Posts Made By: dietmar hager

hi guys,

actually this is my very fist attempt ever to utilize h-alpha data.
I have chosen M57 which I have recetnly imaged as an LRGB.

I was lucky to have one clear night for acquisition of H-alpha data.
3 hours h-alpha in 2x2 binning mode.
(I'd love to do that in 1x1 but weather is no partner here...)

as soon as weather improves, I'd like to do some more luminance with the 2x powermate and also I'd love to add much more h-alpha data.

data and all images (full size and an enlarged crop) are on my website.

I'd be greatful for any suggestions and comments on this one:
http://www.stargazer-observatory.com/m57.html

hi guys,

finally I got one more night for acquisition of h-alpha.
I now have 6 hours of 2x2 binned h-alpha data.
we are looking at 11.3 hours total exposure time.

please find time to take a look.
http://www.stargazer-observatory.com/m57.html

thanks

Hi friends of the celestial wonders,

…this is gonna take some time to read,…guys 

Let me present you my most recent result on a very fascinating planetary nebula, located in Cygnus.
Ngc 7008 is a gorgeous object for visual observation in a powerful telescope.
I used the 20“ dobsonian at high magnificiation and it reveals both, color and details to me.
So I decided to go for a considerable deep LRGB shot.
I was really very lucky this time, being spoiled with very decent seeing conditions in the very nigh I acquired luminance data.
Judging by the FWHM-values in the images I read 1.2 arc seconds. Judging by the eye (5“ TMB Apo f/9-high power) it was about 7-8/10.
Transparency was very cooperating as well, even though I saw some faint high athmospheric clouds wandering throuh a couple of my color frames…

As I started imaging 2 nights before luminance with RGB when seeing was less well, I did not want to exchange the setup in terms of utilizing the powermate barlow,…and of course 13m3 is not perfectly bright…so I just kept course and 2050mm primary focal length sustained.
We are looking at 70 minutes 1.2 hours luminance 1x1 binned; and 90 minutes 2x2 each color channel. ( 6 darks each)
Of course the telescope used fort his job was again my „big boy“, the 9“ f/9 TMB Apo.
Astroart4 served me well acquirering the data and for autoguiding.
Preprocessing was accomplished in Maxim dl, as well as alignment and sigma combined stacking. A wee bit of DDP finally.
Further preprocessing was done in CCD stack (deconvolution (pos contrain 3 times 40 iterations)), as well as registax.
PS CS2 and Pix Insight LE for postprocessing.

The „Fetus-Nebula“ is a fascinating object, as it holds a dark „amoeba-shape“ like cloud that is said to origin back ages ago when a seperate nova blew up that very region…good for us, as it gives much more contrast now…

Now go ahead and click „full size“.
You will find an interesting star field. It came to my attention when the first light frame was downloaded: do you notice? The field is split in two halfs…
The number of stars is not symmetrical in terms of densitiy. The PN lies exactly in the middle, deviding the field in two halfs.
Most likely there is a dust-cloud somewhere inbetween the PN and the CCD chip,…which happens to meet my expectations, as we look into the Cygnus-region, which is repleat with multiple dust-clouds…
I saw this in all frames, including the 2x2 binned RGB frames.

Now be encouraged to hit „enlarged crop“ please…cos’ I also want to navigate your attention to the nice narrow optical multiple star-systems at 7h00 very close to the bright yellowish star. For me as one of the „non-obstructed-apo-guys“ imaging with a „small“ optical system in comparison to the „huge light buckett“-people (don’t take that too seriously) it is most pleasing to find these little guys definitely split! Also at 12h00 is an extremly tight double-system,…and this is also indicated to be split…I have no exact data on these guys, but the distance cannot be much more than 1 arc second,…I believe it is below that…?
There are of course many more nice features in this object,…and also in the image, which makes me really very happy.
Take a look onto the region of the nebula at 11h00 on the egde of the nebula. There is small irregular shaped part which deserves to be noticed as well.

So, guys, I do hope you enjoy the „ride“!
Your comments are most appreciated.

http://www.stargazer-observatory.com/ngc7008.html

people, you really should take some more time to check this story, Tammy Plotner from Uiverse Today wrote on that little PN - it is most informative and worthwhile being read:
http://www.universetoday.com/2008/06/30/cosmic-mystery-ngc-7008-by-dietmar-hager/
best wishes,
Dietmar

Hi guys,

this is a preliminary view on a project I am currently running and I call this:
H-Alpha-OSC…as I used both, OSC from last year and HA from this season…
Last year I imaged M27 with the Starlight Xpress SXVF M25C, a one shot color CCD, attached to the „big boy“…the 9“ f/9 folded TMB Apo.

3.8 hours of total exposure time resulted in a nice overwiew.

I was planning on adding H-Alpha, Luminance and O3 as soon as possible.
Well, as weather was against my plans last year I had to wait…and so I commenced adding the requested data recently.
5.6 hours (2x2 binned) of H-Alpha was taken in 2 nights with Starlight Xpress SXVF H16.
I just played around a bit and blended this data in as both, luminance and additional partial information to the red-channel.
The image you will see is an interimistic „preliminary“ view of what is yet to „grow“ over the next weeks…
Next time I will add O3 (also 2x2 binned), and after that to achieve a nice pattern of tight stars I shall go for some 1x1 binned luminance.

When you click the link, please make sure to move the mouse over the small image, as this activates a roll-over effect with the HA-OSC image.

I did this a couple times with OSC and Luminance which happens to work very well.

Thanks for looking!

http://www.stargazer-observatory.com/M27-9.html

hi folks,

this time I present a very unusual and hardly known galaxy,...at least this is what I think, after searching for images on the web, taken by amateur-collegues.

well, this galaxy is quite huge (12.9 by 5.9 arc minutes) but brightness is extremly low!

the final result you will see is a collaboration between my observatory neighbourgh and close friend over more than 20 years Martin Winder
and me.
This would be Martin's website:
http://members.liwest.at/picard/

Martin used his 16" RC f/6.5 (2" starlight instruments reducer) and ST 10 for image acquisition:
lum in 1x1 color in 2x2 bin.
he also preprocessed the entire dataset (dark calibration, alignment, normalize and stacking)

then I came into the play, having some fun and also a bit of a hard time processing L,R,G and B. it was a challenge, as the object's data was vaguely some 140 counts above the background...

end of speach - here is the result, guys:
http://www.stargazer-observatory.com/ic-2574-martin.html

hey - who has ever imaged that guy?...
thanks for your comments!

hi guys,

here is another collaborative result from Austria:

Martin has collected some great data on the Keenan's system.
after dark-flat subtract, alignment and stacking conducted by Martin, I was privilegd to process the files.

here is all data and all the images FYI:

http://www.stargazer-observatory.com/5216-martin.html

let me also draw your attention to a fascinating artice written by Tammy Plotner from UT on this interactive pair:

http://tinyurl.com/6mfxgf

thanks for looking!

hi guys,

this is gonna be the last collaborational result I have to offer for a while..."flame out"...as we now have used up all data, Martin has acquired this year (february)...not much...? well, better than nothing.

NGC 4618+25 is a beautiful couple, and for some reason not very frequently attended by imagers,...why???

see here all data nd all images:
http://www.stargazer-observatory.com/4625-martin.html

please make sure to learn about that couple:
Tammy Plotner from UT has made great research on these 2 !
http://tinyurl.com/62jq2j

hope you enjoy,

hi guys,

recently I showed you my prelim. result on M27.
now I have some O3 in addtion to OSC and Ha.

what started last year in july, ended now...
when I still had my one shot color CCD (M25C) I collected some 3.8
hours of data in a night of not very good seeing last year..
in june and july 08 I acquired H-alpha and O3.
more than 12 hours total exposure time...phew - I think this gonna
become normal...

I think the image is deep in both, Ha and O3 now, and it is another
combination of different CCDs.
one shot and mono.

as for the sensitivity of CCD:
boy - that was a tremendous difference!
2.5 hours of O3 (2x2) showed much more data than 6 hours of Ha (2x2).
the SX H16 is very sensitive to green obviously, but way less
sensitive to red...unfortunately.
NP - it's just a matter of exp-time...*g*.
on the other hand - the 4021 chip is nice to handle, as it is qute
"calm"...
o.k. - end of speach - here we are:
http://www.stargazer-observatory.com/M27-9.html

thanks for looking.

hi guys,

I have been published as a feature here on Universe Today.
The story by Tammy Plotner is about some interesting multiple star-systems.
take a look!
http://www.universetoday.com/2008/08/04/the-colors-of-summer-albireo-and-ras-algethi-by-dietmar-hager/

besides the story, you can find all data on the images on my website:

www.stargazer-observatory.com

hi guys,

...I was lucky to get a bit deeper in this object in terms of the
dataset of H-alpha and O3.
(I had posted this recently - 12.3 hours)
seeing was not really good lately, but transparency was terrific!
I could improve the data in H-alpha and o3, consequently.
difference to the prior version is more depth, more clarity on the
features of the nebula and better colors,...I hope.
we are now looking at 13.8 hours of total exposure time - maybe this
will still grow...:


9" tmb apo f/6.8 (astrophysics reducer) july 07 and one shot color
M25C: 3.8 hours
9" tmb apo f/9 June and July 08 2x2 binned H-alpha (7hours) and 2x2
binned O3 (3 hours) monochromatic CCD H16.


so, different focal lengths, differene CCDs. all counts for the final
image.
OSC data was used for generaly color and luminance information.
h-alpha and o3 for both, color and lum.


here we are with the result:
http://www.stargazer-observatory.com/m27-ha-osc-o3-full.html


thanks for your thoughts, I hope you like this.