Posts Made By: Taylor Chonis

Hi. I am sure there will be many more of these coming up here in the next couple hours, but this is my shot at tonights lunar eclipse. It is a 10 second exposure from Lincoln, NE taken with my Takahashi FSQ106N and Extender-Q yielding 850mm FL with a Canon 10D sitting atop a Celestron CGE mount (its been resized for posting). Taken at about 9:35 PM. Enjoy!

Taylor

Here's my latest

M35 & NGC2158
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Date: March 6 & 11, 2007
Location: Lincoln, NE (Miller Observatory)
Telescope: Takahashi FSQ106N
Mount: Celestron CGE
Camera: SBIG ST-2000XM, Astrodon I-Series Filters
LRGB. Exposure: 25:15:15:15 min. L Subframes = 5 min. binned 1x1, RGB Subframes = 3 min.binned 2x2. Total = 1.17 hrs.
Processing: All reduction and combining performed with AIP4Win. Processing, including Russ Croman's Gradient Xterminator, was performed in Photoshop CS.

Enjoy!

Taylor

Hi All. Attached is my newest image that I have completed in collaboration with Tom Miller. We have been imaging Markarian's Chain for about a month or so now on our clear nights (that are few and far between which is why this has taken a month!). We have gone pretty deep for this region. I am surprised to find that Markarian's chain is imaged relatvely unoften. I am happy with this image and I have found it very challenging! The image acqusistion was done by Tom and I did the Processing. This is a relativly colorless region due to all of the elliptical galaxies (which are typically yellow/red due to all of the old stars), but color can be seen on some of the galaxies. There are alot of galaxies in this field! Below are the image specs:

Markarian's Chain
Takahashi Epsilon 250 Astrograph
Software Bisque Paramount ME
SBIG STL-11000M
Astrodon I Series LRGB Filters
Taken from March 11 - April 7, 2008
Total Exposure Time: 17.8 hrs! (maybe a bit overkill, but it cant hurt)
L - 9 hrs, R - 3 hrs, G - 2 hrs, B - 3.8 hrs
Image reduction in AIP4Win and CCDSoft
Processing in Adobe Photoshop CS (with Russ Croman's Gradient Xterminator)

Enjoy! Comments/Compliments Appreciated!

Taylor Chonis
http://www.angelfire.com/stars5/tschonis

Hello All,

So this might be slighly off topic, but I dont know where else on A-mart to post this question. This is directed to anyone that lives in or around Tucson, AZ. I am a student and currently working at NOAO in Tucson for the summer. I decided to take advantage of the clear skies here in AZ and I brought my CCD imaging rig. I was wondering if anyone knows of any observing locations around Tucson that I could go to (Other than Kitt Peak or Mt. Lemmon of course; I am hoping for something slightly closer to town since Ill often be using it on week nights). Since I have no generator, AC power is a must. Any one have any suggestions? Thanks for you help and sorry if this was off topic.

Clear Skies to All,

Taylor

Hi All,

I am helping an older fellow set up an upgraded 16" LX200-ACF in his observatory. He currently has a ~15 yr old classic 16" LX200 whose electronics were recently zapped (as such, the mount no longer functions). He is using this unfortunate event as an opportunity to upgrade. The telescope is currently mounted in his observatory on the Meade equatorial pier. He wishes to mount the new LX200-ACF on this same pier, so before he makes the purchase, I just want to make sure for him that the bolt pattern on the bottom of the new LX200-ACFs has not changed since the classic LX200 versions of the 90s. If anyone knows the answer to this, I would appreciate confirmation. Thanks!

Taylor

Thanks for the comments. I thought the green channel needed some more work too, but I was having some trouble with my stars coming out green because I had more counts on the green image than the others for some reason. I am going to rework it and lower the saturation a bit. Anyhow, the peace and quiet was not too hard to come by. No one lives in our fraternity house during the summer except the rush chairs, so as a rush chair, I only had to deal with 2 other guys. Now if it was during the school year, I wouldnt dare bring a 4000 instrument into the house. TOo much crazy stuff goes on! Anyhow, I was also impressed with the quality of this image even though it was in downtown. Light pollution or not, the DSI Pro performs well! Thanks again.

Taylor

This is a shot or M42 I just took. Why do these dark columns show up? Is there something wrong with the camera or the chip or something? That is my only solution to this is that something with the camera is not correct. Please, any thoughts?

Taken with a STL11000M, 10 sec. exposure, auto contrast.

Ha! Forgot the image! Sorry. Here it is!

And here is the 7 hrs of H-alpha data.

Taylor