Posts Made By: Jim Thommes

I will be getting back to images taken with the Artemis camera soon, but I wanted to process a batch of data from earlier sessions with my ToUcam. Here is M10 the second globular on this session in Ophiuchus (M9 was posted earlier). I have attached a mid size thumbnail. A full size image and exposure / processing details are at:

http://jthommes.com/Astro/M10.htm

Scope was my C8 at f/5, Camera was my ToUcam SC3
Total exposure time was about 22 minutes

I've been out for a bit...You people have sure been posting many great images - congrats. I thought I would jump into the party again with a late season M101...

I took some exposures of M101 in late May and I have now processed them. The exposures were made with the Artemis285 Camera. I have attached a mid size thumbnail, but a full size image as well as exposure and processing details can be accessed at:

http://jthommes.com/Astro/M101.htm

Scope was my C8 at f/4.4 and the camera is of course the Artemis285

Here is an image of NGC6992 taken with the Artemis Camera.

Exposure was 50 minutes 16:16:6:6:6 Lum:HA:R:G:B. 8x120 L, 4x240 HA, 6x60 RGB

A full size image as well as exposure and processing details can be accessed here:

http://jthommes.com/Astro/NGC6992.htm

The Scope was my Megrez II at f/3.9 Camera was the Artemis. I used a Celestron f/6.3 focal reducer - interestingly enough this produced round stars over the full frame. No edge star coma repair was applied.

This image utilized HAlpha exposures in the Luminance construction to improve star size and to improve contrast on the nebula.

Here is an image of M5 taken in early June. I have attached a mid size thumbnail. A full size image as well as exposure and processing details are at:

http://jthommes.com/Astro/m5.htm

Scope was my C8 at f/6 and the camera is the Artemis285. The focal reducer is the Celestron f/.63.

Exposure was 34 minutes 16:6:6:6 L:R:G:B.

Here is an image of the Lagoon Nebula. I have attached a mid size thumbnail, but it is really best to see the full size/resolution image (and processing / exposure details) at:

http://jthommes.com/Astro/Lagoon.htm

Scope was my Megrez II at f/4.2. The camera was the Artemis285.

Exposure was 20:10.5:6:6:6 HA:L:R:G:B. The HA was 4 min subs

I usually frequent the *other* CCD forum (DSOs), but I did have a chance to observe the impact and I thought I would share my results here....

Like Stefan I also found the calibration challenging even from frame to frame the same evening.

There is a rather large animated Gif of an 18 image sequence. Beware, it is about 6 Megabytes. It can be accessed here:

http://jthommes.com/MiscAstro/Archives/images/DImpact-Tempel1WF-C_JThommes_03_Jul_2005.gif

These images were taken in 3 minute intervals (3x50 second stacks) between 5:46UT 4 Jul and 6:44UT 4 Jul. During this time I had observed the peak reading for the comet starting at about 980 and peaking at about 2800 on the Artemis285 camera (Used the focus aid to get these readings). These images are of course stretched a bit for visual purposes, but I did try to calibrate all the frames to a constant peak for the star GSC 5546:1406 (the star between the two brighter stars upper left of the comet). This calibration was the best I could do to keep the visualization constant. Part of the difficulty is that at the end of the sequence, I was shooting very low to the horizon and that tended to interfere with some haze and star bloating.

I think the images tend to show brightening of the comet peaking in the 4th or 5th frame and then holding

This data was captured with my C8 SCT on a GEM mount. The camera was the Artemis285. Filters were for broadband visual light.

I have been away for a while and I thought I would check back in with this post of a late season NGC2403...

It was low in the sky on the evening in question (early June). I have attached a mid size thumbnail. A full size wide field image as well as exposure and processing details can be accessed at:

http://jthommes.com/Astro/NGC2403.htm

Scope was my C8 at f/3.1 Camera was the Artemis285.

Exposure was 18:6:6:6 (L:R:G:B). six subframes each RGB was binned 2x2

While you are at my site you might look at another galaxy taken in early May (also a challenging low altitude object for my latitude) this image was taken with my ToUcam SC3 - it can be accessed here:

http://jthommes.com/Astro/NGC2997.htm

...falls short of the Artemis.

This is NGC 4566, a dim but loose globular cluster. I have attached a mid size thumbnail, but a full size image with exposure and processing data can be accessed at:

http://jthommes.com/Astro/NGC5466.htm

Look in the upper right corner for a couple of dim PGC galaxies.

Scope was my C8 at f/7.3, the camera was an Artemis285.

Exposure was 6x180 : 6x60 (L : RGB) Luminance was 1x1 binned RGBs were 2x2 binned. Total exposure time was 36 minutes.

Here is an emission nebula located in Cygnus near the Northern Cross. Only references I found for it are Lynd's Bright Nebulae 168 or Cederblad 173. I have attached a midsize thumbnail, but a full size image as well as exposure and processing details can be accessed at:

http://jthommes.com/Astro/LBN168.htm

Scope was my C8 at f/4.8, Camera was the Artemis285

Total exposure time is 59 minutes.

Tyler had recently posted a great close up of M27. I had recently exposed this object and got some H-Alpha exposures on it as well. I used the H-Alpha to combine in with the luminance. I thought it gave some contrast to the red. I wish I could have captured more of the subtle greens.

I have attached a midsized thumbnail, but a full size image as well as exposure and processing details can be accessed at:

http://jthommes.com/Astro/Dumbell.htm

Take a look at the full size image by clicking the image on the above page (which is displayed at 800x600 instead of the full 1392x1040).

Scope was my C8 at f/10, Camera was the Artemis285

Total exposure time was 52 minutes