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Monday, January 30, 2012

"What?" Project finalized



"?"


Image in HST-palette from ionized elements, Red=Sulfur, Green=Hydrogen & Blue=Oxygen. 
North is Right. Click for a large image!

I shot data for ionized Sulfur and Oxygen last night and now I can compose a three channel RGB-image.
This cosmic question mark, in constellation Cepheus, contains following objects; At top, Cederblad 214(Ced 214) surrounded by NGC 7822, a dot like nebula at the bottom is known as Sharpless 170,(Sh2-170). Image spans over Five degrees vertically. Distance from my observatory, is ~2750 light years and it spans about 40 light years.

Total exposure time is about 9h with an ultra fast Canon EF 200mm f1.8 optics and the QHY9 astronomical camera.

EDIT.

This image get selected as a Space Picture of the Week by the National Geographic magazine. 
You can see the story HERE




Couple of closeups to show the resolution
Not bad for a 200mm camera lens





A natural color composition
From emission of ionized elements

Narrow band channels combined to a visual spectrum, R=Hydrogen + Sulfur, G=Oxygen and 
B=Oxygen + Hydrogen. North is Right.
Note! 
A gray circle, at top Right, shows the apparent size of the full Moon.
(Moon has an angular size of 30', that's 0,5 degrees)


Technical details:

Processing work flow:
Image acquisition, MaxiDL v5.07.
Stacked and calibrated in CCDStack2.
Levels, curves, color and mosaic combine in PS CS3.

Optics, Canon EF 200mm camera lens at f1.8
Camera, QHY9
Guiding, Meade LX200 GPS 12" and a Lodestar guider
Image Scale, ~5,5 arcseconds/pixel
Exposures, Baader 7nm H-a, 13x1200s + 10x900s = 7h
O-III 1h and S-II 1h, total 9 hours.
Calibration with Darks, Flats and Bias frames.




Sunday, January 29, 2012

What?


"?"

A gray scale image of the Hydrogen alpha emission line. Click for a large image!

For a long time we have had clear weather, freezing too. I have spent couple of night shooting some new material. This cosmic question mark, in constellation Cepheus, contains following objects; At top, Cederblad 214 (Ced 214) surrounded by NGC 7822, a dot like nebula at the bottom is known as Sharpless 170,(Sh2-170).  Image spans about three and half degrees vertically. 

Total exposure time is about 7h with an ultra fast Canon EF 200mm f1.8 optics and the QHY9 astronomical camera. I'll shoot other channels, emission of Oxygen and Sulfur, later, for a color image.


Technical details:

Processing work flow:
Image acquisition, MaxiDL v5.07.
Stacked and calibrated in CCDStack2.
Levels, curves, color and mosaic combine in PS CS3.

Optics, Canon EF 200mm camera lens at f1.8
Camera, QHY9
Guiding, Meade LX200 GPS 12" and a Lodestar guider
Image Scale, ~4,5 arcseconds/pixel
Exposures, Baader 7nm H-a, 13x1200s + 10x900s
Calibration with Darks, Flats and Bias frames.


Monday, January 23, 2012

Large print out of the Cygnus nebulae




A framed photograph of the Cygnus Nebulae and my beautiful wife, Anna, as a scale.

The size of the picture is 100 x 170cm (39,4 x 67 inch). It has been printed on acid free premium satin photo paper with a HP Z3200, 12 color, photo printer. I'm very happy with the quality of the print. Original file is so large and detailed, that the image is very sharp and all the stars are absolute pinpoints from edge to edge. I have calculated, that I can print out a sharp copy at size of about 3 x 5m, if I want!

I found the frame, seen in the picture, from a local Framing shop, it's an old, late 1800, gilded wooden frame. The print is then made to match to sizes of the frame. The result looks like an old Baroque painting.

Original image, in the picture above, can be found here with technical details:


Ps.
The frame and framing are bought from Taide ja Kehys Jokela.
The print job is done by the Artwall.




Sunday, January 22, 2012

A panorama from Simeis 147 to IC 405 & 410




Panoramic image from a constellation Taurus

A three panel mosaic in HST-palette from  ionized elements, Red=Sulfur, Green=Hydrogen & Blue=Oxygen. North is Right.

Image above spans about ten degrees, 600', sky horizontally, that's an area of 20 full Moons side by side. 
At Left, a supernova remnant Simeis 147 (Sharpless 240). IC 405 and 410 can be seen at Right. I shot three relatively short exposures for the panorama, about an hour each, since I had shot both main objects earlier at Autumn 2011, with much longer integration time. (Technical details can be seen at end of this post.)
Total exposure time for Hydrogen alpha alone is about 20h.


Panorama as a natural color composition

Narrowband channels combined to a visual spectrum, R=Hydrogen + Sulfur, G=Oxygen and B=Oxygen + Hydrogen. Image is in real orientation in the sky, North is up.


Technical details:

Processing work flow:
Image acquisition, MaxiDL v5.07.
Stacked and calibrated in CCDStack2.
Levels, curves, color and mosaic combine in PS CS3.

Optics, Canon EF 200mm camera lens at f1.8
Camera, QHY9
Guiding, Meade LX200 GPS 12" and a Lodestar guider
Image Scale, ~4,5 arcseconds/pixel
H-a for three panels 3h.

Exposures for the Simeis 147

H-alpha 34x900s, Binned 1x1
H-alpha 14x1800s, Binned 1x1
Total exposure time for Hydrogen alpha is ~13h
O-III & S-II channels are from an older image, it can be seen here

Exposures for IC 405 & 410

New exposures H-alpha 13x900s,
S-II and O-III information are from an older image

Total exposure time for Hydrogen, ~20h