Posts Made By: Michael Sandy

One word - impressive!

Hi John,

Question is.....is this your passion, or are you just wanting to try imaging with a CCD?

If you just want to try it out - find a club or hook up with an established imager. Then you could borrow equipment and see if you like it - better yet rent some time with Arnie (Rent-a Scope) and really give it a go with big time gear. If you are your basic equipment junkie (I should be in a 12 step program to deal with my equipment addiction) all that stuff won't be very satisfying - cause you want to own and set-up the equipment. If that is true - find a cheap camera (like an older ST7 mono - about $600-800) and start to learn, if you don't like it you can always sell the camera again. Or you can pick up a Cannon Rebel and get you feet wet that way. Your mount is likely undersized......but you can get an image, with it and see if you enjoy doing it. As another cheap option, try a webcam and do some planetary work. Just remember that in addition to the camera - you need software, and that can be an expensive piece of the puzzle.

If this is something that you really want to get into, and you want to produce images like Rob Gendler (or some of the other imagers out there) - brace yourself, because it is going to cost some money. But once you get over the initial sticker shock.....it is not THAT bad compared to other hobbies (think about buying a boat, race car, motorcycle, even the cost of a shotgun and a years worth of sporting clays). You already have a GREAT scope, but you'll need to upgrade your mount, buy a cooled camera, add a stack of software, and spend years learning how to make it all work. You can do it in stages.....or you can take the big jump now - but you will have several false starts and adjustments to make to your equipment as you learn.

I don't want to discourage you, but you also need to understand that this is a remarkably difficult hobby. Don't expect to add a camera and start producing stunning images overnight - it will be a challenge to even get an object on the chip for the first couple of evenings......and then you want to try to get that object focused. If after all this, the cost doesn't scare you off and the challenge makes you want to get started tonight - you may have found a hobby. Start your equipment savings account right now - you're going to need it.

Another one of your excellent images! As you know, M-101 is a pretty challenging object - with very subtle color changes from the core to the arms. You've processed it well, and I really like the detail you've captured in the dusk lanes - very nice.

I'm short a lot of exposure time on mine - only about 60 minutes of luminous data and very short on the color channels, but the skies are clear tonight and I'm collecting photons as I type.....so I'll just have to wait and see.

All the best to you!

Hi Keith,

The real answer is "depends".......how bright is your target, what type camera are you using, and what are your other conditions (like skyglow). There isn't just one answer to your questions - but there have been some papers written (and arguements over the conclusions) on the subject.

If your stars aren't saturated - longer subs are going to be better......but past a certain point, not much better than just using more but shorter subexposures (are your confused yet?) Here is a write-up on the subject if you love the math......or just use John Smith's (CCDWare) calculator (as other's have suggested). The real object is to get the best data for your conditions and equipment......and to do that you just have to try different things and see what works best.

I've spent some time reprocessing the two images I posted this week-end. Here is the M-81 and M-82. The challenge with this one is getting balance between smoothing out M-81 and bringing out the details of M-82. So this one has been worked over a bit......but is it better?

The clouds rolled in Friday and are still out there so I didn't get much more data - other than a little more Blue (which I needed). So I reprocessed the data, worked to improve registration, and tried to bring out the detail a bit. I think it is improved, but I'd appreciate your comments.

Very nice Tom! I hope its everything you are looking for - I enjoy your images are as they are, can't imagine how they could get much better. I'm guessing you'll find a way though.

All the best!

Hi Greg,

If you are anything like me, you'll start posting your images before you "master" the processing. 8) Processing seems to be a continuous learning cycle.

Nice observatory!

Have you tried CCDInspector? That software may be helpful.

That is truly an excellent image - you've got to love that FOV, and your composition really works for me. It is hard to imagine what you could do with an STL-11k!

Very well done!!