Sunday, March 25, 2012

My buddy Rick says the blog is lacking in photos of

Me doing my thing, lol. Here is a pic of equipment in use during yesterday's session. And the better side of yours truly. Thanks Rick for coming over, you will have to come back when the sun is really spitting some plasma!

Saturday, March 24, 2012

Solar imaging 3-24-12 between 1900-2200ut

Had some time off today and cooperative weather for once. Did some solar imaging despite the fact that the sun was being a bit boring today. Nevertheless, my buddy Rick came over to see what it was all about. After plowing through the data, here are some composites from today. As usual, equipment is a single-stack, tilt-tuned Lunt 60 hydrogen alpha telescope with a tucsen and mallincam for imagers. Enjoy!











Friday, March 2, 2012

First crack at the whirlpool, m51

Celestron Nexstar 8SE in stock alt-az configuration. Mallincam Color Hyper with TEC on, 128x sens-up and 14' integration. Appx. 0300UT, Very humid with 62.3% lunar illumination. Orange zone LP. 25x14' exposures, stacked in DSS and processed in photoshop for levels/curves/exp./mids, etc... Astro Tools action panel also used.




Not bad for first crack at it, especially with thick humid air, orange zone, and moon illumination. I can't wait to try again at a real dark sky site.