Bortal 8+ Imaging from West London

[susan-parker]

Seeing conditions where I live are less than ideal with very few stars being visible even on cloud-clear nights, however and perhaps because of this I am interested in "seeing" the stars that I cannot see by eye; to remind myself that they are actually there.

Attached is an example, taken with a monochrome Atik Horizon (original):

Orion Belt and M42/M43 Sword/Dagger Nebulae, with NGC-2024 Flame and IC-434 Horsehead also visible.

Stack of 174 frames = 23 minutes and 12 seconds total exposure, with stars down into magnitude 14 visible in the original image. Scale at 33% from original image.

Atik Horizon monochrome camera with Nikkor 105mm f/2.5 @ f/2.8 with IDAS D1 filter, High Gain, 8 seconds per exposure, sensor at -15C. Date 20/01/20 @ 20:15 to 20:41 GMT. Bortle 8+ zone.

[susan-parker]

The Orion Nebula region; with the main Orion nebula M42 centre with the adjoining M43 nebula, and the Running Man Nebula top left.

Stack of 213 frames with stars down to magnitude 15.

Tracking with a total 28 minutes 24 seconds exposure.

Some camera artefacts are visible in the background, e.g. horizontal lines from the sensor.

Atik Horizon monochrome camera with Tamron 500mm f/8 mirror lens, High Gain, 8 seconds per exposure, sensor at -15C. Date 29/12/19 @ 20:28 to 21:18 GMT. Bortle 8+ zone.

[susan-parker]

Test run: Some stars, somewhere up in the Aries / Triangulum region.

Stack of 203 frames = 27 minutes and 4 seconds total exposure, 33% scale of original.

Atik Horizon monochrome camera with Tamron 500mm f/8 mirror lens, High Gain, 8 seconds per exposure, sensor at -15C.
Date 20/01/20 @ 18:43 to 19:17 GMT. Bortle 8+ zone.

[CraigG]

Nice images, especially considering your Bortle zone. Thanks for sharing!
-Craig

[vince]

Hello Susan,

Very nice images, especially seeing as you are imaging from West London! Will we be seeing you at Astrofest next week?

The Horizontal bands could be caused by interference, feel free to send use some fits files into support@atik-cameras.com and we can look into this for you.

Best regards
Vince

[susan-parker]

Orion Belt and M42/M43 Sword/Dagger Nebulae, with NGC-2024 Flame and IC-434 Horsehead.

The atmospherics were challenging and this night there were hints of thin high-altitude cloud, the finer whispier details in the nebulae are not showing because of this.

I used a narrow band IDAS NB1 filter in conjunction with a blue then a red filter for two separate sequences of images:
Blue: Stack of 201 frames = 26 minutes and 48 seconds total.
Red: Stack of 206 frames = 27 minutes and 28 seconds total.
Green: Synthesized from the Red and Blue channels with Astronomy Tools in Photoshop.

Scale at 33% from original image.

Atik Horizon monochrome camera with Nikkor 105mm f/2.5 @ f/2.8 with IDAS NB1 filter and R60 and B12 filters, High Gain, 8 seconds per exposure, sensor at -15C.
Date 21/01/20 @ 19:55 to 20:56 GMT. Bortle 8+ zone.

[susan-parker]

A 1 to 1 crop of the M42/M43 and Running Man nebulae from the previous 33% scale image, less aggressively processed to preserve finer (of what there is) detail.

The blue rings around the brighter stars are from the out of focus red bandpass end, which was not completely cut off by the B12 filter (the 12 being a clue here). I will be getting proper narrow-band filters soon, but this is what I currently have to hand.

With the 105mm f/2.5 Nikkor lens the blue was focused on infinity, whereas the red had to be refocused to be a little closer (c. 150 feet?). The chromatic aberration of the lens really makes that much difference.

[susan-parker]

… and a 1 to 1 crop of the NGC-2024 Flame and IC-434 Horsehead nebulae from the previous 33% scale image.

[susan-parker]

The Orion M42/M43 and Running Man nebulae taken with my new William Optics "SpaceCat" telescope.

Stack of 921 frames from 970 total frames aquired = 122.8 minutes exposure.

Crop and 50% scale of the original (to meet 600KB file attacment limits). Some of the finer wispier details are lost in the JPEG compression.

Stars down to magnitude 16.85 (as per Stellarium).

Atik Horizon monochrome camera with William Optics "SpaceCat", Optolong 2" UHC filter, Dusk set at "High Gain", 8 seconds per exposure, sensor at -15C.
Date 01/02/20 @ 18:39 to 21:13 GMT. Bortle 8+ zone.

[CraigG]

Very nice Susan. Congratulations on the new SpaceCat!
-Craig

[vince]

Hello Susan,

It's good to see you got the Space Cat all connected up OK.

It's a great image

Vince

[susan-parker]

Thanks Craig and Vince

Here is one taken on the 6th Feb of Orion's Belt.

A stack of 432 frames, for 57.6 Minutes total exposure. Stars down into Magnitude 16. 33% scale of original image.

Atik Horizon monochrome camera, William Optics "SpaceCat", Optolong UHC filter, High Gain, 8 seconds per exposure, sensor at -15C. Date 06/02/20 @ 21:432 to 21:53 GMT.

[susan-parker]

From my previous Orion's Belt image; reprocessed and croped to focus on the Horsehead and Flame Nebulae next to Alnitak, with Alnilam upper-right.

The JPEG compression loses background detail so I have had to fettle the black-levels to made the nebulae detail more visible.

[susan-parker]

My first full seven L-R-G-B-SII-Ha-OIII filter test with my SpaceCat and Horizon.

About 30 frames per filter; each L-R-G-B at 8 seconds, and each SII-Ha-OIII at 30 seconds. Seeing conditions didn't allow for more frames as clouds came in.

I had problems with the filter wheel control not showing up in Dusk (or SharpCap), however I could control independantly with Filter Wheel Runner. In Dusk the filter wheel was showing as connected in settings. Not sure what the issue was, probably looking in wrong place.

Processed in Astro Pixel Processor and Photoshop.

[vince]

Morning Susan,

That's great! Especially given the short exposure time!

Let us know please if you continue to have filter wheel issues please. 

Best regards
Vince