Bortal 8+ Imaging from West London

[susan-parker]

... and this is the starting point with the output from Astro Pixel Processor with a 10926 x 3723 pixel 32bit floating-point greyscale image (scaled to 22.5%).

There is about a 1.1° tilt as the camera is not perfectly aligned with the equatorial plane.

The dark band at the top is an artefact from the Horizon Sensor, which I assume could be ironed out with some lights (I now have a light-source so making some "lights" is on my "ToDo" list)?

Horizon sensor is at -15°C (down from about +22 to +24°C when I turn the camera on).

[susan-parker]

My current campaign; Algieba in the constellation of Leo.

A stack of 1690 frames collected over four nights (10th, 11th, 13th, and 14th April).

The NGC3226 and NGC3227 galaxies to the left are clearly visible smudges, other galaxy smudges are (just) discernable.

Pic is a 1 to 1 pixel crop from the original, with stars down to magnitude 16.5 (the final fractions depending on the star colour).

This is a R-L-B stack, where the Super-Luminance is used for the Green Channel, and the Red and Blue are as shot.

High Gain (30) with RGB filters at 8 seconds, L at 2.5 seconds, per frame. I am running the Dusk filter sequence at 50 frames per filter, and repeating the RGB sequence 4 times. So when the cloud comes, I still have some reasonable balance of frames acquired.

Although I have made adjustments, I have not specifically boosted the overall gain of the image (Photoshop "Levels").

William Optics SpaceCat, EFW2.2 with Atik filters, Horizon mono camera; processed with Astro Pixel Processor, Photoshop CS6, and DxO PhotoLab 3.

[CraigG]

Nice Susan!
- Craig

[susan-parker]

The Leo Triplet / M66 Group.

Combined stacks from the 19th and the 20th, with stars down into magnitude 16 and some structure visible in M65 and M66 as well as the band in the Hamburger.

1250 frames: 150 + 200 frames each from R, G, B, filters, and 200 for the L filter.

High Gain (30) with RGB filters at 8 seconds, and the L at 2.5 seconds, per frame.

This is another R-SL-B stack, where the Super-Luminance of all frames shot including Green is used for the Green Channel, and the Red and Blue are as shot.

This is a 33% scale from the original, with most of the frame (I only cropped the raged edges of the stack).

William Optics SpaceCat, EFW2.2 with Atik filters, Horizon mono camera; processed with Astro Pixel Processor and Photoshop CS6.

[susan-parker]

... and a 1 to 1 crop of the Leo Triple.

Given how noisy the atmosphere is I am pleased to see some structural detail.

[susan-parker]

New campaign:

Markarian’s Chain including Messier galaxies M84 and M86, with M88 towards the top left and M87 a bit below centre left.

33% scale from the original, with stars & galaxies down into magnitude 16.

800 frames: 200 frames each from R, G, B, filters, and 200 for the L filter. High Gain (30) with RGB filters at 8 seconds and the L at 2.5 seconds per frame.

R-SL-B stack; Super-Luminance of all frames shot including Green is used for the Green Channel, and the Red and Blue are as shot.

William Optics SpaceCat, EFW2.2 with Atik filters, Horizon mono camera; processed with Astro Pixel Processor and Photoshop CS6.

[susan-parker]

Crop and 50% scale of the previous Markarian’s Chain image.

Messier M88 top left and M87 bottom left.

There are numerous galaxies in these images.

M88 top left is the only one with a hint of structure.

In M86 one can just see the much smaller and fainter NGC-4406B galaxy as a point of light (magnitude 14.3).

[susan-parker]

... and here is the 50% scale image annotated with the Galaxy IDs - 37 of them.

[susan-parker]

The latest version of the Leo Triplet - crop and 50% scale  from the original.

Combined images from 5 sessions on the 19th, 20th, 21st, 22nd, and 25th April, giving a total of 520 minutes exposure.

The structure is better defined in both M65 and M66, and the band in the Hamburger is a bit sharper.

Stars down into magnitude 17.

R-SL-B stack, where the Super-Luminance of all frames shot including Green is used for the Green Channel, and the Red and Blue are as shot.

William Optics SpaceCat, EFW2.2 with Atik filters, Horizon mono camera; processed with Astro Pixel Processor and Photoshop CS6.

[CraigG]

Very nice Susan!

Craig

[susan-parker]

I have been having a go at reprocessing one of my first narrow-band filter imaging campaigns of the Orion Nebula with my current SpaceCat setup (EFW2.2 filter wheel, full set of Atik filters, Horizon mono camera).

Frames were taken over two sessions at the beginning of March 2020 using Dusk for the capture. 30 seconds per frame on high-gain (30x), for 478 frames in total.

For this version I have used the traditional Hubble Pallet with the Sulphur II image to the red channel (R), the Hydrogen-alpha image to the green channel (G), and the Oxygen III image to the blue channel (B).

This assignment produces an image with an overall green hue; so I toned down the green and increased the strength of the other two colours by lowering the x value of the G channel to 0.2 and increasing the x value of the B and R channels to 1.100.

Stacked in Astro Pixel Processor, with further processing in PhotoShop and DxO PhotoLab3, as well as additional Topaz Labs AI sharpening.

This is a crop and 50% scale of the original image, which is showing considerably more detail than I have managed to achieve previously.

[susan-parker]

The Eagle Nebula aka Messier 16 open-cluster in the centre of the image, with a glowing cloud called Sharpless 2-54 above.

From last night as an opportunity imaging with narrow-band filters only, and still with several percent cloud cover, so rather noisy.

Due to set-up issues with the Dusk acquisition software (which was dropping every other frame) I only got 104 frames, plus there was an issue with guiding which spoilt a number more.

104 frames, 30 seconds each: 40 frames SII, 40 frames Ha, 24 frames OIII

This area is full of comparatively faint gas clouds swaddling the clusters, so the background "noise" is in part from this.

This image is a 33% scale of the original, with stars down into magnitude 15.

[susan-parker]

... and a 1 to 1 crop of the Eagle Nebula with "The Pillars of Creation" clearly visible.

And yes, this is ONLY from my own data taken last night; must have hit a sweet spot in the Horizon camera's image levels.

[susan-parker]

Despite the Clear-Outside weather forecast being in the Red, I was able to get a further 180 frames of my M16 Eagle Nebula campaign last night; stars now down well into magnitude 15.

[vince]

Hi Susan,

Those are great images especially from London!

M16 is too low for me in Norfolk.

Vince