Rick Krejci

I captured M57 last night. I wanted to get the envelope in "true color" and was surprised to see it come out mostly in Oiii. I hadn't seen this in any images before.

I used Ha to enhance the Luminance, but not the color at all, so the color is straight from the RGB.

Taken with my DSO 10" f/5 Newt and SXV-H9.

Full details and full res view here:
http://www.ricksastro.com/DSOs/M57DSO.shtml

Rick Krejci

Wanted to try to boost the FL of my 10" f/5 Newt up, so I tried a 1.5x Telecentric barlow...worked like a champ! With the SXV-H9, I'm getting about .69 arcsec/pixel at 1900mm fl...about as high as my seeing would ever allow.

Tried it with M27 narrowband to see if I could get reasonable images through narrowband filters at the slower f/ratio...

For full res and details (as well as Ha and OIII B&W images), go to my webpage:
http://www.ricksastro.com/DSOs/m27HaOiii.shtml

Was able to take advantage of another clear night Friday. I accumulated 3.5
hours of data (with only 4 hours of darkness here in Michigan). I had never
imaged the Iris Nebula and it had always fascinated me, so I pointed my 10"
Newt in that direction. Seeing was average early on and improved as the
evening wore on.

I processed this one a little darker than many I've seen...I wanted to make
it more to the rich and creamy side than bold and chewy. I've never
experienced an area of the sky so rich in subtle hues. What I assumed was
chrominance noise or defects for the most part turned out to be real
features...really cool!

Details here:
http://www.ricksastro.com/DSOs/ngc7023_iris.shtml

Regards,

Rick Krejci

I just got an SXV-H16 this weekend from Starlight Xpress to put through the wringer.

I wanted to start out easy, so I used my TMB80 with TV 0.8x
reducer/flattener...handled the wide chip with no issues and is a generous 4 arcsec/pixel. I could easily get 4 minute subs unguided with the NJP (yes, just with the polar scope alignment).

Anyway, here's the details and full res image:
http://www.ricksastro.com/DSOs/cocoon-h16.shtml

Terry worked his magic even on this Kodak chip. While each
subexposure is not quite as noiseless as the H9, it's pretty darned close. Close enough no not require darks! Conditions were so-so, with no clouds but below par transparency.

It's a 2048x2048 square chip, but I cropped my image due to some manual "dithering" between some exposures as well as making a better composition. I like the square chip in that it gives you flexibility in composition and maximizes the distortion-free area of a scope.

Great characteristics from this camera. I'll have to tell you,
knowing that this chip has similar inherent characteristics as the ST2000's 2020 chip, I was skeptical if I could get away without darks, but the results proved it was no problem. The specs say 40C cooling.

The <3 second download times of a 4 Mpix image is nothing short of amazing! This thing can fill up your harddrive like there's no tomorrow.

I'll try narrowband once I get the filters which are backordered from AVA...that will be the true test of the cameras noise characteristics.

Questions and comment welcome.

Rick Krejci

Here's a Veil I shot on Monday Night...very hot and Hazy here in MI (85F at midnight with 75F dewpoint!)

This was taken with the new SXV-H16...no smoothing or blurring of any kind was done to the luminance fir this image. Not bad for such a warm evening! I'm still working on getting the camera chip flat...I tightened up the adjustment screws on the camera, so hopefully next time I won't have the uneven distortion in the corners.

Sorry about the Diffraction Spikes, Rolando

Full details and Full resolution here:
http://www.ricksastro.com/DSOs/veil_ngc6992_h16.shtml

Rick

With the moon finally at bay, I was able to get a few good nights on a
target I hadn't visited in a while. Once again, used the SXV-H16 and
the 10" Newt with MPCC corrector. Still have a small tilt in the
camera. (upper-right and lower left bloated), but I'm getting there.
It has adjustment screws, but with a square sensor, getting the correct
orientation isn't as easy as one might think.

Also, just got the Moonlite focuser stepper motor and got it working
with focusmax...autofocusing worked great! Beats getting bitten by
mosquitoes while trying to move the focuser fractions of a millimeter...

Full res and details here:
http://www.ricksastro.com/DSOs/N6960_wveil.shtml

Rick Krejci

Was able to get a few more hours of clear sky last night. Seeing was
crappy, but I used the 10" Newt and SXV-H16 anyway.

I just had time to get the luminance of this very cool area. The large
chip allowed me to get 7331 and the quintet in a single frame, and with
good resolution despite seeing.

Full res and details here:
http://www.ricksastro.com/DSOs/deerlick.shtml

Rick Krejci

Jake,

Fantastic image...it's hard for me to fathom it was taken through a $600 (mount included) telescope. Simply amazing!

As to the dist question...I'll let the pro's here address that...

Rick

Alen Chen (http://www.heavenlyview.com/newh9cimages.htm) has one and has been doing great stuff with it! I have the non-color version of the SXV-H9 and am a true believer of the Sony chips...I haven't taken a dark frame since getting one...not even close to a need for one. And extremely low read noise allowing shorter exposures.

Rick Krejci
http://www.ricksastro.com/

Nice detail, Mark! Like Brian, I'm curious about the cooling. I live in Phoenix, so 32-34C ambient is the rule right now.

Looks like your green channel needs a boost.

Rick